Automatic Grouping of Information

This video talks about how web articles can automatically be grouped and presented in an organized way. Since it is so easy to clip articles with the Read It Later’s embedded browser widgets, users presumably end up with a ton of unrelated content in the Reading List. In other words, uncontrolled abundant information. Not good. The key feature of Digest is to automatically organize that Reading List into a sub-topics that can be easily browsed. Sounds like a step in the right direction.

Does it Work?

Over the next month or so, we intend to try this out and see how useful it is. The key will be (1) convenience and (2) how well the automatic groupings work. We want to find out if it saves us time and helps us benefit from all the great information we will be putting into our Reading List.

Fogozine Integration

Additionally, Read It Later could become even more useful when integrated with our Fogozine product as both an import (article library) and export (sharing) feature. Maybe we should even add it to this blog so our posts can be quickly moved to people’s Reading List. Any Read It Later users out there who would like to see this?

How Mobile Devices Affect When We Read

Finally, I have to point out a really good post from Read It Later’s blog titled Is Mobile Affecting When We Read?. It presents some very interesting data about people’s information consumption habits and how they are shifting as more advanced mobile devices like the iPad become available. It is worth adding to your Reading List, and it is the first one in ours.

“More matter is being printed and published today than ever before, and every publisher of an advertisement, pamphlet, or book expects his material to be read.  Publishers and, even more so, readers want what is important to be clearly laid out.  They will not read anything that is troublesome to read, but are pleased with what looks clear and well arranged, for it will make their task of understanding easier.  For this reason, the important part must stand out and the unimportant must be subdued …” Jan Tischichold, 1935

That was true in 1935 when publishing books and pamphlets was on the rise, and it is even more true now that the number of mediums for information exchange have risen considerably.  It does not matter if information is conveyed with applications running on mobile devices, ebook readers, web pages, iTunes podcasts, or good old print. “Clear and well arranged” information makes it easier to understand and more likely to be consumed.  Every publisher (using this term broadly) and every information consumer wants this. We like to think of it as information aesthetics, because it has a lot to do with how the information looks, but there is more to it than just beauty. It is really about good design.

Good design is peculiar because you don’t really notice it (in contrast to bad design, which is usually obvious) . For information, things like organization, typography, contrast, alignment, clarity, repetition, flow, color, and sound all contribute to the overall experience of information consumption. When it is done well, you are more likely to read, listen, or watch the content. You are more likely to take something away from it, and you are also more likely to share and recommend it. There is no doubt that actual content itself is what makes information useful, but aesthetics help play the following roles:

• make people want to consume information
• allow people to focus on what is important for them
• help ideas spread through sharing and word of mouth
• increase the longevity of information

This point was briefly discussed in our previous post on creating documents that people will actually read.

In the future, we hope to cover many different aspects of information aesthetics. For now, lets start with one that is very simple, easy to apply, and extremely potent. White Space

Too much of a good things is bad

Information can be great, but even the best information can be bad when it is crammed together or presented all at once. People need breathing room and space to think. When too much information is crammed together, people will avoid it. White space is a tool that can be used to give us well-placed gaps and voids that allow important information on a page or screen to stand out more clearly. It can also be used to frame and organize information, and it goes a long way towards making information more scannable, accessible, and easy to absorb.

The examples below should help make it more obvious how white space impacts the aesthetics of visual compositions such as printed pages, web pages, mobile applications, and personal documents (e.g. Word or Power Point). However, the concept of white space is just as valid in audio recordings, videos, and life (I known that last one is a big leap, and it is covered briefly at the bottom of this post)

White space in print

Printed information has been around for a very long time. If you look through a variety of different books, you will probably find that some have text and pictures crammed into the entire page, with very little white space on a page (like small, cheap novels and paperbacks). Others have nice clean text, with different information elements clearly segmented, and surrounded by generous space to every edge on the page (likely to be more elegant and expensive books). This study should help you see how white space impacts information readability and aesthetics.

One of the most important uses of white space in the printed world is margins. A good online primer on page margins by Jacci Howard Bear explains how white space serves many important functions, including (a) giving the eyes a break, (b) keeping text and graphics from “falling off the page”, (c) leaving room for holding with hands, (d) leaving room for note taking, and (e) allowing for various methods of binding.

White space on web pages

Web page design is a hot topic today, and many of us consume vast amounts of information this way. An article by Mark Boulton explains how web page “micro whitespace” (the space between small elements) and “macro whitespace” (the space between major elements) can help improve the legibility of web pages. I personally gravitate towards web pages with generous white space, and I like to use tools like Readability and Instapaper to consume information. Both of these tools provide a clean page with large margins and spaces between lines of text. Blocking out the clutter helps free your mind of distractions and paves a way for information to flow directly into your brain.

