Hacking the Good Days...

After thoughts from Facebook’s F8

cathyma — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 14:58:32 +0000

Just a quick summary (by no means conclusive) on the key findings from yesterday’s facebook product announcements in the simplest humanly readable format:

Facebook’s Timeline will become the key focus of the Facebook profile experience. They are trying to make all of your historical data on facebook lots more accessible (eventually you will see a year-to-year list on the right hand side so you can go back and look up what you’ve done last year this time, or add additional content/photos to your page).
Open Graph Apps Publishers and developers are now given the options to build apps that enrich the timeline. Imagine recipes I’ve cooked, music I’ve listened to, videos I’ve watched. A good social app would make it much easier for people to record what they have done, to find our what their friends are up to, and to share such action. More on (Btw if you put together a quick mock apps and choose an Open Graph action (e.g. ‘read’ a ‘book’, you will be given an option to preview the new Profile)

Open Graphs Actions and Objects Like and Recommend used to be the only two verbs enabled by Facebook’s Open Graph; they will now slowly roll out other actions including ‘listen, watch, read’. Eventually this will expand to other verbs that we can customise ourselves.

What does it mean to publishers?

ReadWriteWeb has a gloomy view of ‘once a user opts in, they will not realise they are sharing everything to everyone
Guardian seems to find a way to work around by essentially building their website inside facebook

They can monetise on with their own ads serve (See the MPUs and Skys – it’s theirs and Facebook has nothing to do with that)
Users interact with these content in a Facebook environment, which makes it more likely for them to realise their action might be shared across their networks
Users are clearly sign-posted that once they have read an article it would be added to their timeline, but also given the options to remove the article immediately (see screen grab below)

Exciting time; looks like this will definitely drive engagement up (as the sentimental drive is quite compelling to most of us) for Facebook. As for publishers, it’s about building clear objectives on what’s beneficial to business as it can be expensive building a Facebook App that nails the user experience, but the reward can be significant as well.

The story about the four wives

cathyma — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 22:15:37 +0000

The priest stood up and told us a story about the man and his 4 wives.

+++++++++++++

We Chinese have a lot of stories to tell. Handy metaphors. Stories that make you think.

This one starts with a man who married his childhood sweetheart. He loved her dearly, unfortunately she was very fragile and was always sick. He decided to marry his second wife ,who was very shrewd, to help take care of him and his business. This wife managed the day-to-day of this man and his family brilliantly.

He also learnt that a very beautiful woman in her village was in need of financial support. He thought, ‘Might as well!’ and married this beautiful woman. Unfortunately, they didn’t really have much to say to one another. He felt good having helped her family out, but that was it. So when he actually met the soulmate of his life, he was so happy that he married this woman as his forth wife. Someone he could connect to, someone he could confide in.

One day he was asked to embark on a long journey, a journey that he knew he was not going to come back to, and that he’d be gone forever. He could only pick one wife to go with him.

His first wife said to him, ‘I love you very much my dear, but I am so weak I will only be your liability. Please go without me and I wish you very well.’

What about his beautiful wife? At least he could enjoy her lovely presence? ‘No, thank you. As you know we don’t have much to say to one another. I just don’t think it would be nice for us to travel such a long trip together.’

She had a point.

He then asked his soulmate. ‘Yes, I would absolutely love to come with you, but I can only walk with you so far in the journey as I will need to turn back. Is that okay with you?’

He thought, no, that’s not okay. He needed someone who would be there for him for the whole journey.

He asked his last wife. The wife that managed his day-to-day life.

‘The moment I met you I am destined to be with you. There is nothing that can set us apart. We will go onto this journey together and I will be there to hold your hands when you need me.’

+++++++++++++

The first wife, is actually our body. We are born with a very fragile and delicate body. It can only go so far with us, and there are many things that can bring it down.

The beautiful wife is a metaphore for fame and fortune. Beautiful at first, glamourous to the others. We can’t, however, speak to them, or feel loved or connected with all that externalities.

