Fantasy Box Office

In my junior year of college, a bunch of friends and I started a fantasy football league together. We've all had so much fun in this league that we've continued it every year since. The only downside to this league is that it excludes all of my friends who don't follow football on a level that allows them to compete in the league. This is why I was so excited when my favorite fantasy podcast started describing a game that would bring all the fantasy goodness to a more general audience. The game is called Fantasy Box Office.

The basic goal of Fantasy Box Office is to draft a list of 10 movies that will out earn all of your competitors lists in total box office earnings. Here are the official rules I've played around with and settled on after listening to some different ideas from the podcast:

1. Decide on the length of the season – I'm going to go with Independence Day (July 4) to Labor Day (September 5) since this time block holds a lot of great Summer releases. But you can shorten or extend the season to suit your needs.

2. Draft your roster – Use a site like comingsoon.net to help you create a list of 10 movies you think will make the most money during your season. To make things more interesting, you can enforce a rule excluding all sequels and prequels, eliminating easy choices like X-Men, Harry Potter, or Transformers.

3. Put your list in order – Put your list in order by what you think will be the biggest earners to the smallest earners. At the end of the season, you get a 5 Million Dollar bonus for any movie that you put in the correct order.

4. Track the results – Have the biggest geek of your group gather everyone's movie list and post them on the internet where everyone can see. Then once a week or so, use a site like boxofficemojo.com to track and update the box office earnings of everyone's list.

5. Crown the winner – At the end of your season, add up the total box office earnings of your list including any bonuses. The roster with the highest earnings is declared the winner!

So that's it for the basic “easy” version of the game. If you're a big movie buff, you can increase the difficulty by replacing your movie list with an auction style draft, or introducing additional point systems such as durability, and rankings. Rules for this style can be found here.

Stack Exchange (staying in touch)

I was listening to the Baseball Today podcast from ESPN when Eric Karabell described what he called a stack exchange.  The basic idea is that Eric will keep a stack of his favorite articles he uncovers throughout the week.  This stack of articles contains mostly interesting takes on player performance and comparisons, with maybe a bold prediction or two thrown in.  At the end of the week, he'll send this stack of articles to his buddy, and his buddy will send his own stack of articles back to Eric.  They'll both read each others articles and have something to talk about whenever they run into each other on the road.  I thought this was very cool, and after expanding on the idea a bit, I'm ready to start my very own stack exchange.

The purpose of having a stack exchange:

1.  The biggest reason pushing me to start a stack exchange is wanting to stay in touch with friends.  This is my 6th year in college now, most of my friends have graduated and scattered around the West Coast.  I love to hear about all the new adventures everyone is up to these days, but it's a little different not having those shared experiences and inside jokes like we used to.  Getting to read some of what everyone else is reading may allow me to feel a little more present in there lives. 

2.  I don't read Glamour Magazine, but I do enjoy an occasional article demystifying body language of the dating world, or an interesting poll breaking down the most popular places to meet people in my age group.  Having a stack exchange might be a convenient way to expose myself to some new and interesting worlds out there without having to do all the exploring on my own.

3.  My last reason for wanting to try this is that it's just so simple and so little effort compared to the amount of enjoyment I think I'll get out of it.  The only real two steps for doing a stack exchange are:

  -Create a mailing list with everyone who is participating in your stack exchange.

  -Every week, everyone in the exchange will forward 1-3 articles they find interesting.

Some fun suggestions to try out:

1. Number each stack exchange you make so that you can celebrate mini anniversaries.  For example you can have a group video chat on your 100th stack exchange and talk about what your favorite articles have been so far, or maybe have a little gift exchange for the 1000th.

2. Start conversation threads within your exchange.  After the first person sends out his articles, everyone else should send their own articles by replying to the first e-mail sent.  This keeps all the articles nicely organized by week which makes it easier to send comments and feedback articles.

3. Request articles! Maybe you heard something on the news about the new iPhone 5 but you don't know much about it.  You can just request your tech buddy to drop an article describing some cool new features or maybe a timetable for availability.

4.  Have a standard format for emails.  I'm going to try article title, followed by short description or note, followed by a link to the article.

And that's about it.  I'm starting my first stack exchange this weekend.  I'll try some of my own suggestions and experiment a little.  I'll try to update this post with any success or failure stories along with any tips I find useful.