White space in mobile applications

Consuming information via mobile applications has grown considerably, and many of us regularly learn new things on our mobile phones and tablet devices. Mobile applications typically run on a small screen, so space is at a premium. It is usually not practical to provide large amounts of white space. However, as Ellen Lupton explains, the gaps around text and graphics must be designed to “guide the eye and create clear visual separation”. Fortunately, today’s smart phones have very high resolution screens, allowing mobile applications to provide a very good information consumption experience when white space is carefully applied.

White space in presentations and personal documents

Not everyone creates web pages or mobile applications, but I bet just about everyone creates Word, Pages, Power Point, or Keynote documents. White space is important. If you want your documents to be read and your presentations to be heard, please consider how margins, text spacing, section spacing, and graphical arrangement will impact your intended audience. There always seems to be a tendency to try and fill up all available space (especially in presentation slides), as if “wasting” space is a bad thing. For most applications, it is not. Read through blogs and books from people like Garr Reynolds, the Heath Brothers, and Jan Schultink to get a clearer picture of how white space can be used when designing documents and presentations. A recurring theme is to use white space generously to allow your key points to come through clearly.

White space in other mediums like audio and video

The concept of breaking up printed information with white space to make it more clear and appealing can be extended to audio and video mediums as well. Remember, too much of a good thing can be bad. A constant stream of words or images, even if they are very meaningful, can loose their effectiveness if they are not broken up by pauses, breaks, and emptiness. Without this white space, everything appears equally urgent and important–which is almost never the case.

White space in life

Are we taking it too far here? I don’t think so. White space in our life helps make us happier and more productive. Simple thinks like scheduling breaks into our day, week, and year help keep us energized. Leo Babauta has a great post where he explains how designing white space into our lives helps has add clarity, peace, balance, and the ability to emphasize things that are most important. Molly Gordon adds that white space is a key to maintaining work-life balance.

Consider how white space can be used in all forms of communication and life

All of this can be boiled down to the following:

Information, communication, and our daily lives can be improved when empty spaces are used to accentuate what is most important.

Check out the White Space Fogozine

View the White Space (Information Aesthetics) Fogozine to view the articles linked to in this blog post.

If you use Fogozine for iPad, you can download the .fogo file for direct import into the application.

As far as we know, it is the first app (on any platform) that allows you to bundle digital media from web sites, digital pictures, and RSS feeds into a convenient and sharable packages.  We are finding new uses for it every day and we hope others find even more.  You will soon see more and more posts on this site about different ways to use Fogozine.

We also know 1.0 is not perfect, and that is why we are already hard at work on an updated version.  If you have any feedback for us–good or bad–we want to hear from you.  You can contact us at feedback@fogomedia.com or leave a message on our support site.

Have fun with Fogozine.  We hope it helps you take control of information that matters to you.

After committing a lot of time to developing for the Mac platform, we shifted our focus to the iPad because we feel it uniquely brings digital media to life and allows information to  go anywhere you go (while keeping you connected to the ‘cloud’).  Fogozine for iPad v1.0 allows you to take disparate digital media sources (currently RSS and Evernote) and put them together in an attractive and easy-to-consume package.  The iPad touch screen allows natural gestures like swipes and pinches to do exactly what you would expect, and once you create the perfect Fogozine, you can easily personalize and share your remix with the world.

Version 1.0 is just the tip of the iceberg.  We have a lot more exciting capability in the works, but all the basics are there in 1.0.  Stay tuned to this blog, or our twitter feed (@fogomedia), for updates on Fogozine iPad availability and future enhancements.

Fogozines are like ‘mix tapes’ for digital media.  Just like the cassettes you used to record and share your favorite songs (or maybe you skipped straight to burning CDs and making iTunes playlists), Fogozines can be used to easily package and share digital media.

Currently, Fogozines can include information from RSS feeds and Evernote notes, but more is on the way.

Here are the recommended uses for Fogozines:

(1) Use Fogozines to consume media.  Fogozines nicely combine disparate sources of information, and they have a beginning and end (just like analog magazines) which makes them less prone to information overload.

(2) Use Fogozines to share media. Fogozines uniquely package information into sharable little bundles which are easy to pass around.

That is it! Simple, right?

Here is how to make them …

Create a Fogozine in just two steps

You can use the Fogozine application to make a Fogozine in just two steps:

(1) Create new Fogozine from Fogozine Library

Touch the Fogo Flame to open Fogozine Library.

