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It’s now the end of our third year publishing the Open Insights newsletter. We thought we’d celebrate by relaunching our popular blog Oracle + Open Source.  The design is new, there’s a lot more content, things are easier to find, and overall it is indexing great on Google, even better!

Like what you see here? Forward us to a friend. And let us know if you have any suggestions or comments. They are always welcome.

In This Issue:

1. Feature: Gaining Legs

2. New Articles

3. Audio Interviews

4. Current Reading

5. Lightweight Humor

6. Miscellaneous

7. Past Issues

8. Technical Articles

9. About Heavyweight Internet Group

1. Feature: Gaining Legs

This phenomenon has always intrigued me, how an idea can as they say "gain legs", and begin to walk on it’s own.  In some cases you want to encourage this, such as building press for a book, or new business.  As an idea catches on, less attention and finances need to be focused on advertising and PR.  On the flip side this can also be a process which has some destructive affects, if it is an idea which misrepresents us, but gains legs none the less. 

The recent democratic primary race between Clinton & Obama has had plenty of both.  As one candidate "gains momentum", their polls move up, and voters are looking at them more favorably.  This may be due to some real momentum in popular opinion, or because of heavy ad placements in that state before the primary, or because of the demographic makeup of that state.

Interestingly,  we know politicians rarely match our original impressions.  What is really happening is they are throwing out ideas, and seeing which ones catch, which ones gain legs.  These are ideas about who they are, who they can be, what they’ll be able to do and accomplish.  It is a lesson in the art of spin, to be able to turn every story your way, and bend it against your opponent.

Famous social psychologist Robert Cialdini points out:

"Commitment decisions, even erroneous ones, have a tendency to be self-perpetuating because they can ‘grow their own legs’.  That is, people often add new reasons and justifications to support the wisdom of commitments they have already made.  As a consequence, some commitments remain in effect long after the conditions that spurred them have changed.  This phenomenon explains the effectiveness of certain deceptive compliance practices such as ‘throwing the low-ball’.

This has all sorts of implications for us in business and in our careers, since this process is at work in every social situation.  Since we are all human, we are in a better position if we understand these processes, in ourselves and those around us.  Cialdini has written a number of books on the topic including "Influence: How and Why People Agree to Things" and "Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion".  I highly recommend his stuff.

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part I

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part II

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part I

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part II

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part I

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part II

3. Audio Interviews

In our most recent interview we had the opportunity to talk with Norman Yamada CTO of Millburn Corporation.

We’ve also moved our podcast to Odeo for Audio Podcast hosting. It is a great service, and provides all the RSS and subscribe links automatically. So please subscribe if you haven’t already!

Get Anyone to Do Anything: Never Feel Powerless Again – David J Lieberman

The title makes it sound a bit like self-help for the helpless, but actually this book is chock full of tips and insights into human nature.  Once you’ve read all of this stuff, the day-to-day behavior of politicians might even make sense!

Influence: Psychology of Persuasion – by Robert Cialdini

Cialdini’s books are anecdotal and scientific.  They’re full of great stories that illustrate important points, making them a pleasure to read, but he stays on point, focusing our attention on our singularly human nature of persuasion. 

A little inane humor to brighten up your day…  Jessica Hagy has this cute little blog called indexed.  She uses index cards to illustrate little truisms, often with funny comments on venn diagrams.  Here’s a funny one the relationship of status to money.

We all want to optimize our sites for Google.  I mean other than a select few, that’s where most of our traffic comes from, so the more our site plays well with Google, the more users, readers, customers, and clients will find their way to us.

Most of the SEO material I’ve read has been pretty sparse, and unclear.  But I’ve been following the topic over at my good Felix’s #comments blog, and I’m starting to get it.  So you can too!  Take a read: Google loves me, again!

If you haven’t been following the news on the topic, take a look over at this NY Times piece: Silicon Valley Start-Ups Awash in Dollars, Again.  Personally I don’t think there is much hysteria this time around, sure there’s some, but not much.  The industry is more mature now, and computers in general have lost their initial wow factor, so people are general more sober, and able to step back and see what is actually useful, can make money, is making money, or might well make money.  That’s the root of investing smart.

Issue 42: On Efficiency

Issue 41: Roshomon Effect

Issue 40: Self Taught

Issue 39: Reputation Management

Issue 38: Are You Fast Failing

Issue 37: A Real Open Book

Issue 36: Rarity of Excellence

Issue 34: Hindsight Is Always 20/20

Issue 33: Market For Experts

Issue 32: Different Heritages

Archive: Past Issues

MySQL Disaster Recovery: click here

It’s now the end of our third year publishing the Open Insights newsletter. We thought we’d celebrate by relaunching our popular blog Oracle + Open Source.  The design is new, there’s a lot more content, things are easier to find, and overall it is indexing great on Google, even better!

Like what you see here? Forward us to a friend. And let us know if you have any suggestions or comments. They are always welcome.

In This Issue:

1. Feature: On Prudence

2. New Articles

3. Audio Interviews

4. Current Reading

5. Lightweight Humor

6. Miscellaneous

7. Past Issues

8. Technical Articles

9. About Heavyweight Internet Group

1. Feature: On Prudence

With recent market freefall, and economic uncertainty, I’ve felt echos of the dot-com crash.  Suddenly a lot of people are losing a lot of money, and strangely changing their risk profiles too!  I recently saw an article in the economist "Requiem for a prudent man" bringing back an old idea.  Prudence of course isn’t just a concept you carry with you when times are down, it’s even more important to keep your resolve and stick to your guns when all around you people are thinking money is falling from trees.

What’s Your Risk Profile

In an Economist piece titled "Requiem for a prudent man" they quoted Tony Dye’s thinking.  "Dye used the analogy of being asked to board a train which you were convinced would crash at some stage in its ten-station journey.  The optimal strategy may be to stay on board the train for five stops or so.  But if your main concern is safety, you should not board at all."  Well said.  It reminds me of conversations with financial advisors, where they ask this perplexing question: "What is your risk profile?"  I always chuckle.  Only an outsider can see the humor I guess.  It’s so common a question in the financial world, it’s come to carry some semblance of sense.  My answer, well I don’t want to risk my money at all, I just want to make more.  They then smile at me, at my naivety.  I actually think that this is most people’s actual philosophy, though their emotions tend to get in the way.  People figure, well I want to make high returns (ie I want to make a lot of money), and then backward justify the actual risk or let it get lost in the numbers.