The soulmate wife is our friends and families. People we love, people we care about.

The journey is our life. We are all going to cease. Despite the love and care in the world, our families and friends can only travel with us so far. They have yet to turn back or embark on their journey themselves.

The competent wife? She is our heart. Our heart and soul are the only constant, the only permanent fixture that will travel far with us no matter what. It is much more worthwhile to cultivate our heart, our soul, than the pursue of things. Life starts, and hopefully ends, with compassion.

Aren’t we all spiritual beings having a human experience?

To my father, Simon Ma (1953-2011)

What really matters

cathyma — Sat, 28 May 2011 23:15:28 +0000

Many times I am asked, what is social media?

It’s funny how just 3 years ago my tech friends would literally shudder when they heard the term; as too often marketing terms get spinned around and completely lose their real meaning. Think of terms like ‘Web 2.0‘, ‘taxonomy‘, ‘the cloud‘.

But there’s something more about it. This time. This term. Social Media. It’s been staying and sticking around for the past 3 years. As of recent, some of us would just dropped the word ‘media’ and focus on ‘social’ instead. What is it?

The truth is, business and marketing aside, if we look at the intrinic needs of most of us, it’s about to attach and connect, to be soothed and feel belonged.

This is why when you broadcast about your product on Facebook people would block you; talking about yourself all the time you get unfollowed. But if you provide meaning, value, purposes to others, or even just being plain fun, cool, or randomly interesting, you get more traction and respect. The internet (and it’s more user-friendly layer popularised by platforms like Facebook and Twitter – which is how I define ‘social media’) is technically new, but not sociologically. Satisfy someone’s wants and needs, and they would like to keep connected to you albeit the medium. Be there for others, and they will follow. It’s too much of a cliche, but really, give to take.

Image on yogicquote

A letter to the clever hacker

cathyma — Sat, 21 May 2011 22:43:59 +0000

Dear Mr Hacker,

In the past couple of months I’ve noticed that my blog has been unfortunately ‘hacked’. And quite cleverly so.

Some one injected search-engine-viewable keywords that are not visible to the human eyes. As a result when you search my name, my blog appears as a really rich repository of useful herbal medicine for some.

I have been a bit bemused by the whole situation, though later realised it wasn’t as fun when I tried (still trying) to undo the damage. I have three years of blog posts and comments that I still hope to import and restore, but that at the moment looking more difficult than I imagined.

In the past 12 months I’ve joined a new company, my team and I worked together to launch a new social platform on two of their core sites (goodtoknow.co.uk and trustedreviews.com). We have also established IPC Media as Facebook’s first UK media partner – as a result we get to sneak peek new features and experiment and play. There’s also so much to do with the analytics front as well. So much time to learn, so little time to muck around.

As a result, I don’t think I have the resources (or can be asked) to worry about ‘my’ blog in the ‘ego-system’ of ‘social media’ at the moment. I don’t really care about myself (I guess I’m not fit enough to be a ‘social media guru’). Would you please leave this little pitiful blog alone, Mr. hacker? I don’t think I actually drive that much traffic to your site, your effort is probably wasted on my blog.

With warm regards,

Cathy

Looking for Good Developers for IPC Meda

cathyma — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 17:55:46 +0000

My dear friends, we’re hiring developers! Here’s the job spec.

We care about our developers and want the best for them. We recognise you are as good as people you work with when you’re in a team. Our developers are also our consultants, we look up to them and count on them to ship kick-ass products.

We are currently looking into streamlining core infrastructure, our single-sign-on system (with Facebook Connect Integration), as well as introducing social media to our brands… We need someone who works well in a team, conscientious, and perpetually wants to improve things around them.

Our technical team lead/ architect/ ninja comes with a very rich repertoire of knowledge in search, information architecture, and web standards.
My area of expertise is community design, sociology, social policy and stakeholder management (to keep developers away from noise). We just recently establised IPC Media as the first UK publisher to be Facebook’s media partner. Enough about us – at IPC you get to meet different models/stars/Angling experts/Horse fanatics – it’s never boring! Plus we organise regular learning events (next month we’re inviting A/B testing expert from LoveFilm and Google to come speak to us).