Touch the ‘+’ button to create a new Fogozine.  Type in the desired name for your new Fogozine (you can always change it later).

(2) Add Articles

Touch ‘RSS Feeds’ to start adding articles to your Fogozine.  Fogozine comes with few default RSS feeds, but you can customize this list.

Touch one of the RSS feeds to load up available articles.

Touch one of the articles to get a preview of its contents.

You can touch ‘Preview Article’ to see what the article will look like in Fogozine.  Touch ‘Add Article to Fogozine’ to add it to your Fogozine.

That is pretty much it.  Let’s see what else you can do.

I created a Fogozine, now what?

Once you get articles in a Fogozine, you are probably going to want to customize things like the Title, Theme, Summary, and the Articles themselves.

Touch the ‘Edit Fogozine’ button to edit your Fogozine.

Share your Fogozine with the World!

Now that your Fogozine is just the way you want it, try sharing it with friends.

Touch the ‘Share Fogozine’ button to expose sharing options for your Fogozine.

Features to help you efficiently consume information

Fogozines give you the flexibility to leave and explore content on the web, but this is always done within the context of a Fogozine article — ensuring that you are grounded and won’t get lost in an endless sea of information.

Touch ‘Hide Articles’ make your Fogozine full screen, which is makes it much easier to read.

Each Article that comes from the web has a link to view the article source.  Touch this to open article source in its own browser.

At the bottom of the Fogozine viewer is a scroll bar and table-of-contents viewer.  Use these to navigate your Fogozine, or you can just swipe left and right to change pages.

Customize your Article sources

Import RSS Feeds from Google Reader

The easiest way to get RSS feeds into Fogozine is to import them from Google Reader.

Touching the ‘Reader’ button at bottom of RSS Feed screen will allow you to import RSS feeds from your Google Reader account.

Manually add RSS Feeds

You don’t use Google Reader?  Don’t worry, we still have a way add RSS feeds.

Touch the ‘+’ button at the bottom of the RSS Feed screen to manually add new RSS Feeds

Use Evernote to bring a wealth of article sources into Fogozines

Evernote makes it easy to remember things big and small from your notable life using your computer, phone, and the web.  Now you can use Fogozine to package and share collections of Evernote notes.

RSS and Evernote are just the start … more article sources will be coming soon.

Configure your Accounts

Fogozine currently integrates with Evernote, Instapaper, and Posterous (more are on the way).  Fogozine will prompt you for login credentials when you try to use those services, but you can always change this later by using the Account Settings menu:

Click on the ‘Settings’ button to change account settings and access additional Fogozine information.

More information makes it more likely you will find the most useful information, and it gives you more raw material to draw from when synthesizing information. It is also has the potential to drive you crazy. If you want to drink from the information fire hose, you must have a good strategy for information skimming.

Information Skimming Helps You See the Big Picture

In a nutshell, information skimming is about consuming more, highly focused (short), bits of information in order to be better informed, make better decisions, and seeing the big picture more clearly. Done well, this technique will give you a huge advantage over the rest of us who get bogged down with too much, or too little, useful information.

Goals

Unlike the focused information consumption approach discussed previously on this blog, the goal of information skimming is to continuously scan and consume small bits of information that have relevance and meaning to you. Sometimes called environmental scanning, this approach works much like a radar–you continuously scan, and received signals from, your environment. If you quickly pick up the right signals, you can make better-than-average predictions of the future. For example, think of meteorologists who use radar to help them predict the weather.  They are not always right, but continuously monitoring the environment sure helps them be more accurate.

Lets look at what advantages you will have when you skim information really well:

• You will know what is going on in your world. The emphasis is on you because the information is only useful if it is meaningful in the context of your industry, your interests, your tribes, your competition, etc.
• A constant stream of new inputs will help you make better conversation, and it will continuously provide new inspiration for your art (which is hopefully part of your work).
• Many diverse and relevant information signals will help you detect patterns. Pattern detection is fundamental to making future predictions (which in turn greatly impacts decision making), and it also helps you become better at anticipating and adapting to change.
• You will make new connections to people and ideas. Some of these connections will turn your world upside-down and some will open up new opportunities. A small number will be life-changing.
• The big picture will start to emerge from the noise. Light bulbs will go on. Confusion will subside (at least temporarily).

How many of us would not want to have more of these advantages?

Is information skimming the only way to get them? Certainly not. Information skimming provides kindling for the fire, raw material for the production line, nutrients for the seedling. In other words, the best of us can not succeed without some quality information to chew on.

Input Sources and Tools

So where do we start? Where do we go for the best raw information?