Is It Different From Off Track Betting

The truth is unless you’re a Warren Buffett, or George Soros, or have some inside insight on what the markets are going to do next, betting the markets and stocks is a lot like gambling on horse races.  I know, I know, there are all sorts of trends, and t-bill rates, and comparisons against the index and so forth.  But if Long Term Capital Management with all it’s world class economists and experts wasn’t a lesson, the recent bailout and related chaos should surely be instructive.  While the human variable remains in the mix, the movement of the markets will remain somewhat unpredictable.  

Below I review Richard Bookstaber’s prescient title "A Demon Of Our Own Design – Markets, Hedge Funds, and The Perils of Financial Innovation".  This title came out in April 2007, so I guess he’ll be getting a lot more speaking engagements now!!

The Advantage of Being An Outsider

When I talk to folks that are not in technology, they often have insights invisible to me.  Their attention and focus is different, so they can see things that are not obvious to me.  So in that sense I take it as a blessing perhaps that my background is not focused on finance.  It allows me to see that cash is different than the proverbial "paper", that options remain abstract to me, full of legal jargon, and hidden surprises.  And it allows me to maintain my scrooge type skepticism that if it seems to good to be true, it probably is, so yes, read the fine print.

Risks Worth Taking

All this caution and prudence is not to say I don’t think their are real risks worth taking, I just think they’re different risks.  I used to debate finance with a good friend of mine.  I’d say, what is the marginal return of me spending all this time on learning about stocks, and funds?  I’d rather just park my money in an index that tracks the market (see John Bogle review below) and be done with it.  Sure I could spend a *LOT* more time, and potentially get some small margin greater, but what will this make me in real dollars.  I can think of a few much better ways to spend that time.

Build Your Career and Skillset

There are a few tried and true methods for building real wealth for you right now.  On the low risk side there is building your skillset.  Spend time learning more, in a wider arc, about your discipline.  Even better, widen it by learning about related fields.  For instance if you’re a lawyer, and you learn a whole lot about technology, you could push yourself into a niche where fewer lawyers reign supreme.  Are you a tech guru, go ahead and learn something about business.  Start thinking strategically about your resume too, and what skills are missing there.  Then go and fill in the missing spaces.  Keeping sending your resume out to recruiters and headhunters to gauge the market.  It’s an ongoing process.

Next up is writing.  Writing about your chosen field does a couple of things.  It forces you to learn it well enough to teach it, which can be challenging.  And then it also puts you up on a stage, to potentially be criticised.  But this also will keep you on your toes.  The huge upside is that it sets you apart from your peers as an authority, and the more you write the better you get.  If your writing style is popular with readers, this can have a huge upside.

And then of course there is public speaking.  Public speaking may seem like a risky proposition, but to me it’s nothing against risking my money on shaky funds!  The first few times are sure to be a trial for you, but from there you will grow.  You will learn about yourself, and also what your audience may be looking for.  You’ll learn a lot about how much you know.  And it’ll also make you better at interviews, and initial meetings with clients.  These are key, and being able to build up rapport with an audience is much harder and more daunting that one or two people in a conference room.

Keep An Eye On The Market

I also recommend always keeping one eye on the market.  This is mainly for informational purposes, but also for self-esteem at the thought that your skillset is still in demand.  Watch the job boards, such as www.indeed.com, www.craigslist.com, www.dice.com, www.hotjobs.com, www.careerbuilder.com, www.monster.com and so on.

I can’t emphasize enough how much I like Indeed.  Firstly it’s a one-stop shop because it aggregates content from these other sites.  Secondly it has a great salaries tab, which can give you real insight into what the range of salaries your skillset can command.  Third and perhaps most importantly is the interesting trends tab.  This can provide insight into where the market is going.

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part I

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part II

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part I

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part II

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part I

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part II

3. Audio Interviews

In our most recent interview we had the opportunity to talk with Norman Yamada CTO of Millburn Corporation.

We’ve also moved our podcast to Odeo for Audio Podcast hosting. It is a great service, and provides all the RSS and subscribe links automatically. So please subscribe if you haven’t already!

A Demon of Our Own Design: Markets, Hedge Funds, and the Perils of Financial Innovation – Richard Bookstaber

This book has been on my to read list for quite some time.  It’s time has certainly come.  It argues, with plenty of great examples all around us, that the financial innovation is as much a curse as it is a blessing.  Good stuff.

Common Sense on Mutual Funds: New Imperatives for the Intelligent Investor – John C. Bogle

Bogle is the founder of the Vanguard Group, who brought indexed investing to the masses.  The theory kind of boils down to, if the markets are so hard to predict, why even try?  Track the market with an index, lose the manager and the fees, and beat 90% of investors.  Who can argue with that?  A lot of people apparently.

A little inane humor to brighten up your day…  Jessica Hagy has this cute little blog called indexed.  She uses index cards to illustrate little truisms, often with funny comments on venn diagrams.  Here’s a funny one the relationship of status to money.

We all want to optimize our sites for Google.  I mean other than a select few, that’s where most of our traffic comes from, so the more our site plays well with Google, the more users, readers, customers, and clients will find their way to us.

Most of the SEO material I’ve read has been pretty sparse, and unclear.  But I’ve been following the topic over at my good Felix’s #comments blog, and I’m starting to get it.  So you can too!  Take a read: Google loves me, again!

If you haven’t been following the news on the topic, take a look over at this NY Times piece: Silicon Valley Start-Ups Awash in Dollars, Again.  Personally I don’t think there is much hysteria this time around, sure there’s some, but not much.  The industry is more mature now, and computers in general have lost their initial wow factor, so people are general more sober, and able to step back and see what is actually useful, can make money, is making money, or might well make money.  That’s the root of investing smart.