Google Reader Reading Flow

After returning from vacation last week, one of my first priorities was emptying out my Google Reader. catching up on the 1000+ posts that built up over the past month would be intimidating without solid Google Reader technique, so I thought this would be a perfect time to share my best tips and tricks for speeding up the Reader process.

First step is to jump into your settings and organize your feeds into folders. I keep a folder for each category of blogs I follow including tech, productivity, sports, personal finance, forums I participate in, and a folder for my favorite blogs which I've named “Stars.”

Change a feeds folder with the 'Add to a folder' drop down menu

The next step in my system is to change the Google Readers default view to something a little more practical. Switching to list view displays the blog name, date, and article name on a single line, instead of the entire article shown in the expanded view.

Change to list view by clicking 'list' in the top right corner

Combining the list view with my favorite Google Reader keyboard shortcuts cut out extra minutes out of my reader time that can really add up.

Shift + P and Shift + N – use this shortcut to navigate between previous and next subscription feeds in your reader.

Shift + X – open and close folders with this shortcut.

Shift + O – once you've landed on the correct feed use this shortcut to open and view all posts from that feed.

P and N – use the 'p' and 'n' keys to navigate between articles in a post.

O – use the 'o' key to open the article into expanded mode so you can read the entire article. Press 'o' again to send the article back into list view.

M – if you navigate to an article that doesn't look interesting, use the 'm' key to mark that article as read.

V – use the 'v' key to open an article from the original blog it came from in a new browser tab.

CTRL + W – close the new browser tab and return to your reader with this shortcut.

S – use 's' to star an item for later reading.

G then S – hit 'g' then 's' to view all your starred items

These are all the shortcuts I need in my daily routine, but here is a link to the full set of keyboard shortcuts if you want to explore. And that's about it! It may not seem like much but I would estimate it shaves a full 10 minutes per day compared to scrolling through expanded posts with my mouse. One final tip for anyone stuck in a situation like mine. If you have thousands of posts to get through, I find it useful just going through all of it and starring items you want to check out instead of reading them. After emptying out your entire Reader this way, you can go back to your starred items with the 'g then s' shortcut.   

DIY: How to setup GTD gmail

This is a tutorial on how to setup your gmail inbox to better match your GTD workflow.  you can find my previous post on GTD if you're not sure what I'm talking about right now.  Otherwise here is an example of what you'll be able to do with your new GTD inbox:

As you can see, you'll have sections to place your 'Action Required' and 'Scheduled' items.  These sections will sound familiar to you if you're a GTD fan, otherwise I will explain there uses  further as we get to them in this tutorial.


Importing Email: 

We first need to create a master gmail account.  This will be the account where you will be able to check the mail from all other gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, Live or .edu email accounts you may own.  To do this, we need to make sure that mail from all of your accounts get imported here. If you only use one email account you can skip this section.

1.  Click on the settings icon in the top right corner of gmail. Then click on settings. This will bring you to your general mail settings.

2. Click on the ‘Accounts and Import’ tab, scroll down and click on ‘Add POP3 account.’

3. A new window asking for your email address will pop up.  Enter the email address of the account you want to import to your master gmail account and click ‘Next.'

4.  Now fill out the username and password for the account being imported.  Select the correct POP Server and Port number from the drop down menu.  If you are importing a school or work email account, you may need to ask your IT department which Server and Port to use.

5. Check the box ‘label incoming messages:’ , this means that any message imported from this account will be labeled with the email address that it was imported from. Click ‘Add Acount.’

6. The next window will ask if you would like to be able to send mail from this new account.  Make sure ‘Yes’ is checked so that you are able to send mail as this imported account, without having to leave your master gmail account. Click ‘Next Step.’ 

7. On the next window, enter the name you want to appear in the ‘from: ‘ field when you send email.  Click ‘Next Step.’

8. On the next window, Click ‘Send Verification.’ Then check the inbox of the account you just set up import for and look for the confirmation email. Click on the confirmation link to complete imort setup.

9. repeat steps 1-8 for any other email accounts you would like to import into your master gmail account.

Setting Up Labels:

1.  Click on the settings icon in the top right corner of gmail. Then click on settings. This will bring you to your general mail settings.