The answer is highly personal. Everyone needs to find their own perfect combination of sources and consumption tools. These sources and tools have to fit your needs and your workflow, and you must find ways to use them efficiently. More on that later.

To start with some basics, here are sources and tools that will probably end up on many people’s list:

RSS Feeds: Pulling content from blogs, Internet news sites, and other sources, RSS feeds are a useful way to pull many sources together in one application for consumption.

Tweets: Twitter, when used the right way, can be a tremendously useful source (and tool). Read our blog post on using Twitter for more ideas.

Blogs: There is a ton of information published on blogs every day. Not all of it is useful or trustworthy, but some of it is perfect for information skimming.

Magazines and Newspapers: These have been used for many years to get up-to-date and specialized information. Now, most of these publications are available digitally, and many can be accessed via the Internet.

Television and Radio: The numbers may be dropping, but a most of us still rely (at least partly) on television and radio to consume information.

Email: Newsletters, links from friends, and document attachments fill our inboxes every single day. Just about all of us need to make reading emails part of our daily routine.

Discussions (online and in person): We learn a lot by communicating with other people. Whether it is face-to-face or in an online discussion group, this can be a great way to pick up new ideas and connections.

YouTube, Vimeo, Viddler (and others): Digital videos can be produced and posted by anyone, and many contain potentially useful information (if you can find it).

Podcasts: Podcasts can be a great way to consume short audio or audio/video content on the go. Some people do a fantastic job capturing their knowledge and experience in well-produced podcasts. They tend to target very specific subjects, so you must take the time to find the ones that are most relevant to your life.

Computers, mobile devices, tablets, etc.: Unless you want to be tied completely to print, TV, and radio (and face-to-face conversations), some sort of a computing device is essential. The most exciting trend here is the combination of very powerful mobile devices, fast wireless communication, cloud computing, and the proliferation of digital content. More on that in our Mobile Tech to the Rescue post.

Internet-Enabled Software Tools: There are far too many to mention, but ton of great software tools exist to help us keep up with, filter, consume, and share information. Just as technology has given us tools to create and access more information, technology also keeps giving us better tools to manage it. Find the ones that work best for you. Here are some ideas:

• Google Reader, and other RSS Readers
• Google Alerts
• Twitter Clients (there are many)
• Evernote
• Instapaper
• Evri
• Digg
• Alltop
• Flipboard
• Fogozine (we reserve the right to plug our own product every once in a while)

I am really curious to know what other sources and tools people rely on. Please leave a comment (or email) with additional suggestions, and we will do a follow-up post that is more comprehensive. You can also enter your favorite tools and sources on our AnswerGarden poll. Your answer will immediately be shown in the answer cloud.

Tips for Effective Information Skimming

Finding the right sources and tools is only the beginning. It is extremely important to figure out how to skim information effectively. This is the hard part, and it is what separates the super-skimmers from those who waste time on useless information or simple get overwhelmed and quit. Here are some tips:

Be Mindful – Start by being mindful of what you are trying to achieve. What type of information is important for you? What is going to provide you the right connections to new people and ideas, and allow you to see the big picture more clearly? It might help to do some brainstorming and note down the key themes that emerge. Keeping these themes in mind as you skim information on a daily basis will help you focus on what is likely to help and ignore what only distracts.

Diverse Sources – You want to receive signals from a full spectrum of information sources. Breadth and diversity will give you the best raw material to work with. You will be forming your own ideas and viewpoints (at least in part) from this information, so seeding your mind with any bias.

Filters and Sorting – One of the most critical, and most difficult, parts of information skimming is quickly filtering, sorting, and prioritizing the gushing torrent of information signals coming at you. It is a skill that gets better with practice. There are many tools to help with this, but you ultimately need to decide was is true and untrue, useful and a waste of time. This theme was recently echoed by Seth Godin in his Management of Signals blog post.

Fit Your Workflow – Information skimming works best when it is done regularly and consistently. To do that, you must find a way to make it part of your daily workflow, using whatever time you have available, and with whatever tools are at your disposal. It is helpful to map out your daily routines and look for ways to seamlessly fit information skimming into your days. The more natural it is, the more likely you will do it consistently and effectively.

Share and Receive – Information skimming should not solely consist of consumption. When you come across some gems that others could benefit from, share them! In addition to making you feel good, the generosity will be contagious. You will more frequently become the recipient of the same behavior. The best part of this is that people are the ultimate information filters. Machines are getting better, but people reign supreme. In other words, your friends will feed you relevant information more often than Google search.

“Right now, we take in information from many places, but we’re not particularly focused on filtering the information that might be false, and more important, what might be missing.” – Seth Godin

Be Careful

To wrap up, we will add a few words of caution. These things are most likely to sabotage your path to “black-belt” information skimming–please avoid them!