Issue 42: On Efficiency

Issue 41: Roshomon Effect

Issue 40: Self Taught

Issue 39: Reputation Management

Issue 38: Are You Fast Failing

Issue 37: A Real Open Book

Issue 36: Rarity of Excellence

Issue 34: Hindsight Is Always 20/20

Issue 33: Market For Experts

Issue 32: Different Heritages

Archive: Past Issues

MySQL Disaster Recovery: click here

It’s now the end of our third year publishing the Open Insights newsletter. We thought we’d celebrate by relaunching our popular blog Oracle + Open Source.  The design is new, there’s a lot more content, things are easier to find, and overall it is indexing great on Google, even better!

Like what you see here? Forward us to a friend. And let us know if you have any suggestions or comments. They are always welcome.

In This Issue:

1. Feature: On Efficiency

2. New Articles

3. Audio Interviews

4. Current Reading

5. Lightweight Humor

6. Miscellaneous

7. Past Issues

8. Technical Articles

9. About Heavyweight Internet Group

1. Feature: On Efficiency

Efficiency in consulting is a tricky business.  So many variables can affect it.  How a team works together, how well people are communicating, how well it is managed, and how well the individuals on the team operate.  There are also differences in perception.  Some people downplay their strengths, making their triumph seem less pronounced.  Meanwhile others inflate their strengths.

Examples

We all remember situations when working with someone who is rather green.  We may have the luxury of

more time, and being able to help them along as they get up to speed, but when we’re faced with a pressing deadline we’re surely frustrated.  Fast-forward to a memory of working with someone who is very astute, efficient, together, and good at reading between the lines.  They seem to be a breeze to work with, and you feel confident that what they deliver will be what you expected.  What’s more they probably finished the work in less time.  You’ve probably also encountered individuals who can strategize well enough to completely avoid tasks that in the end may be redundant.  If you’ve ever played a fast paced sport and being outfoxed by someone who you know you are fitter than, you know what I mean.  It’s plain that some people just strategize better, and that can dramatically impact our performance and efficiency.

What Happens With Fees

Why dwell on all of the above?  Well when engaging a consultant, it is one-half (and the often ignored half) of the equation of cost.  cost = rate x hours  remember?  I have to think most people don’t consider this equation, if my conversations with clients, and recruiters are any indication.  Most of those conversations are extremely oversimplified, dwelling on the dollar amount, as though some who bills twice as much per hour will cost twice as much in the end.  The implication, everyone has the same efficiency!  Of course people don’t, and when we emphasize the big picture, most people can recognize the point. 

Talk To References

So what to do?  One thing you can do is ask for references from your consultant.  These will serve as testimonials, and though you may not want to ask rates as those vary from client to client, and quote to quote, you can and should ask that reference if you found the consultant to be efficient.  This is fair, and the consultant will probably encourage this.  In my experience with new clients that I didn’t get through referrals, they are generally pleasantly surprised and satisified with what they got for their money.  This is probably due in part to reading between the lines, and intuiting what the client wants, but also a reflection of efficiency.

Consider Fixed Fees

If you want to further reduce your doubt about how much a project will cost, consider fixed fees.  Clients, suggest them to your consultant, and consultants, suggest them to your clients.  Build in a buffer, and be clear about requirements.  Note to self, requirements, specifications, and boundaries are the keys to making this work.  So it’s very important that all parties be honest with themselves.  If certain areas seem more vague or imprecise, build in more buffer for those.  While running the project, be vigilant about what is in and out of scope, and have everyone refer to the specifications as outlined in your agreement or contract.  In the end fixed fees keep everyones eyes off the clock, and on the project, and allow the client to know the project, if it stays within scope, will not grow or involve surprises in cost.

Conclusions

In the end, a lot comes from experience.  Senior consultants tend to have the experience to be more efficient, and thus charge seemingly higher hourly fees.  Furthermore client experience should lead one to check references, and consider the entire equation when looking at the overall costs of a project.

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part I

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part II

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part I

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part II

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part I

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part II

3. Audio Interviews

In our most recent interview we had the opportunity to talk with Norman Yamada CTO of Millburn Corporation.

We’ve also moved our podcast to Odeo for Audio Podcast hosting. It is a great service, and provides all the RSS and subscribe links automatically. So please subscribe if you haven’t already!

The Logic of Life:  The Rational Economics of an Irrational World by Tim Hardford

It’s always insightful when someone applies the unwavering science of economics to questions we encounter everyday.  You may turn up your nose when he turns his eye towards questions of love and finding your someone special, you have to agree he’s not afraid to ask difficult questions.  Perhaps not as wacky as "Freakonomics", it as accessible, and fun to read.

Yes: 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive by Robert Cialdini

Cialdini is the author of the famous book "The Psychology of Influence".  He has an excellent writing style, and the science to back it up.  This is the more science-y version of "How To Make Friends And Influence People" with lots of simple suggestions, and things to keep in mind.  If you’re a consultant, freelancer, or any business that sells products and services (who does that leave out?) then you need to know how to be persuasive, and have a bit of charm.  So we should all welcome a few hints and suggestions.

A little inane humor to brighten up your day…  Jessica Hagy has this cute little blog called indexed.  She uses index cards to illustrate little truisms, often with funny comments on venn diagrams.  Here’s a funny one the relationship of status to money.

We all want to optimize our sites for Google.  I mean other than a select few, that’s where most of our traffic comes from, so the more our site plays well with Google, the more users, readers, customers, and clients will find their way to us.

Most of the SEO material I’ve read has been pretty sparse, and unclear.  But I’ve been following the topic over at my good Felix’s #comments blog, and I’m starting to get it.  So you can too!  Take a read: Google loves me, again!

If you haven’t been following the news on the topic, take a look over at this NY Times piece: Silicon Valley Start-Ups Awash in Dollars, Again.  Personally I don’t think there is much hysteria this time around, sure there’s some, but not much.  The industry is more mature now, and computers in general have lost their initial wow factor, so people are general more sober, and able to step back and see what is actually useful, can make money, is making money, or might well make money.  That’s the root of investing smart.

