RobMalanowski.com

Mailbox is a terrible idea

2013-02-24T03:01:00-06:00

After waiting in line behind 119,000 people, my Mailbox account was activated. Waiting for those 119,000 people gave me some time to really think about the app, however. It gave me the time to realize that the app is not a good idea for anyone. Let me explain.

The main feature of Mailbox is the ability to get to Fake Inbox Zero by "snoozing" your emails. This is also it's very worst feature.

Suppose you are Mr. Super Important Email Man, and you get a cool 500 emails per day. Fake Inbox Zero sounds great, doesn't it?

Math Time

I'm going to be generous here, and assume that you can reasonably handle 70% of your email¹ to start off. At the end of Day One, you will have 150 emails left in your inbox. Snooze time! You (not so) wisely snooze those 150 emails until tomorrow, so you can enjoy Fake Inbox Zero for a moment.

Day Two

Since you're Super Important, another 500 emails are delivered to you. The 150 snoozed emails from Day One are also back, bringing your total to an unhealthy 650 emails. We already determined that processing 350 emails is about where you top out. That means you'll process 350 emails on Day Two, but you'll have to snooze 300 emails.

Day Three

500 emails. 300 from yesterday's snooze-binge. That's 800 total, 350 processed, and a whopping 450 snoozed.

Fast forward to Day 21

Your inbox explodes from the weight of the 3,500 emails delivered to it. You look at it, think about the fruitlessness of processing a measly 10% of your email, and go play golf.

Your golf game will improve if you use Mailbox in this way. Your ability to handle your email will suffer drastically, and that's exactly the opposite of what you're trying to do here. The last thing you need is more email.

What if I don't get very much email at all?

Why in the world would you need Mailbox if you get six emails a day? Handle it and quit crying about it.

Server issues

Mailbox is already a very bad idea before you even consider the server issues. Mailbox only works with Gmail. Gmail is historically very reliable, but it does go down. With Mailbox, you're reliant not only on Gmail's servers, but Mailbox's server as well. If Mailbox goes down, so does your use of the Mailbox app. All your cool snoozing and procrastinating goes out the window. You can still use Mail.app or the web view, of course... but using Mailbox introducing another way for your email to break.

So. Bad idea. Procrastination. More ways for your mail to break. Mailbox is free, but it's a terrible idea. Pass.

If you get 500 emails per day, you can't. But just go with me. ↩

Your Words

2013-02-16T04:06:00-06:00

Use them carefully.

Want to be Heard? Try Shutting Up

2013-02-16T03:32:00-06:00

Many (Most?) of us work a day job - probably in an office setting. Working as part of a team in an office can be great, but it also has it's challenges. Being heard, even if you have great ideas, is one of those challenges. Your instincts may tell you to speak louder, and more often. After all, if you're always outspoken, always loud, people have to listen to you, right?

Not so fast, buckaroo.

In fact, the complete opposite is true. Think for a moment - you probably have that guy in the office who just won't shut up. He speaks up in every meeting, trying to take it over. He's constantly giving his opinion on things, even if they don't really concern him. Regardless of the subject matter, Mr. Chatty has something to say.

Do you listen to this guy?

I don't. And I'd wager to say that you don't either. This guy is talking all the time, and that dilutes his effectiveness drastically. You aren't likely to take his thoughts seriously.

Do you want to be heard? Shut up.

Don't voice your opinion at every opportunity. Keep your thoughts to yourself; let others take the stage. That is, unless you feel very strongly about the matter at hand. By keeping quiet in most situations, when you do finally speak up, everyone is very likely to stop and listen - really listen.

Choose your timing carefuly, and choose your words carefully. Make sure every time you speak, you have a clear purpose. Make sure your words are important, and that they will make a difference. Do that, and your coworkers will truly listen to you. Your words will matter - and all it takes it learning to keep quiet.