If this rings a bell to anyone, please kindly invite them to contact me directly! My gmail starts with ‘cathyma’ and that’s it.

More about IPC media – We have a portfolio of sites (Wallpaper, NME, Nuts, Marie Claire, Decanter for wine) and we’re growing a mobile development team as well.
http://www.ipcmedia.com/brands/
We’re also just around Borough Market… Chorizo burgers, anyone?

Please pass along/retweet. Thank you!

It’s harder to be kind than clever

cathyma — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 22:32:16 +0000

‘It’s harder to be kind than clever. [...] Cleverness is a gift. Kindness is a choice. Gifts are easy, they are given after all. Choices can be hard. You can seduce yourself with your gift if you’re not careful.’

Founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos

(Talk starts at 6:26)

What makes a First-Class Tester

cathyma — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 23:56:13 +0000

Note: This blog post is more for the techkies. Please skip if you’re not interested in product management or agile…

Been reading Manage It!, a product management book highly recommended by Phobeo (thanks! love it!) and I was particularly inspired by the roles of a first-class tester. Page 266 and paraphasing here. A first-class tester is someone who can

Be sufficiently creative to assess the design and architecture of the system before the code is written
When the code is implemented, design and implement their test harnesses, both automatic and manual, creating test the stress the system in ways the developers do not expect
Measure what they’ve tested, assess the risk of what they have tested
Know whether they have tested enough of the system to help you understand the risks of product release
Keep up with developers, assuming the developers are using continuous integration and not checking in a week’s worth (or more) of code at one time
Have a peer relationship with developers. They work as partners, not adversaries
Alter the way the developers create the product

‘When testers help developers see their problems early, the developers are more likely to include the testers in other requirements and design discussions.’

This is so inspiring that I feel that I am suffering from first-class-tester-envy. Testing should not be seen as a tedious job on pointing out flaws in system. A great tester is not a doctor that tells patience what’s wrong with them. A great tester is a nutritionist and a fitness instructor or yoga teacher (whatever school you prefer) that keeps the system and the process ‘fit’. Ideally by the time you run automatic and system test, all readings should be healthy. A first class tester reduces the risks of finding big problems towards the end of the product development cycle and be the source of truth in the team. A great tester is an inspiration and part of the core fabric in a team.

“Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear” — Ambrose Redmoon

The greatest strength is complete vulnerability

cathyma — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 23:21:56 +0000

Photo credit to Leo Reynolds

Just came back from a special talk at the Foundling Museum that really blew my mind away.

I have always been very interested in the attachment theory, in terms of the way we bonded as children affects the way we relate to others as we grow up. I guess it’s all a bit common sense; you can’t look forward without looking back.

This talk was by the elegant and graceful Dr Alysa Levene, ‘Bonds of love and affection at the London Foundling Hospital in the eighteenth-century‘.

Over 18,000 babies and young children were left at the Foundling Hospital between its opening in 1741 and the end of the eighteenth century. We know almost nothing about the emotional experiences of any of them. However, we can tease out something of the emotional bonds that existed between these children and their parents by examining the letters and tokens left with them. Very few of these children were ever taken back by their families, but this was not the end of their experiences of family life. Most were sent to be wet nursed in foster homes in the countryside, and here too, we can see some evidence of their experiences via the letters written by the inspectors of nurses back to the hospital. Not all of these experiences were happy, but this talk will illustrate how much the Foundling Hospital records can tell us about mothering, nurture and the model of childhood in the eighteenth century.

We were told that some mothers did try their best to at least leave the hospital with their children names, in hope of being able to recognise and retrieve their own children. Sadly very few managed to come up with the means to pick up these children, and also not that many of them survived. Given that back that in London almost half of the children die before they reached teen age, it was hard to imagine the hardship back then.