Issue 38: Are You Fast Failing

Issue 37: A Real Open Book

Issue 36: Rarity of Excellence

Issue 34: Hindsight Is Always 20/20

Issue 33: Market For Experts

Issue 32: Different Heritages

Archive: Past Issues

MySQL Disaster Recovery: click here

It’s now the end of our third year publishing the Open Insights newsletter. We thought we’d celebrate by relaunching our popular blog Oracle + Open Source.  The design is new, there’s a lot more content, things are easier to find, and overall it is indexing great on Google, even better!

Like what you see here? Forward us to a friend. And let us know if you have any suggestions or comments. They are always welcome.

In This Issue:

1. Feature: Roshomon Effect

2. Conferences/Speaking

3. New Articles

4. Audio Interviews

5. Current Reading

6. Lightweight Humor

7. Miscellaneous

8. Past Issues

9. Technical Articles

10. About Heavyweight Internet Group

1. Feature: Roshomon Effect

There is a pretty famous Japanese film called Roshomon. During a trial, participants in a murder tell the series of events through their eyes. They retell truths, half-truths, and even falsehoods. In the retelling, we the audience, are given the chance to see the events unfold from three mildly, and sometimes thoroughly different perspectives.

This metaphor has many parallels in the real world, from discussing politics on one side or the other, to discussing global tensions, history, and current conflicts. For us in business, and especially in consulting, this is a challenge we face everyday.

The Client View

Here I’m referring to the economic buyer. This is the individual who controls the budget, and who has to manage costs, while executing on the technology iniative. This person sees the big picture, but may not always follow all the underlying details. Their perspective requires seeing the forest for the trees, seeing the whole project from a mile high, or longer term than just what we’re faced with today.

The Employee View

Here I’m referring to coworkers, and folks you would be working with day-to-day to get things done. These people tend to be detail oriented, and may focus on the theory, but miss the high-level business perspective. Sometimes these folks may feel you’re an asset, a way to get things done quicker, while others may feel somewhat threatened, as though bringing in a consultant implies not a shortage of resources, but somehow a shortage of knowledge and expertise. In the end, either can be the case, but it does not have to be adversarial. This can be an opportunity, if it is managed and presented that way.

The Consultant View

A consultant acts both as a part-time or temporary employee, but also as a corporation. What does that mean? Well it means they have a bottom line, like any business, and seek to minimize costs, and maximize profits. Their means to this end is by basically making the client happy, improving their position, or otherwise solving some business problem. I’ve met many consultants over the years who saw their job to be solving technical problems. By focusing too much on problem solving, they missed the clients high-level needs. This can often be solved by better communication, but sometimes it means listening to what the client wants, even when it is in conflict with some technical or general best practices engineering goal that may not be relevant at the moment.

How do we reconcile these perspectives?

Well studying the Roshomon Effect can certainly help. It requires a lot of patience, and endless communication. Storytelling works well, weaving illustrative stories, and analogies that really

express things in a way the client can understand. And that’s not just retelling the story of what you’re going to solve for them, but also what challenges you’re experiencing day to day. It also means at times tiptoeing around existing staff, keeping them happy, being personable, and relating to their concerns, but at the same time keeping the clients paramount, and the end goal.

This is a dance, there’s no other way to say it. It’s an art, surely. Sometimes the client has a good sense of your goals, and can express where they want to go in terms that you, the consultant can understand. Sometimes, they can only see their needs right now. There are certainly times when a client imagines that they are your only client, that they need you now, and you must be available, since you’re working for them. So it is also important to share your challenges, not by complaining, but by really putting each issue or challenge in it’s proper perspective.

I can’t emphasize storytelling, and retelling enough. By continually discussing a current challenge or project, you and the client iron out, detail, and review the specifics in terms that make sense to the both of you. Since you do have different perspectives, and each line item, and project milestone has a slightly different meaning to each of you, the more you discuss, mull over, and deliberate, in the end the more you’ll see eye to eye.

2. Conferences/Speaking Engagements

Last April was the Collaborate 2007 conference in Las Vegas Nevada. I ended up giving two talks, one on Monday, and one on Tuesday. I’ve uploaded video of both of them.

In other news, we’ve submitted a series of five abstracts to the IOUG Collaborate 2008 Conference and another five to the O’Reilly MySQL Conference in April 2008.  You can find them on our relaunched Oracle  + Open Source site by clicking "abstract", or by following this link.

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part I

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part II

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part I

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part II

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part I

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part II

4. Audio Interviews

In our most recent interview we had the opportunity to talk with Norman Yamada CTO of Millburn Corporation.

We’ve also moved our podcast to Odeo for Audio Podcast hosting. It is a great service, and provides all the RSS and subscribe links automatically. So please subscribe if you haven’t already!

Curveball – by Bob Drogin

A lot of non-fiction books read more like documentaries than a good story, but this book is a real exception.  Drogin weaves this like a spy thriller, and indeed it is one.  A former nobody and possible taxi driver turned engineer, defects to germany, and to get better treatment, and all the associated perks, begins telling a tale of Iraq, mobile germ factories, and a million other half truths. 

Lacking any other solid source, and in a run-up to a war that seemed inevitably, the intelligence community latched onto his unsubstantiated story.  This is a real case of believing what you want to believe, and seeing what you want to see. 

It’s fascinating because it plays squarely into the perception topic I discussed in Luntz’s "It’s Not What You Say, It’s What People Hear" review.  The climate in the US, especially in the intelligence community after September 11th was such that only one story, only one angle, only one conclusion would be considered.  Fascinating read, and highly recommended.

Supercapitalism – by Robert B. Reich

Friedman’s "The World Is Flat" surely shook up a lot of us, describing the power and leveling influence of the global markets.  Reich’s book Supercapitalism discusses it in a lot more detail, considering strengths, failings, and what we need to do to keep it working for us.

Starting in the 50’s and 60’s where this model made the US incredibly wealthy and successful, and spread that wealth around so everyone really benefited, he moves forward to our Wall Mart present.  He emphasizes that we cannot expect corporations to do anything that isn’t to improve their bottom line and returns to investors.  If we want to make them accountable, we need to use the democratic process, and legislation to change "the rules of the game". 