One-Sided Information
Too much one-sided information from similar sources will limit your ability to make connections and see the big picture. You want get the complete story. Seek out sources that cover diverse topics and differing perspectives. Step back and think about what information you may be missing and then find ways to add it to your routine.

Overdoing It
Information skimming can go to far. If all you do is skim, you will never get the opportunity to turn these input signals into meaningful knowledge. A balanced approach is best. Reading the headlines and opening paragraph of today’s news is a great way to see what is going on, but you should also find time to read that 2000 word article that appears insightful and relevant to your world. By the way, this article is almost 2000 words.  If you are reading this, then you are NOT information skimming (thanks).

Beware of The LOUD and FALSE
There are some really loud information signals out there, and many are false and misleading. Think of this as noise. You must avoid as much of the noise as possible, because it wastes your time and distracts from what is actually important. Be mindful and trust that your ability to filter information will improve with practice.

All Consumption, No Sharing
Most print, radio, and television is 100% consumption. Online and social media is different. It is extremely easy to share and create, and this behavior actually make it more useful. Make sharing part of your daily workflow.

Summary

Effective information skimming is essential for taking control of the information that matters to you.

If you think it is easy, work on adding more sources or spending less time with the same amount of benefit.  If you are intimidated by all the information that comes rushing in when you open the door, we encourage you to keep practicing.  Be mindful of what you want to accomplish and start from there.

Have other ideas?  We very much appreciate the opinions and advice from everyone else out there.  Please comment!

This blog is about making information more useful, so it may seem out of place to talk about sharing.  But this post is about sharing information, and the act of thoughtful and generous information sharing is fundamental to making information more useful for all of us.  Selfless sharing also has side benefits like improving the size and strength of your social networks and increasing happiness, but let’s first focus on how information sharing allows us to take control of the information that matters.

We have said it before, but consider all of the information being produced on a daily basis.  Only a very small fraction of that information is going to be relevant to any one of us.  Who has the time to find the important and relevant bits?  Individually, we don’t stand a chance.  There are lots of ways we can try (many of which are discussed on the blog), but a single person just can’t keep up.  The answer is to look at what we can do collectively.  All together, we can consume and filter a lot of information, and the act of sharing is what enables everyone to benefit.  Of course, all sharing is not equal.

Effective Sharing

The effectiveness of sharing is proportional to the level of personalization, thoughtfulness, and selflessness.  These three things are very important.

First, lets consider personalization by breaking information sharing down into three different types:

• Sharing publicly – this is sharing information in a public forum like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or on a blog.  Sharing information this way is generally not very personal. The most effective public information sharing usually comes from people who consistently share good information on a particular topic.  By doing this, they build up followers who are like-minded and interested in the same information. In a way, this makes their public information sharing more personal.
• Sharing to a group – sharing information to a [relatively small and like-minded] group is more personal than sharing publicly, and is typically done in some sort of online forum, email distribution, or newsletter.  Groups share common characteristics, and information sharing can be personalized to be more useful to people with these same characteristics.
• Sharing to an individual - sharing one-on-one to another individual is as personal as it gets.  Emails, twitter DMs, phone calls, and face-to-face conversations are examples of individual information sharing. By knowing exactly who you are sharing information with, it can be extremely targeted and personal (and hence, more useful).

By the way, the opposite of personalized information sharing is information spamming.  Constantly spewing information can cause more harm than good.  Think of personalization as a filter, not a fire hose.

Next, let’s see how thoughtfulness and selflessness lead to effective information sharing.  Thoughtfulness implies thinking about how shared information will impact the people you are sharing with.  Randomly spamming people with information that has no relevance to them is not useful.  However, information that is carefully considered and deemed useful can be of tremendous benefit.  This is where the benefits of sharing goes into overdrive, and it requires us to constantly think about how the information we are consuming can impact others.  In addition to thoughtfulness, it is important that sharing information is a selfless act – meaning that it is an act of generosity, not for personal gain.  When you start keeping score, or you adopt a tit-for-tat mentality, you are no longer acting selflessly.

The fact is that everyone wins when we all share information that is personalized, thoughtful, and selfless.  The power of social networks is unleashed, and we become a collective group of information filters for one another.