What’s most touching about this museum is that it is full of display of the tokens and threads created by these mothers out of desperation and love for their children. You can see little hand sewn heart that had been tagged along side of the record of the children, as well as little notes left with them,

‘Go gentle babe…

And all thy life be happiness and love’

It was heart breaking. But also up-lifting to experience the residue of parental love, despite hundreds of years have elapsed in between. If you have time for a little stroll around Russell Square, I’d recommend this museum most highly.

And if you’re not based in London, you may want to check out this TED talk on vulnerability which I found as fascinating,

‘Connection is why we are all here.’

‘In order for connection to happen, we have to allow ourselves to be seen. To be really seen.’

‘People who have a strong sense of worthiness and the people who do not, there is only one difference. It is that people who have a sense of worthiness believe that they were worth of love and belonging.’

Enjoy!

Lessons from the wisemen, 2010

cathyma — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 22:49:28 +0000

Some of you who followed my blog may notice that I tend to write a reflective piece (like this and this) towards the end/beginning of the year. Every year I was surprised by much learning/people/inspiration that came into my life; for that, I thank you. Here is my list for 2010,

1. A filled up or empty bottle won’t make noises. Bottles that are half-filled are the noisiest.

That’s actually a Chinese proverb. I learnt that there words are messy and actions speak louder. Sometimes in order to be heard it’s not about being loud, but to be quiet. When you speak little but only speak when there is something meaningful to say, people listen. If you shout, you almost prove that point that you are not worth listening to. Most powerful way to be listened to, however, is to speak with actions. Sometimes the best thing you can do for a friend who is grieving is just to say nothing and sit next to them.

2. Inaction can be the most powerful action

When life gets bit tough and confusing, it can feel like you’re lying under water when a pebble hitting the river bed. At times like this, it’s best to be still. With stillness you can look inwards and listen to yourself; what is it, why are you not happy? You may get a new perspective and realise that you are not even standing in the river you want to be in. Time to move on.

3. You can’t control everything in life, but you can be good to yourself

This classic research shows that lack of control is more likely to induce ulcer in animals despite the same level of shock administrated. It is unfortunate that we have no control on many things in life. From a taoist point of view, pursuing the infinite (the many things we won’t be able to change) with the finite (our limited being) is a dangerous path. Next time when you are angry with the ‘thing’ at work, at other people, at the tube strike, just let go and accept the fact that you have no control over. And notice the shortness of breath that happens when you are angry. Why don’t give your feet a tennis ball massage, get a nice haircut, or treat yourself your favourite magazine/book?

4. It feels good to assume the goodness in human nature

This mini saga story that I posted before is worth repeating here on this topic,

The waitress repeated, “Medium $3, Large $3.50.” The kid had emptied his pocket. He had $4 in total. The waitress was getting impatient. Five minutes. Finally, the kid asked for a medium scoop. Later, the waitress came to clean and swallowed hard. There was $1 bill left as a tip.

Read more: http://www.rajeshsetty.com/2010/10/04/mini-saga-61-thoughtfulness/#ixzz1A6YwG2Po
Under Creative Commons License: Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike

My little coping mechanism in modern society (don’t I sound like a caveman?) is to think of a story that would sufficiently justify someone’s ill action (though it’s all done in my tiny brain so that it wouldn’t risk being ‘patronising’). For example, if someone pushes you to get onto the tube, I’d think, ‘ah maybe she’s standing all day at work and really need the seat’. Of course, sometimes people do push your buttons too much – in that case I’ll just go back to point number 3 and pull out my box of chocolate. That, for sure, would make everything better.

5. Judgment, attachment and resistance are the barriers to the present

During this year’s (yoga) practice we studied more about the concept of duality. Heaven and Earth, Joy and Sorrow, the Past and the Future. But what intrigues me is how hard it is to stay in the present. How many hours do we waste worrying? Or busy planning our next steps? I love the saying (ironically as a product manager) ‘life is what happens when you’re busy planning’. As well as ‘things you worry are usually not the problems. Real problems are things that would not even have come across your mind.’