He also gets into the influence of campaign contributions which go to both parties.  As he explains, this is inevitable as your competitors are sure to do the same.  Interestingly, he doesn’t suggest we ask corporations to be more fair, but rather, suggests we enact laws to protect investors, whose own money, and returns are ultimately being diverted from their own pockets.  Interesting stuff!

A little inane humor to brighten up your day…  Jessica Hagy has this cute little blog called indexed.  She uses index cards to illustrate little truisms, often with funny comments on venn diagrams.  Here’s a funny one the relationship of status to money.

We all want to optimize our sites for Google.  I mean other than a select few, that’s where most of our traffic comes from, so the more our site plays well with Google, the more users, readers, customers, and clients will find their way to us.

Most of the SEO material I’ve read has been pretty sparse, and unclear.  But I’ve been following the topic over at my good Felix’s #comments blog, and I’m starting to get it.  So you can too!  Take a read: Google loves me, again!

If you haven’t been following the news on the topic, take a look over at this NY Times piece: Silicon Valley Start-Ups Awash in Dollars, Again.  Personally I don’t think there is much hysteria this time around, sure there’s some, but not much.  The industry is more mature now, and computers in general have lost their initial wow factor, so people are general more sober, and able to step back and see what is actually useful, can make money, is making money, or might well make money.  That’s the root of investing smart.

Issue 38: Are You Fast Failing

Issue 37: A Real Open Book

Issue 36: Rarity of Excellence

Issue 34: Hindsight Is Always 20/20

Issue 33: Market For Experts

Issue 32: Different Heritages

Archive: Past Issues

MySQL Disaster Recovery: click here

Happy New Year 2008!

It’s now the end of our third year publishing the Open Insights newsletter. We thought we’d celebrate by relaunching our popular blog Oracle + Open Source.  The design is new, there’s a lot more content, things are easier to find, and overall it is indexing great on Google, even better!

Like what you see here? Forward us to a friend. And let us know if you have any suggestions or comments. They are always welcome.

In This Issue:

1. Feature: Self Taught

2. Conferences/Speaking

3. New Articles

4. Audio Interviews

5. Current Reading

6. Lightweight Humor

7. Miscellaneous

8. Past Issues

9. Technical Articles

10. About Heavyweight Internet Group

1. Feature: Self Taught

Recently I was having lunch with a colleague of mine.  We were catching up as we hadn’t seen each other in some months.  She had recently started a new and challenging job, one she was very excited about.  The new challenges involved a lot of open-source technology, so we got to talking about that.

She made a very interesting observation to me, one that has stayed with me, and one that I continue to mull over.  She said that open-source is very autodidactic.  Ok, I admit, I didn’t know the word either, at first.  Maybe some of you can feel my pain!  Basically it means self-taught, and what she was getting at is that open-source is this teeming wilderness of software, without instruction manuals, the familiar structural framework of corporations, and business processes that one can latch onto, study, and follow.  Of course I thought, how else would you want it?  And therein lay my own misunderstandings.

I’ve been involved in open-source technologies for years.  Even while at University, most of the software projects that a computer science major comes in contact with are open-source, or sort of do-it-yourself research projects, or experiments on what’s possible, and how things work.  So for me jumping into the commercial world of Oracle came later, and it all fit together very well like a puzzle, as I understood where many of the Oracle programmers thinking was, or could often guess. 

Many of the people who come to Oracle professionally did not start out as engineers or computer science majors in their University days.  They’ve come to the technology from the top-down.  This can be a real godsend on the business side, because they understand business processes, can communicate to real business needs, and translate what is happening under the hood from a shared vantage point.  But for these folks open-source really is very much a freewheeling world, one which requires constantly to learn and relearn, reverse-engineer pieces and components, and think outside the box. 

I think both types of people are really crucial to business.  And I also think that for this reason, the continual embrace of open-source technologies by Oracle corporation, such as Linux, Apache, and PHP will both build Oracle’s business and stock price, and at the same time grow the demand for requisite skilled engineers.  This is good news for everyone, both in the commercial Oracle space, and in the open-source space.  

For business, it’s worth considering, given this dual nature, which type of folks you’re looking for when you’re hiring full-time employees, consultants, and outsourced resources.

2. Conferences/Speaking Engagements

Last April was the Collaborate 2007 conference in Las Vegas Nevada. I ended up giving two talks, one on Monday, and one on Tuesday. I’ve uploaded video of both of them.

In other news, we’ve submitted a series of five abstracts to the IOUG Collaborate 2008 Conference and another five to the O’Reilly MySQL Conference in April 2008.  You can find them on our relaunched Oracle  + Open Source site by clicking "abstract", or by following this link.

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part I

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part II

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part I

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part II

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part I

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part II

4. Audio Interviews

In our most recent interview we had the opportunity to talk with Norman Yamada CTO of Millburn Corporation.

We’ve also moved our podcast to Odeo for Audio Podcast hosting. It is a great service, and provides all the RSS and subscribe links automatically. So please subscribe if you haven’t already!

Peak: How Great Companies Get Their Mojo From Maslow – by Chip Conley

Chip Conley is the CEO of Joie de Vivre Hospitality a company which manages a boutique collection of hotels in the Bay Area.  Surviving the dot-com and post-911 downturn was not easy for anyone, but for the hotel industry, especially in the Bay Area, it was a very very dramatic crash.  So to say their company thrived and expanded during this period, is really to underline the real-world success of Chip’s ideas.  He’s really ironed them out, and presented them here for the rest of us, to learn and grow our own business.  Are you in a job, a career or a calling?  This book will challenge you to ask the question.

The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature – Steven Pinker

I warn you in advance, Mr Pinker will challenge your assumptions, and all of our modern assumptions about human nature.  From racism, to gender, politics, to violence, he pulls out all the stops, and isn’t afraid to touch hot-button issues.  A bit dense at times, Pinker is a great modern thinker, and asks us to do the same.  I definitely don’t agree with all of what he says, he certainly challenges us to think deeply about our modern conceptions, and assumptions about our basic nature, what we have control over, and what is more linked to our own million year evolution.