Take Personal Action

To improve the effectiveness of your information sharing (and we all have some room for improvement), you must take personal action.  What can you, as an individual, do to enable collective information sharing?  For starters, try to do more of the following:

1. Build your social network - You can’t share information if you have nobody to share it with.  Most of us have some friends and family to share with, but there are ways to grown your network (and sharing information will help strengthen those connections).  Try to keep track of new people you meet.  What are their interests, hobbies, jobs? Keep them in mind when you are consuming information, and be sure to share when you get the chance.  It is also useful to become affiliated with groups who share common interests with you.  Share the information that you find to be important, and the community will return you the favor in spades.  Find ways to grow the number of people you interact with on a regular basis, and you will have a solid foundation for both sharing and receiving information.
2. Share information that is personalized, thoughtful, and selfless – As explained previously, make your information sharing as effective as possible by targeting it at specific people, groups, and niche areas.  Think about how information is going to benefit others before you pass it along, and most importantly, share information generously, not because you expect to get anything in return.
3. Express thanks to others who share information with you – This is important and possibly overlooked.  You want to encourage others to share effectively with you (and others).  By acknowledging the generosity of others, you will make them feel good about their act and make it more likely that they will share with you again in the future.  Don’t feel guilty when someone helps you out by sharing a particularly important tidbit of information.  Thank them, and explain how this act of sharing helped you. Allowing other people to help you is just as important as finding ways to help others.

Side Benefits

It may be enough that information sharing increases your exposure to useful, and relevant, information.  But there is more.  Sharing and generosity have a way of improving and increasing your connection to other human beings, which in turn leads to higher levels of success, fulfillment, and happiness.

The best thing about sharing and generosity is that it benefits everyone.  If you see life as a zero-sum-game, then you may view sharing really good information as a competitive disadvantage (someone else will steal some of your potential success).  But  success is unlimited, and the more we share information effectively, the more success everyone will achieve.

“Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.” – Buddha

“Humans understand how favors work. Doing and trading favors is woven into the fabric of our culture. When people are recipients of a favor, it’s in their nature to want to pay it back. Doing nice things does make people feel good, but there’s neurology behind it, too. We want to pay people back because it is in the nature of a community to do so; it keeps communities strong and protected against the outside world.” — Chris Brogan

The benefits of sharing and generosity, and the resulting increases in social connection, happiness, and success are well-documented (and won’t be rehashed here).  But if you are interested in investigating further, checkout these links:

• “The first person to get happy when deciding to do something for someone else is YOU”: Bob Thurman at TED.com
• Clay Shirky: How cognitive surplus will change the world
• The benefits of generosity, by David Philips
• The Boston Globe: How to Help (Yourself)
• A must-read eBook put together by Seth Godin
• Are you giving enough gifts?

How do you share information?

Most of us experience focused information consumption much less frequently than we should. We are lured by the power of technology to make us efficient information skimmers, multitaskers, and hyper-communicators. Often times, this efficiency is for the better; it allows us to be more informed, connected, and productive with our time. However, when short, fragmented mechanisms become our sole means of information consumption, we start to loose our ability to make important connections and see the big picture. This leads to shortsighted decisions and “status quo” work production. Life-changing decisions and high-value creation requires focus. There is a time and place for Twitter, RSS feeds, web aggregators, and news headlines, but we must also make time for focused, deep consumption of information.

Meaningful Knowledge

The goal is to be able to turn information into meaningful knowledge. For this post, the term “meaningful knowledge” is something that goes beyond the mere understanding of a concept or fact. Meaningful knowledge comes from the synthesis of many facts and concepts into a new and highly personal understanding that allows you to make good decisions, see the world differently, and create value in the world (whatever that means for you). This is big picture stuff, and it will provide you with frameworks and filters for organizing the rest of your life.

A Focused State

To turn information into meaningful knowledge, we must get into a focused state that allows us to consume, and reflect on, lengthy content (e.g. books, large magazine or blog articles, and long videos or podcasts). Sometimes, a collection of related content is the key to making important connections. Here, more than anywhere, focusing on relevant content while blocking out the rest is critically important. All too often, “more is better” thinking leads us to try and get to a little bit of everything we find, which can in turn cause us to lose focus on what is most important.

Focus: A Simplicity Manifesto in the Age of Distraction

Leo Babauta has a nice ebook called focus – a simplicity manifesto in the age of distraction. He does a good job explaining the importance of focus, and he provides lots of suggestions on how to achieve it.  Since he has freed this ebook from all copyrights, I have taken the liberty to aggregate it using Fogo Media’s Fogozine Mac Application – check it out here.  Here are some of my favorite quotes:

“It’s not technology we should be afraid of. It’s a life where we are always connected, always interrupted, always distracted, always bombarded with information and requests. It’s a life where we have no time to create or connect.”

“When you consume information, you’re helping your creativity as well — you find inspiration in what others have done, you get ideas, you gather the raw materials for creating.”