Email

2013-02-15T03:06:00-06:00

You aren't as important as you think you are. No one can usefully deal with 500 emails per day. Not even you, Mr. Super Important Whoever-you-are. You can hate email with a white-hot fury and stress yourself to an early grave, or you can get over yourself.

You are not that important.

Those 500 emails you get every day don't all need or even deserve a personal, thoughtful response. You do not have that much going on in your life. You are not in charge of that many things. You are not that important.

Are you getting it yet?

Learn to hit the archive¹ button very quickly. You should know within 5 seconds whether an email actually deserves action on your part. 500 emails per day times 5 seconds each means you should be able to burn through your inbox in 41 minutes at most. 5 seconds per email isn't enough, you say? You're doing it wrong. Skim faster.

Forty-one minutes per day for the most hardcore of email users. You, even you, Mr. Super Important Person, can spare forty-one measly minutes.

If you spend literally ² 3 or 4 hours per day handling email, you're doing it absolutely wrong. You have some sort of inflated sense of how important you are. Getting over that is the key to handling email in a reasonable amount of time.

But I'm different

No you're not.

"Y" in the Gmail web view. ↩
literally, as in actually. ↩

iPad mini - I was wrong

2012-12-10T09:01:00-06:00

My first post about the iPad mini was generally positive, but ended with "thanks, but I'll wait." My wife, another iPad fan, agreed. Then we went to the Apple Store.

I want it!

These were my wife's words as soon as she saw the iPad mini in person. She repeated the phrase as soon as she picked it up. Naturally, the Apple store was sold out, so we had to call around to a few places. We ended up finding a black 32GB WiFi model at a semi-local Target.

Over the next week, she alternated between using her iPad 3 and the iPad mini. Back and forth, back and forth. When she was using the iPad 3, I jumped at the chance to use the shiny new toy. I even set up a folder with a few of my most-used apps — Instapaper, OmniFocus, and Reeder.

Fast forward about two weeks.

My wife has fallen out of love with the iPad mini. She loves the size and weight, but can't get over the screen. The Retina display prompted her upgrade from the original iPad to the iPad 3. She decided that she couldn't go back.

Me, on the other hand... I was shocked. Pixel snob, Retina snob that I am... I wanted an iPad mini of my own. I didn't want one after the keynote. I didn't want one after seeing it in the Apple store. I only wanted one after weeks of using one.

Lack of Retina Display

It matters, and you know it. You're only kidding yourself if you say otherwise. Switching from the glorious iPad 3 display to an iPhone 3GS-esque display is jarring. It's painful. It might even make you rub your eyes for a moment.

I never stopped noticing the lack of a Retina display. I likely never will. But the size and ridiculously light weight of this device make me OK with it. I can see the pixels, and that's OK. I'm getting a half-weight iPad, and that is worth more to me today than a Retina display.

So, my wife is returning her iPad mini. I've asked Santa for a white 16GB WiFi model. I don't know if he'll deliver, but I sure hope so.

1Password 4 for iOS

2012-11-17T09:26:00-06:00

Rene Ritchie from iMore on the upcoming 1Password for iOS:

1Password 4 for iOS is a brand new app. It will require a purchase. There will be a special price available at launch time. The existing 1Password iOS apps will no longer be sold. They will continue to be supported, will sync with 1Password 4 and be available for download in the "Purchased" section of iTunes.

This is not only ballsy, it's awesome. Software like 1Password is immensely valuable. It's also a one-time purchase. That means that the company gets paid once when you buy the software, and that's it. They keep putting out updates and new versions, but don't get paid anymore.

Charging for all-new versions is something we've had on the desktop for years. iOS developers seem to be more afraid of doing this. I'm glad AgileBits has the balls to charge for the update. I'll pay it gladly, knowing how much I use and trust 1Password.

Thin

2012-11-06T09:36:00-06:00

The iPad mini is thin. Apple made a big fuss about it. Every review makes a big fuss about it. And they're all right - it's amazingly thin. Just how thin, though?