A little inane humor to brighten up your day…

Google Announces Plan To Destroy All Information It Can’t Index.  It doesn’t get much better than that! 

We all want to optimize our sites for Google.  I mean other than a select few, that’s where most of our traffic comes from, so the more our site plays well with Google, the more users, readers, customers, and clients will find their way to us.

Most of the SEO material I’ve read has been pretty sparse, and unclear.  But I’ve been following the topic over at my good Felix’s #comments blog, and I’m starting to get it.  So you can too!  Take a read: Google loves me, again!

If you haven’t been following the news on the topic, take a look over at this NY Times piece: Silicon Valley Start-Ups Awash in Dollars, Again.  Personally I don’t think there is much hysteria this time around, sure there’s some, but not much.  The industry is more mature now, and computers in general have lost their initial wow factor, so people are general more sober, and able to step back and see what is actually useful, can make money, is making money, or might well make money.  That’s the root of investing smart.

8. Past Issues

Issue 38: Are You Fast Failing

Issue 37: A Real Open Book

Issue 36: Rarity of Excellence

Issue 34: Hindsight Is Always 20/20

Issue 33: Market For Experts

Issue 32: Different Heritages

Archive: Past Issues

MySQL Disaster Recovery: click here

OPEN INSIGHTS Newsletter

Issue 39 – Reputation Management

  December 1, 2007

by Sean Hull

Happy Holidays everyone, we hope you’ve enjoyed the topics in 2007.  We plan to bring even more in 2008.

It’s now the end of our third year publishing the Open Insights newsletter. We thought we’d celebrate by relaunching our popular blog Oracle + Open Source.  The design is new, there’s a lot more content, things are easier to find, and overall it is indexing great on Google, even better!

Like what you see here? Forward us to a friend. And let us know if you have any suggestions or comments. They are always welcome.

In This Issue:

1. Feature: Reputation Management

2. Conferences/Speaking

3. New Articles

4. Audio Interviews

5. Current Reading

6. Lightweight Humor

7. Miscellaneous

8. Past Issues

9. Technical Articles

10. About Heavyweight Internet Group

1. Feature: Reputation Management

Your reputation, you build your career around it, you work on your resume, hand out your business cards and conduct yourself in a professional manner.  All this to build the reputation you command in your area of expertise. 

But what about your online presense?  Typically when we think of online sites, we think of social networking, search engine optimization, and the like.  It’s all about bringing more readers to your blog, more google or yahoo searches to your website.  But online marketers are starting to liken all of this optimization as ultimately about your reputation, and they’re right.

So first let’s introduce a few new acronyms for your little noggin to remember. 

SEM – social engine marketing

SERM – search engine reputation management

SMO – social media optimization

SEO – search engine optimization

MediaPost is a pretty good blog which you can also receive as a newsletter.  They had a really good article on Search Engine Reputation Management.

Some of the recommendations are those you’re already doing, such as using Linkedin,  starting a blog, and so on.  But have you thought about linking to other sites, or commenting on blogs of other sites, strategically linking back to your own.  You can do this on blogs and forums.  Be kind and say something constructive though, don’t just try to hawk your wares or chances are the comment will be deleted.  Also really look at all of your sites and figure out if you are pushing a consistent message about your specialty, and if it’s easy to understand.  Ask people who aren’t in your field or area to review it, and give their quick opinion.

And of course practice search engine optimization techniques which although at first might seem mysterious, can certainly be learned.  My colleague Felix Sheng over on his comments blog has posted on this topic quite a bit.  Here’s an article about understanding google’s pagerank algorithm and one on how it recently changed, another on using google analytics.  In another piece he talks about a firefox plugin called YSlow and another on google’s supplemental index ratio.  Quite a mouthful, but I assure you once you get reading it’ll fall into place.   

Want to get more insight?  Just google yourself by typing your full name into google to see what comes up.  Then I’d recommend checking out how the experts show up.  I follow Keith Ferrazzi, Seth Godin, and Steve Rubel quite a bit.  Go ahead and google them, and you’ll see their books come up, their blogs, and all their online "properties" which push their brands.  Haven’t written a book, well I suggest you get to work!  Haven’t given a lecture, that’s next on your list then.

You should also make ample use of social bookmarking sites like del.icio.us, digg.com, stumbleupon and technorati.  By adding these widgets to the bottom of your blog posts, you allow your readers to tell the world they liked your stuff.  This process feeds back on itself, and builds your traffic as more readers find out about you and your ideas.

It’s all a slow process, so don’t expect to get it all at once.  But if you take some of these suggestions and apply them, little by little you’ll build up a following.  Happy Holidays, and happy optimizing!

2. Conferences/Speaking Engagements

Last April was the Collaborate 2007 conference in Las Vegas Nevada. I ended up giving two talks, one on Monday, and one on Tuesday. I’ve uploaded video of both of them.

In other news, we’ve submitted a series of five abstracts to the IOUG Collaborate 2008 Conference and another five to the O’Reilly MySQL Conference in April 2008.  You can find them on our relaunched Oracle  + Open Source site by clicking "abstract", or by following this link.

Eight Ways to Hack Oracle – Part I

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part I

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part II

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part I

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part II

4. Audio Interviews

In our most recent interview we had the opportunity to talk with Norman Yamada CTO of Millburn Corporation.

We’ve also moved our podcast to Odeo for Audio Podcast hosting. It is a great service, and provides all the RSS and subscribe links automatically. So please subscribe if you haven’t already!

Words That Work: It’s Not What You Say, It’s What People Hear by Frank Luntz

Luntz has been writing copy, and working as a proverbial "spin doctor" for politicians of all stripes. But after you dig into his book, you begin to really appreciate the different perspectives of people, and how very important the words you choose can often be. Whatever your position, and whatever your need to communicate with other people may be, this book is surely for you. His writing style is very down-to-earth, with lots of stories, and anecdotes to keep you turning the pages. Highly recommended.