The Web Shatters Focus

An article published this week by David Carr in Wired Magazine further strengthens the argument. This article goes deep into the science behind the power of focus, and it is a gem as long as you focus long enough to read the whole thing. Basically, frequent switching of our attention prevents us from transferring memories from short-term to long-term storage. According to the article, distractions “impede our thinking and increase the likelihood that we’ll overlook or misinterpret important information.” Carr and I agree that there is a time and place for information skimming, but he points out that “once a means to an end, a way to identify information for further study, it’s becoming an end in itself—our preferred method of both learning and analysis.” This is the problem. We do not allow any time for focused consumption of information. Here is one more great quote from the article:

“The depth of our intelligence hinges on our ability to transfer information from working memory, the scratch pad of consciousness, to long-term memory, the mind’s filing system. When facts and experiences enter our long-term memory, we are able to weave them into the complex ideas that give richness to our thought. But the passage from working memory to long-term memory also forms a bottleneck in our brain. Whereas long-term memory has an almost unlimited capacity, working memory can hold only a relatively small amount of information at a time. And that short-term storage is fragile: A break in our attention can sweep its contents from our mind.”

Ways to Harness the Power of Focus

Assuming you have bought into the argument that focused information consumption helps us build meaningful knowledge, lets move on to some practical ways to achieve it.  Here are six suggestions:

1. Free Yourself from Distractions: The first step to achieving focus is getting in (and staying in) the zone by shutting off potential distractions. At one extreme, this might require complete isolation from people, technology, and other interruptions. More likely, you just need to find a place where email, telephone, coworkers, and family are unlikely to bother you. I personally find coffee shops a great place to get away and focus. Airplane rides are superb. At a minimum, shut off email and your Twitter application when you are trying to focus.
2. A Beginning and an End: One reason books, newspapers, and magazines are easy to focus on is they have a clear beginning and end. On the other hand, your RSS reader and news aggregator web site are endless — they just keep going and going, and they link out to so may other places. As stated previously, there is a time and place where this is exactly what you need, but this works against you when trying to focus. Therefore, you should try to make sure your information has a beginning and an end. This is easy in the analog world, but you will have to be very disciplined when consuming information online.
3. Set Aside Time, Regularly: Get in the habit of establishing focused information consumption sessions on a regular basis. Splitting your time between information skimming and focused consumption is likely to provide the best results. You probably already do plenty of information skimming, so you need to figure out how to make focused consumption a more regular occurrence. Disconnect from the computer a few nights a week or schedule time on the computer where you use a tool to help block distractions (see next section for some suggestions).
4. Do Not Just Read, Think: Reflection and thinking should be a natural part of focused information consumption. This is where you find ways to relate the information to your personal situation, make connections, and pick up on subtle patterns that help you derive meaning. It is OK to let your mind wander.  When shut off from other distractions, your mind has a knack for wondering directly to the key realization that unlocks a new level of understanding.  Bingo! Ureka! Ah Ha!  This is what you are seeking.
5. Have a Purpose: Some of the most wonderful realizations come when you are least expecting them, but most of the time, it helps to have a purpose. Purposeful consumption (e.g. knowing what you are trying to accomplish) gives you focus, and it allows you to filter out information that is not relevant.  It keeps you on track, and it keeps you from checking the score of the ball game when you forget why you were reading something.
6. Keep a Journal: If your goal is to gain new understandings that relate to personal situations, I have found that nothing is more effective than keeping a journal by your side. When you read about something that makes you go “ah ha,” write it down. Every once in a while, look back at all your notes and look for connections. Look for things that might relate to your life. Write all that down as well. Repeat. It will focus you on the areas most important to you, and you will feel good about the result.

Technology Tools That Promote Focus

Technology, and the internet in particular, can be a huge distraction, but there are some tools that help promote focus. Here are three that I find useful, as well as a link to some suggested by Leo Babauta. I am really interested to find others. Please share any tools that you find useful for focused consumption of information.