And how we love judging. ‘The coffee isn’t good enough.’ Attachment. ‘This is not how I used to feel when I was with xx’. Resistance – the feeling that you’d rather be somewhere else or doing something else. All these vices. It’s nice if we can all take a moment to feel the earth we stand on, air we inhale, people we love, and just being with our own selves without any judgment.

6. Focus on the minimum, incremental chuck of improvement

I cannot even begin to articulate how much I learnt from Agile (for my non techkie friends – is a software development philosophy/methodology) and how that can be apply to my personal life. The main gist of Agile that inspires me is the notion of focusing on the little incremental, deliverable improvements that yield the most results. The example I love is if there’s one thing that you can do to tidy up your room – make your bed. So that you come home and you always have something nice and tidy to tug in. Don’t worry about buying a house, but start thinking about how much you can comfortably put away each month. Don’t worry about buying that amazing experience for your mum, but to send her a text message to let her know that you love her your way. The magical switch is not how much you plan to do, but how little and how you do it well.

7. Change is the Constant in Life

Finally – I guess if I were to put a theme to the year 2010, lots of it is about upheavals and changes, some of them for the worse first, then ease into blessing later. Some are just straight-up happy shocks (hello to my pregnant friends and babies of 2010!). Life happens when you least expects it. I hope year 2011 would awaits you with a few lovely, delightful surprises around the corner. Hope you enjoy reading my highlight of 2010… and here’s your treat!

Wish you a very happy 2011.

Profoundly moved..

cathyma — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 12:41:06 +0000

by Liu XiaoBo’s speech in accepting the Nobel Peace Prize 2010, with exerpts below (more about Liu),

On ‘I have no enemies’,

“Hatred can rot away at a person’s intelligence and conscience. Enemy mentality will poison the spirit of a nation, incite cruel mortal struggles, destroy a society’s tolerance and humanity, and hinder a nation’s progress toward freedom and democracy. That is why I hope to be able to transcend my personal experiences as i look upon our nation’s development and social change, to counter the regime’s hostility with utmost goodwill, and to dispel hatred with love.”

On mutual respect between Liu and the Chinese officials whom imprisoned him, and why he has faith in China,

“Although I continue to maintain that I am innocent and that the charges against me are unconstitutional, during the one plus year since I have lost my freedom, I have been locked up at two different locations and gone through four pretrial police interrogators, three prosecutors, and two judges, but in handling my case, they have not been disrespectful, overstepped time limitations, or tried to force a confession. Their manner has been moderate and reasonable; moreover, they have often shown goodwill. [...] It is precisely because of such convictions and personal experience that I firmly believe that China’s political progress will not stop, and I, filled with optimism, look forward to the advent of a future free China. For there is no force that can put an end to the human quest for freedom, and China will in the end become.a nation ruled by law, where human rights reign supreme. I also hope that this sort of progress can be reflected in this trial as I await the impartial ruling of the
collegial bench ‑ a ruling that will withstand the test of history.”

And finally, on love,

“If I may be permitted to say so, the most fortunate experience of these past twenty years has been the selfless love I have received from my wife, Liu Xia. She could not be present as an observer in court today, but I still want to say to you, my dear, that I firmly believe your love for me will remain the same as it has always been. Throughout all these years that I have lived without freedom, our love was full of bitterness imposed by outside circumstances, but as I savor its aftertaste, it remains boundless. I am serving my sentence in a tangible prison, while you wait in the intangible prison of the heart. Your love is the sunlight that leaps over high walls and penetrates the iron bars of my prison window, stroking every inch of my skin, warming every cell of my body, allowing me to always keep peace, openness, and brightness in my heart, and filling every minute of my time in prison with meaning. My love for you, on the other hand, is so full of remorse and regret that it at times makes me stagger under its weight. I am an insensate stone in the wilderness, whipped by fierce wind and torrential rain, so cold that no one dares touch me. But my love is solid and sharp, capable of piercing through any obstacle. Even if I were crushed into powder, I would still use my ashes to embrace you.”