The Column
This Column has been written for the better part of a month now. Dunno why I never posted.
Old Man Opinions
I slowly find myself saying or thinking things that used to be what I’d call “old man opinions”. I think that means a few things:
- I’m getting older.
- Old people had some right ideas.
- Old people think old people are right.
See the Top 5 for some technology-specific “old man” opinions I’ve developed.
4 Burners Theory
There’s a fairly well-known framework called “The 4 Burner Theory”. It posits you can think about your life as a 4 burner gas stove. Each burner represents something:
- Health
- Family
- Friends/others
- Work
The theory says you only have so much gas you can give. You can’t operate all 4 burners at maximum simultaneously without burning yourself out.
While I don’t fully agree with the zero-sum nature of the theory, nor even the way each burner is allocated, I do think about it. All I want to say further on the topic can be said with a picture.
Sorry, friends. 🙁
2025 Puzzle Box
This year’s puzzle box has been a bit of a nightmare. I heard it said “you have to make mistakes to learn”, and I’ve been forced to learn a ton since I picked up on the design & fabrication this year’s puzzle box. I’m sorry 10x over to my wife and children who’ve seen less of me than I’d like, and have seen me dejected when I hit roadblock after roadblock.
I might write more about this in January, but with each year’s puzzle box I’ve been intentional about scoping things. This year I kept the scope as small and simple as I could due to potential unknown unknowns about actually doing what I wanted to do with it. Thank goodness I kept the actual puzzle part of it simple, because I had no idea how hard & time-consuming the “making” side of it was going to be. If I’d known it was going to be this hard to walk this path, I may not have started walking… but I’m grateful because I have learned a ton and the final product is one of the coolest things I’ve ever done.
Top 5: Old Man Opinions About Technology
5. Everything Doesn’t Need to be “Integrated”
It feels like every productivity app is trying to become your one-stop-shop, all-in-one solution. Notion has succeeded in this, and now there’s dozens of competitors aping Notion. Every app is now moving towards being your “one stop do-it-all solution!” Here’s the thing, though, I don’t like lock-in. I’m okay using multiple applications for their specialty. I’d rather use applications that let me import, manipulate, and export CSVs and .TXT files. For most cases, I don’t need the “walled garden of glorious features”. When it comes to tools, I am okay with verticals, I don’t need a horizontal all-encompassing mess.
This actually ties into Enterprise Architecture & Capability-orientation, but I won’t bore you. Big, complicated-sounding things reflect themselves in our day-to-day lives.
4. I Don’t Want Any More Subscriptions
Having a subscription for an application I use to make doodles is stupid. Let me pay you once. If your tool works, you don’t need to update it. Just give me the app and I’ll give you the money. I understand that this is difficult and less “Economically viable”, especially in the cloud model, but would become too dependent on the cloud for everything. See #2 below.
3. Software Doesn’t Need to Change All the Time
Perhaps the most old-man of all of these opinions, I get irritated when applications I use update & “upgrade” themselves into something unrecognizable. You find a good workflow that produces the desired results only to have to relearn it next week when that workflow simply doesn’t exist anymore.
2. “The Cloud” isn’t a Panacea
I was very bullish on “The Cloud”. You can find columns in this very blog where I extolled the virtues of the Chromebook philosophy. And some extent they absolutely do have their place, but the cloud has become a go to solution for every software, it seems. It’s like we forget that we have in our pockets today, the functional equivalent of super computers from five years ago, and that they can do the work themselves in so many cases.
1. More Often than Not, New Tools are Worse
With some obvious exceptions, getting & learning some new tool or software has typically not resulted in a higher quality of life than I had before. Running the same hardware, my Windows 10 machine was probably 30% faster across the board before I “upgraded” to Windows 11.
Quotes:
I’m not sure vampires concern themselves with the US constitution. - Jon
I, too, am of the belief that vampire magic probably supersedes the laws of man - Joe