Managing IT as a Business by Mark Lutchen

Mr. Lutchen spent years as CIO PricewaterhouseCoopers. So when he speaks about IT it’s from real-world experience. IT in most organizations has been a support function and a cost center. In common terms that means it is effectively a necessary evil, providing services so the business can thrive. By this arrangement CIOs typically are not directly involved in decision making, and make budget requests to build and extend infrastructure. But this traditional model is short sighted, and leads to various recurring problems. Bringing the CIO to the decision making table requires both courage on the part of existing leadership, and the CIO technologist to step up to the plate, with business vision, and an ability to communicate in commonsense language. Beyond the buzzwords and business-speak, this is quite a good read.

A little inane humor to brighten up your day…

Google Announces Plan To Destroy All Information It Can’t Index.  It doesn’t get much better than that! 

We all want to optimize our sites for Google.  I mean other than a select few, that’s where most of our traffic comes from, so the more our site plays well with Google, the more users, readers, customers, and clients will find their way to us.

Most of the SEO material I’ve read has been pretty sparse, and unclear.  But I’ve been following the topic over at my good Felix’s #comments blog, and I’m starting to get it.  So you can too!  Take a read: Google loves me, again!

If you haven’t been following the news on the topic, take a look over at this NY Times piece: Silicon Valley Start-Ups Awash in Dollars, Again.  Personally I don’t think there is much hysteria this time around, sure there’s some, but not much.  The industry is more mature now, and computers in general have lost their initial wow factor, so people are general more sober, and able to step back and see what is actually useful, can make money, is making money, or might well make money.  That’s the root of investing smart.

8. Past Issues

Issue 38: Are You Fast Failing

Issue 37: A Real Open Book

Issue 36: Rarity of Excellence

Issue 34: Hindsight Is Always 20/20

Issue 33: Market For Experts

Issue 32: Different Heritages

Archive: Past Issues

MySQL Disaster Recovery: click here

It’s now the end of our third year publishing the Open Insights newsletter. We thought we’d celebrate by relaunching our popular blog Oracle + Open Source.  The design is new, there’s a lot more content, things are easier to find, and overall it is indexing great on Google, even better!

Like what you see here? Forward us to a friend. And let us know if you have any suggestions or comments. They are always welcome.

In This Issue:

1. Feature: Are You Fast Failing?

2. Conferences/Speaking

3. New Articles

4. Audio Interviews

5. Current Reading

6. Lightweight Humor

7. Miscellaneous

8. Past Issues

9. Technical Articles

10. About Heavyweight Internet Group

1. Feature: Are you Fast Failing?

That term, fast failing, it has a sort of counterintuitive feel to it.  If your failing, why would you want to do it quickly.  Then again, that’s why new terms and concepts catch on, it is how a new meme makes the rounds.

The term fast fail seems to have worked it’s way into management and innovation circles via a circuitous path starting in computing.  By making components fail-fast, the overall system becomes more fault tolerant. 

In innovation the idea is to follow your nose towards the new users, or those on the bleeding edge, who always like to try new things.  These are Malcolm Gladwell’s mavens, whose book I reviewed back in Open Insights 18.  When you have networks of these types of users, such as on sites like Facebook, fast failing allows you to quickly weed out those unpopular or somehow unworkable ideas and concepts, and concentrate efforts on the ones that succeed in the real world.  I blogged about facebook as guest blogger on comments.  Take a look at A Real Open Book.

It’s an intriguing concept, fast failing.  I might argue that it is more representative of the "real-world" than focus groups, or opinion polls.  You get real information in real situations.  That said, such a focus group of proverbial power users or early adopters may skew the results away from ideas that have appeal to more conservative users.

If you want to read more about this topic, I suggest taking a look at the October 13th Economist.  There is a whole special report on Innovation, which is quite good.  This piece on open innovation is available online: The Love-in.

2. Conferences/Speaking Engagements

Last April was the Collaborate 2007 conference in Las Vegas Nevada. I ended up giving two talks, one on Monday, and one on Tuesday. I’ve uploaded video of both of them.

In other news, we’ve submitted a series of five abstracts to the IOUG Collaborate 2008 Conference and another five to the O’Reilly MySQL Conference in April 2008.  You can find them on our relaunched Oracle  + Open Source site by clicking "abstract", or by following this link.

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part I

Oracle, MySQL and Postgres – Feature Comparison Part II

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part I

Open Source Technologies for Oracle DBAs Part II

4. Audio Interviews 4. Audio Interviews

In our most recent interview we had the opportunity to talk with Norman Yamada CTO of Millburn Corporation.

We’ve also moved our podcast to Odeo for Audio Podcast hosting. It is a great service, and provides all the RSS and subscribe links automatically. So please subscribe if you haven’t already!

Get Anyone To Do Anything – by David Lieberman

With a title somewhat manipulative sounding, it might draw you or put you off at first depending.  But Lieberman’s book is really just insight into influence, a la Carnegie’s classic How to Make Friends and Influence People.  He breaks down human nature, to help managers better motivate through common understanding rather than dictate, and helps those who might otherwise be fooled or tricked to avoid that fate.

Instant Analysis – by David Lieberman

With a checklist of 100 behaviors and habits, Lieberman is at it again, helping us understand human nature, in this case our own, in order to be less self-defeating, more dynamic, and ultimately more successful people.  Who could argue with that?

A little inane humor to brighten up your day…

Did you really name your son "Robert’);drop table students;".  Ok so maybe that’s only funny to an uber geek.  Ooops!

We all want to optimize our sites for Google.  I mean other than a select few, that’s where most of our traffic comes from, so the more our site plays well with Google, the more users, readers, customers, and clients will find their way to us.

Most of the SEO material I’ve read has been pretty sparse, and unclear.  But I’ve been following the topic over at my good Felix’s #comments blog, and I’m starting to get it.  So you can too!  Take a read: Google loves me, again!

If you haven’t been following the news on the topic, take a look over at this NY Times piece: Silicon Valley Start-Ups Awash in Dollars, Again.  Personally I don’t think there is much hysteria this time around, sure there’s some, but not much.  The industry is more mature now, and computers in general have lost their initial wow factor, so people are general more sober, and able to step back and see what is actually useful, can make money, is making money, or might well make money.  That’s the root of investing smart.