2. Click on the ‘Labels’ tab, scroll down and click on ‘Create a new Label.’

3. Type in ‘1GTD’, click on ‘Create’

4. repeat step 3 and create tags for ‘1GTD/Action-Required’ and ‘1GTD/Scheduled’

Setting Up Multiple Inboxes:

1.  Click on the settings icon in the top right corner of gmail. Then click on settings. This will bring you to your general mail settings.

2. Click on the ‘Labs’ tab, scroll down and check the box to enable ‘Multiple Inboxes.’ There should now be a tab for ‘Multiple inboxes’ in your email settings.

3. Click on Multiple inboxes in your email settings.  Copy and paste the following search query into the text box labeled ‘Pane 0: ‘

Copy this: is:1GTD/Scheduled

4. Enter the title, ‘Scheduled’ into the Panel title for Pane 0.

5. Copy and paste the following search query into the text box labeled ‘Pane 1: ‘

Copy this: is:1GTD/Action-Required

6. Enter the title, ‘Action Required’ into the Panel title for Pane 1.

7. On the bottom of the ‘Multiple inboxes’ settings page, there is a setting labeled, ‘Extra panels positioning: ‘. Select the option that says, ‘Above the inbox.’

Using the System:

1.  The purpose of this system is to be able to process any email that comes in so that your inbox doesn’t grow out of control.  Your goal is to keep your inbox at zero messages.  I still can’t quite keep my inbox at zero, but here are the steps I use to get as close as I can.

2. When you open any email, you don’t want to close it until you are done dealing with it.  If a friend sends you a message asking for a good recommendation for a great blog on personal finance, do Not close the email thinking you’ll get back to it later.  Go ahead and search for a good blog, and reply with a link right then and there.  When you are done you can archive the email to be done with it.

3. Many times you will get a email that you just can’t deal with at the moment.  For example, I just got an email from Best Buy asking me to spend a gift certificate I’ve won.  But I want to wait until the item I want from Best Buy goes on sale before I pick it up.  Since it’s impossible to complete this email at this time,  I can click on ‘move to’ at the top of the email, and then select ‘1GTD Action Required.’

This email is now moved out of my default inbox, and into my separate inbox labeled, ‘Action Required’.  This new inbox is where I keep all the emails I can’t quite complete just yet.  When the item I want finally does go on sale and I make the purchase with my gift card, I can remove the ‘Action Required’ Label and it will automatically be archived.  


4. Another type of mail I frequently receive is a message regarding an event I’ve commited to.  I’ve already recorded the event in my calendar, but I don’t want to get rid of the message quite yet because it has all the event info such as time, place, descriptions and other reminders.  So I’ll again click on ‘move to’, and select ‘1GTD Scheduled’. 

This email is now moved out of my default inbox, and into my separate inbox labeled, ‘Scheduled’.  This new inbox is where I keep all the emails regarding events already listed in my calendar. And that's all there is to it! Here's another picture of what your inbox would look like now:

DIY: Getting Things Done

As a first DIY project, I thought I could share my own Thrifty Techie version of David Allen's popular GTD system.

So what is GTD?

Getting Things Done (GTD) is a term usually referring to the system David Allen outlines in his book, “Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity.” If you want a comprehensive guide to this system without having to go out and buy the book, Trent from The Simple Dollar has a great 14 part series explaining GTD as described by David Allen, while using practical examples from his own life to illustrate how the system works. I would definitely recommend going out and reading either the full book, or at least Trent's summary, but here is a quick jump start guide just to give you the gist of it.

GTD is composed of five basic principles: collect, process, organize, review, and do. Each one of these steps has its own set of benefits, but the real power comes from using them all together.

Collect – Our brains are not very reliable. We are bombarded with hundreds of tasks to do, names to remember, great ideas, facts, and other information, only to forget half of it by the end of the day. To make matters worse, keeping all of this information in our heads greatly reduces our ability to focus on specific tasks. How can you expect to concentrate on writing that report when you are simultaneously trying to remember to meet your friend in an hour, pick up groceries on the way home, and the other five errands you need to run that day. David Allen suggests using an inbox to throw anything that comes your way. Whether it's bills you just got in the mail, lyrics from a song you just heard on the radio and want to look up later, or a great idea for a blog post you want to remember. You'd be surprised with how clear your mind can become just by dumping everything on paper and collecting it in one place.