Well, Apple has only ever made one iOS device that's thinner than the iPad mini. Not surprisingly, that's the paper-thin iPod touch (5th generation.) The last generation iPod touch matches the 7.2mm thickness of the iPad mini, and nothing else is as thin.

Here's a chart showing the thickness of every iOS device ever made. Besides the thinness of the iPad mini / iPod touch (5), the one thing that really stands out to me is how thick the first three iPhones were. The iPhone 3G / 3GS twins were nearly as thick as the original iPad. Wow.

The James Harden trade

2012-11-05T09:43:00-06:00

October the 27th marked the end of James Harden's Thunder career, and the beginning of his time with the Houston Rockets. Some thoughts:

The Thunder cheaped out by offering "only" $54 million over four years. Harden was eligible to receive a max of $60 million over the same time frame.¹
Harden was really shortsighted for not biting the bullet and signing the $54 million contract. He would've made "just" $13.5 million per year instead of $15 million per year. On second thought, I don't know how he would feed his family on that tiny amount.²
Harden was right to hold out for the max. He is a max player with enormous upside. OKC found the money to pay Durant, Westbrook, Perkins, and Ibaka, so why not Harden?

Harden and OKC blew up something really special by not agreeing to a new contract. Trading your third best player after a Finals appearance doesn't make any sense to me. But sometimes the NBA doesn't make any sense. Besides, as a Lakers fan, I approve of this trade.

OKC had already used the "designated player" provision on Westbrook, which is why they were able to lock him up for five years. ↩
See Sprewell, Latrell. ↩

iTunes 11 doesn't matter

2012-10-31T09:54:00-05:00

The Internet has her panties in a bunch today over the iTunes 11 delay. The app that most of us rarely use will be a month late. It doesn't matter.

I, for one, almost never use iTunes on my iMac. When I want to play music, I use Alfred. Alfred uses iTunes, but I don't have to. iCloud has removed the need to sync with iTunes.¹ iTunes just isn't the all-important digital hub that it once was.

Plus there's this — presumably Apple isn't happy with iTunes 11 as it sits, so they're waiting until they get it right. This is not a mission-critical app. Sure, the current version of iTunes sucks in a lot of ways. But it's sucked for a long time. There's no need to rush the replacement.

The exceptions being my wife's beloved iPod shuffle, and loading movies onto our iPads before long trips. ↩

iPad mini First Thoughts

2012-10-24T08:49:00-05:00

I missed the live stream of latest Apple event ¹, but caught up later in the day. So, iPad mini.

Tech sites have been exploding with iPad mini rumors for as long as I can remember. I never paid much attention because I didn't really care. The iPad was the perfect size for me. If anything, I'd buy a larger iPad rather than a smaller one.

Still, the mini is interesting. It still seems large enough to be useful, while being much lighter than the iPad (3) I currently enjoy.

I've been contemplating hinting for a Kindle Paperwhite for Christmas. The combination of small size, light weight, a backlit screen², reasonable price, and singular focus intrigues me.

The iPad mini complicates this, if only slightly.

It has a smaller size, it weighs less than the normal iPad³, and of course still has a backlit screen. It doesn't have the singular focus of a Kindle, and it costs $200 more. On the other hand, I can use OmniFocus on it. And Instapaper. And Reeder.

So.

Will I buy one? I don't know. Probably not, at least not yet. It's priced a little higher than I would like⁴. It also doesn't have the lovely Retina display that is my favorite iPad (3) feature. Incidentally, this is the one thing that made my wife take pause. She was all set to get one until she heard about the screen. Now she's all set to wait.

No one expected a Retina display in the iPad mini. I don't think Apple made a mistake by not including it. The thinness and lightness are the biggest selling features here.

Silly work ↩
Finally ↩
The Kindle is lighter still ↩
There's nothing wrong with the pricing. Apple will sell every one it can make, as usual. ↩