Issue 37: A Real Open Book

Issue 36: Rarity of Excellence

Issue 34: Hindsight Is Always 20/20

Issue 33: Market For Experts

Issue 32: Different Heritages

Issue 31: Auto or Traffic Engineer

Issue 30: Crowdsourcing

]Archive: Past Issues

MySQL Disaster Recovery: click here

OPEN INSIGHTS Newsletter
Issue 37 – A Real Open Book
October 1, 2007

by Sean Hull

Founder and Senior Consultant
Heavyweight Internet Group

It’s hard to believe we’re approaching the end of our third year publishing the Open Insights newsletter. We have a lot of new topics coming up, and plenty planned for the new year, so stay tuned.

Like what you see here? Forward us to a friend. And let us know if you have any suggestions or comments. They are always welcome.

In This Issue:

1. Feature:A Real Open Book

2. Speaking Engagements

3. New Articles
4. Audio Interviews
5. Current Reading
6. Lightweight Humor

7. Miscellaneous

8. Past Issues
9. Technical Articles
10. About Heavyweight Internet Group

1. Feature: A Real Open Book

They’re all over the news these days, the latest community networking site to make a lot of waves, Facebook. If you’re watching from the outside, you might see another in the long string of community networking sites, from Friendster to Tribe, MySpace and all the rest. So why is facebook pulling any surprises?

Well for starters Facebook recently opened up it’s platform in 2006 to non .EDU domains. That was a big change, but what’s driving things now is it’s open API. It’s all about applications on Facebook now, with almost 5000 to choose from. And that number is growing.

On Facebook there are applications to integrate flixter, your movie watching preferences, or twitter, your moment by moment update of your movements. There’s a skype app, and one for various instant messengers. Like to use Yelp as a platform for restaurant reviews, there’s a plugin for you too. Want to remember birthdays, Facebook is there for you. From purity tests, to gifts, to vampires, to “poking” the virtual knock at the cubicle next door, facebook is becoming a one stop shop for your internet life. That’s something that is certainly different.

Stu Philips argues that it’s like Fruit Flies for Applications. It allows developers to try out their ideas quickly and easily, and see which ones take off, and which ones fall by the wayside. With a huge community base of users it’s no wonder.

Back in 2004 Joel Spolsky argued that Microsoft had already lost the API wars and clearly they are less at the forefront these days. But another force might be at work here. One that comes into play as systems, and their interconnectedness becomes ever more complex. In those cases, standards or “open standards” become more and more crucial to all players on the field. This is exactly what the Economist has said recently in an article Stay Vigilant that although “the computing world has now become so interconnected that it will be hard for a single company to control it” we should still keep an eye on the monopolies anyway.

With all that said, it’s clear that a company like facebook may be building a proverbial dashboard that in some ways Google Homepage now iGoogle and Netvibes tried to do with some success. The thing is with Facebook, it has a much wider application because so many different types of content can be integrated there.

With the web 2.0 landscape changing everyday it is anyones quess where the cards will fall. But one thing is for sure, the companies that are more open, and interoperate better, seem to be holding on stronger, and that’s to everyone’s benefit.

2. Speaking Engagements

Last April was the

Collaborate 2007 conference in Las Vegas Nevada. I ended up giving two talks, one on Monday, and one on Tuesday. I’ve uploaded video of both of them.

3. New Articles

Oracle 10g RAC versus DataGuard for High Availability

4. Audio Interviews

In our most recent interview we had the opportunity to talk with Norman Yamada CTO of Millburn Corporation.

Norman shares with us his experiences providing world-class computing solutions, and the pros and cons of doing it with open source.

We’ve also moved our podcast to Odeo for Audio Podcast hosting. It is a great service, and provides all the RSS and subscribe links automatically. So please subscribe if you haven’t already!

5. Current Reading

What Color Is Your Parachute – Richard Nelson Bolles

For all job hunters out there, and on some level we’re all job hunters, this book is about stepping up to the plate with the right preparation, helping you answer those questions about problem solving, and personality that interviewers love to throw at you.

Crazy Busy – Edward Hallowell

Should you read a book about how to give yourself a guilt free break? Well that all depends on you. If you sleep with your blackberry under your pillow, it might not be a bad book for you. I heard an interview with this guy on NPR, and thought he had some really great observations.

6. Lightweight Humor

It seems The Onion has

found some factual errors on the internet. Impossible!

7. Miscellaneous

I’ve turned up some interesting links from the Economist. Enjoy!

Various Charts

From internet security risks, to the smoking habits of asians, the prices of illicit drugs to the toll of the war in Iraq. For the numbers, it’s all here.

Mark Penn’s Microtrends

Mark Penn has authored a book called Microtrends, and in it he uncovers counterintuitive ideas which are shaping the world in front of us.

Technology Monitor

This section is a new feature offering articles on emerging technologies, from alternative energy to nanotech and forensic science.

8. Past Issues

Issue 33: Market For Experts

Issue 32: Different Heritages

Issue 31: Auto or Traffic Engineer

Issue 30: Crowdsourcing

Issue 29: Mainroads or Sidestreets

Issue 28: High Availability

Issue 27: Fragile Foundations

Issue 26: Logistical Fitness

Issue 25: Which Red Button
Issue 24: Consulting Conflicts of Interest
Issue 23: Devil In The Details
Issue 22: Beware of Software Fashion
Issue 21: Open Season, Open Sesame?
Issue 20: Better Web Better Business
Archive: Past Issues

9. Technical Articles

Oracle DBA Interview: click here
Tools for the Intrepid DBA: click here
Oracle9i + RAC on Linux/Firewire: click here
Migrating MySQL to Oracle: click here
MySQL Disaster Recovery: click here

10. About Heavyweight Internet Group

In a nutshell, Oracle. Everything related to and surrounding the database technology we specialize in, but specifically setup, admin and tuning of Oracle technology. I have 10 years experience with Oracle, wrote a book on the technology, and write and lecture frequently. I’m founder and senior consultant of the company. In capacities where your company might hire Deloitte, AIG, or Oracle Consulting we can bring the same level of service and experience, at about half the price. Simple equation.

Looking for a top-flight DBA? Visit us on the web at iheavy.com.