Process and Organize – This pile of items you've just collected can quickly grow into a jungle of uselessness if you don't continually process it into actionable items. At the end of every day, I go through my inbox and place everything into a category. Things that can be done in less than 2 minutes are done right then and there. This usually includes any emails I wanted to send, papers to be filed, maybe a new blog I wanted to check out. Anything I can't get to until something else happens first gets put into the “waiting” pile. For example, I can't make that presentation until Bob gives me the numbers to use, or I can't fix Bob's computer until the parts arrive. At this point the only things left are “next action” items. These are the tasks I will use as my to-do list for the next day.

Review – This is definitely the hardest step of the entire process (at least for me it is). No matter how on top things you are on a day to day basis with the first three steps, there are always going to be little things that slip through the cracks. Maybe a few tasks get pushed to the back of your inbox keeping you from ever getting around to completing them. Or maybe you forgot to write down a couple home repair projects you were planning on getting around to at the end of the month. The only way to combat this is your weekly review. Once a week, you just sit down, and go through your inbox, to-do lists, action items, and project folders to make sure everything is in the right place and nothing is forgotten. You can also use this time do do a complete brain dump and just get everything out of your head and written down into your GTD system.

Do – GTD is a great system for capturing and organizing all the information and different tasks you run into everyday. Once you have a nice list of things you need to do, you need to decide on what to do first. David Allen uses a combination of time and energy you have available to decide what would be a good task to start on. Stephen Covey, author of, “The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People” suggests prioritizing your tasks using some version of his urgent/important matrix. I would say this is the one area I'm still exploring, trying to find a good balance allowing me to get the maximum productivity out of my day.

Whats next?

So that was your quick introduction to GTD. Now that you have an idea of what it is, I would still recommend picking up the full version of the book, or at least reading Trent's rundown of the system on The Simple Dollar. It's worth getting the full technical details of how this system works, as well as a full explanation of how following each step can benefit you. Hopefully it will inspire you to get started today. Following this post, I want to share some tweaks I've made to the system to gain better flow with my more digital life. I'll be posting on:

-how to set up your email to work right along side GTD

-how to set up Evernote with GTD

-how to set up Google Tasks and Google Calendar with GTD

DIY: Spoof Email

We learned a pretty cool little hack today in class that I thought might be some fun to play around with.
Just a reminder:

1)this tutorial is meant for use in a safe and legal training environment only.
2)It is meant for educational purposes only. The site is no way responsible for any misuse of the information.
3) And most important, Performing hack attempts (without permission) on computers that you do not own is illegal!

Okay, now for the fun stuff.  The first thing you'll need is a smtp mail server.  In my example, I used my schools mail server, smtp.pacific.edu, on port 25.  another choice would be to use your ISP's mail server, comcast works well for example.  Here is a list of other mail servers.  You'll just need to find the port number. Now open up a terminal and try out these commands!

C: - what you should type into your command prompt
S: - is the response you should get from the command prompt
// - any comments that I want to add. DO NOT type these into the command prompt

C: telnet smtp.pacific.edu 25  //25 is the port number for outgoing mail
S: 220 smtp.example.com ESMTP Postfix
C: HELO smtp.pacific.edu  
S: 250 Hello smtp.pacific.edu, I am glad to meet you
C: MAIL FROM:  //the address you are actually sending from
S: 250 Ok
C: RCPT TO: //the address you are actually sending to
S: 250 Ok
C: DATA
S: 354 End data with .
C: From: "Bob Example"  //address that the mail shows up from
C: To: Alice Example     //address that the mail shows up to
C: Cc: theboss@example.com
C: Date: Tue, 15 Jan 2008 16:02:43 -0500
C: Subject: Test message
C:
C: Hello Alice.
C: This is a test message with 5 header fields and 4 lines in the message body.
C: Your friend,
C: Bob
C: .           //the . Ends the data and sends the mail
S: 250 Ok: queued as 12345
C: QUIT
S: 221 Bye
{The server closes the connection}

-Some last tips, you need to be on the same network as your mail server.  For example I would need to be on my campus network in order to use smtp.pacific.edu. You can also use something like putty to get remote access to a network.
-Try sending yourself mail from the future you!