You're not using ActiveWords?!!  You don't know who Buzz is?!! You're in for a real treat!  Tech evangelist, Robert Scoble will interview my buddy, Buzz Bruggeman, CEO of ActiveWords, on www.fastcompany.tv today at 10:00 AM PST.

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Buzz is always an interesting guy to visit with. To refer to him the CEO of ActiveWords is too limiting. Buzz is perhaps the best networker in the tech world - he's certainly the most prolific. (There are probably only 2-3 degrees of separation between Buzz and anyone in the tech world you'd want to meet.) I've had the opportunity to work with Buzz on several occasions as we share a common passion for all things mind mapping, GTD, and productivity.

Buzz and I first began talking about adding ActiveWords support for Lotus Notes several years ago. We finally did it and, with ActiveWords and eProductivity, millions of Notes Users can finally control the most productive aspects of Lotus Notes, from anywhere - even when Notes isn't running! I wonder if he will demonstrate or talk about ActiveWords and Notes on the show? (Hint to Buzz)

Anyway, here's the link to the live broadcast. I believe the replay will be up shortly, too.

Update: Here is a link to a PDF of my ActiveWords Wordbase

As I prepare to take our eProductivity software public (It's been a private client-only solution for many years) I needed to find ways to support a growing community of eProductivity users. Since we are already a Notes and Domino shop, naturally I first checked to see what was available within the Notes community. This search led me to two outstanding tools: IdeaJam, by elguiji software and DomBulletin from OpenNTF.org.

IdeaJam
is an amazing product that engages community by allowing people to post ideas and vote on others. IdeaJam wraps all of this in the normal social tools like RSS, comments, email alerts, tag clouds and so on. What's neat about the voting is that you can cast a vote to Promote or Demote an idea. So, over the course of a day/week/month, you can see how the popular ideas float to the top. If you are a power Notes user, then you are probably already familiar with the IdeaJam site that Notes users are using to tell IBM what features are most important to them. In the year that the public IdeaJam site's been up I think they have had more ideas and votes posted than McDonald sold Hamburgers in the same period! (Well, close.)

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In the very short time that we've had our IdeaJam site up we've had several excellent ideas submitted and some of these are already in our development queue. I plan to blog more about IdeaJam as I get more experience with the process of involving users in the design process. You're welcome to check out our fledgling eProductivityJam.

Continue Reading "Two social productivity tools: IdeaJam and DomBulletin" »

The downard spiral of deproductivity

Friday, July 11th, 2008
This says it all...

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Source: phdcomics.com.  Via: re:Domino

I read this morning that Alan Lepofsky has left IBM for Socialtext. As a friend of Alan's it both exciting and saddening to read this announcement. Alan's influence on me personally was one of the contributing factors in my decision to launch this blog by this title. Although I had no prior knowledge I have often wondered if Alan would not be more satisfied working for a smaller company. It always seemed that each time I spoke with him in person that he had more ideas and passion than he could comfortably convey through his blog or current position at IBM. Apparently Alan had those same thoughts as well.   IBM's loss is Socialtext's gain. I admit that, secretly, I was hoping someday eProductivity would be large enough to attract the likes of an Alan or Ed. It still is. I can think of few who had done a more exemplary job at building a sense of community around the Lotus product line.  Alan, I wish you the very best of success in all of your endeavors and I look forward to learning more about their products as I continue to read your blog.

All is not lost

Fortunately, the Lotus community still has Ed Brill to carry the torch for all things Notes and Domino and to act as our dedicated FUDBuster against attacks of misinformation. Please continue on, Ed!

What about those valuable Notes tips Alan used to share?

Alan's departure leaves a big hole in the Notes community in terms of sharing valuable insights on using Lotus Notes productively. For those of you that follow my blogs, you know that I often tip my hat to Alan's informative how-to posts. We share a common passion for helping people get Notes.  I've often considered the idea of asking Alan if I could syndicate some of his content here at Notes on Productivity to expand the reach of his blog, but he's done just fine so far without my help. As eProductivity launches this month, I plan to step up my own blogging about using Lotus Notes productively and perhaps share in the valuable service which Alan provided to the Notes community.

Alan, on behalf of many grateful Notes users around the world, thank for your service! I wish you the best of success!

A few days ago, I posted an eProductivity Preview Invitation for folks to see what we have done to create the ultimate GTD implementation tool for Lotus Notes. As part of the sign-up, I asked folks a number of questions, including which version of Lotus Notes. Here are the results so far.

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As you can see, there are concentrations at each end of the spectrum with pockets for each version. This is to be expected. This is not a comprehensive survey, but it is interesting to see what the folks most interested in getting things done with Notes are using. Fortunately, we have coded eProductivity to support versions 6.02 - 8.5x of Lotus Notes across all platforms (yes, even Mac and Linux).

I plan to update this over time to see what more we can learn.

The sign-ups for the eProductivity preview program continue to pour in. We decided to increase the # of preview kits we will offer to 200 so that everyone that completes the application will be able to participate.

It's been interesting to read the forms that people have filled out to learn who uses Windows (99%) and who uses Mac (< 1%) and which versions of Notes folks are using. (Lots of activity in Notes R6.x and R8.x) and what challenges people face trying to get things done in Lotus Notes. I'll have lots to share as times goes on.

Meanwhile, I'd like to offer a special thanks to the bloggers that have picked this up, and I encourage you to visit their blogs:

Michael Sampson:
eProductivity for Notes is About Ready To Go ... Eric Has a Special Offer

Chris Blatnick of Interface Matters:
eProductivity for Lotus Notes...Want To Be Way More Efficient?

Stephan Wissel:
Procrastinator Professional and (e)Productivity

Ben Poole:
Do you want to get things done?

Oliver Starr of GTD Times:
Eric Mack to Launch eProductivity: your chance to get a preview in this post

(If I have missed anyone, please let me know. If you are a GTD or Notes blogger, let me know and I'll add you to our pre-launch list.)

I am preparing the preview kits and will send them out in batches of 25 as the completed applications are received. I plan to send the first batch tomorrow morning.

Some folks wrote with questions, e.g. what versions of Notes?, will I get a free trial?, etc.. I refer you to the eProductivity Preview Invitation which has all of the details. (Be sure to scroll down the page as there is a lot to read.)

Thanks, I look forward to posting great news, soon.

Eric