1. Instapaper: This tool takes the core text from web pages and stores it so that they can be consumed later on your computer or mobile device. Information is fed to Instapaper through web bookmarklets and integration with other applications.  It can then be viewed on computers and mobile devices.  The most beautiful thing is that it throws away everything but the text–so no distractions. Also, the viewing applications on the computer and mobile devices are very simple and easy to use. It promotes focus. Comparing Carr’s article (referenced earlier) viewed on the iPad Wired application versus Instapaper, Milind Alvares writes that “as soon as you’re a few lines into the story, it’s apparent that [the iPad's] two-column/three-column layout was nowhere near Instapaper’s readability, with generous single column, whitespace, font size, making a huge difference.”  Instapaper has an great iPad application, so I recommend skipping the Wired app and instead read the articles using Instapaper.
2. Readability: Claimed to be “an arc90 laboratory experiment”, Readability is a great little web plugin. Go to the site, add the bookmarklet to your web browser, and use it when you are reading an article that requires focus. Like Instapaper, Readability gives you large text, lots of white space, and nothing but the content you are trying to read.
3. Fogozine: This may be biased because Fogozine is our application. However, we firmly believe that Fogozine is a tool that enables focused information consumption. It is one of the key motivators that drives us to build it. Unlike most digital tools, Fogozine gives you a “beginning and an end.” As discussed above, this is a powerful way to prevent distraction. Fogozines also push you to have a focus. Each Fogozine is created around a central theme, or purpose, and this allows you to see multiple related content sources side-by-side. Having this all in one package (and one application) makes it easier to make connections and spot patterns. Finally, like Instapaper and Readability, we strive to make Fogozines simple, clutter-free, and easy to read, yet we also allow for other information mediums such as video, audio, and pictures.  An example Fogozine can be found here.

Finally, here are some more technology tools suggested by Leo Babauta.

Many of us feel overwhelmed by the onslaught of digital information piling up in our email inbox and available to us through internet-enabled services. Many are also struggling to understand how to use the Internet and social media to our greatest advantage.

If there is one thing we want to do at Fogo Media, it is to help you find ways to harness the power of digital information. Unless you are 16 years old and never knew any other way, you are going to have to adapt in order to take full advantage of the changes taking place. We want to show you how.

Our firm belief is that it is worth the time and effort to change the way you think and act. You will need to try new tools and devices, you will need to change the way you consume and filter information, and you will need open yourself to new methods of communication. This may be hard for many, but doing so will give you an advantage over those who fail to change.

By getting access to more of the right information at the right time (and that will be very specific to your needs), you will be able to quickly detect new and emerging patterns. This will lead to better decisions based on more accurate predictions of the future. You will also be able to share information and communicate more effectively, giving you more influence over others. Please use it to do good things!

This is powerful stuff. Information abundance + social media allow you to connect with others in a way that makes everyone collectively more intelligent. Just imagine what is possible. Even better, take action and make things happen. Experiment. Think big. Do not be afraid of failure. We are all figuring this out as the world continually changes. Your efforts will be rewarded with accomplishments not possible if you sit on the sidelines and watch.

Here is a video of the event:

April 22 NJ Mobile Meetup Presentation – Mobile to the Rescue? from Brock Butler on Vimeo.

Twitter may be the single most effective digital information filtering tool available today.

What is an information filter? Anything that separates the things you want to read from the things you do not want to read. That is a good thing. With the abundance of digital information available to us, we must aggressively filter information to make it useful. Searching, tagging, sorting, and segmenting are all examples of filtering. Everyone must do this, but those of us who filter the best will get the most relevant information in the least amount of time. Time, being the most scarce resource, is very valuable, so Twitter usage may give you an advantage in a time-starved world.

Twitter helps you find the "golden nuggets" in less time

Why is Twitter the best digital information filter? Because people filter better than machines. The trick is to follow the right people. If you follow people who tweet a lot of new content that is of interest to you, you no longer have to go out and find that content yourself. It is like you have an army of information miners working for you to find the nuggets you are most likely to want to read. Internet searching and online recommendation services are great, but they can not beat (yet) an actual human brain for filtering information.

Recommended techniques for using Twitter to filter information. Here are six techniques that help get better results with Twitter:

(1) Follow people with a high signal-to-noise ratio (S/N)

This is an engineering term, but it is a simple concept. The signal corresponds to the informative tweets that provide you with potentially useful information.  Noise refers to tweets that add no real value, like “I just ate a really good fried corndog.”  The higher the number of tweets in the “Signal” category relative to the “Noise” category, the better the S/N.  Just about everyone includes some noise in their signal, but too much noise will become a time-waster.  Avoid following people with a poor S/N.

(2) Make quick decisions on what is and is not worth reading

This is applicable beyond just Twitter, but it is especially important to be able to quickly pick out potentially useful tweets from tweets that are going to be a waste of time.  When in doubt, it is probably best to move on.

(3) Be purposeful by knowing what you are trying to get out of Twitter

Is it a daily dose of the latest news? Research on a specific topic? Following the whereabouts of celebrities? Twitter can help with all of that, as long as you have a purpose that aligns with what you are trying to get out of Twitter.

(4) Use Twitter lists

If you have multiple purposes for using Twitter (different topics of interest) then you should use Twitter lists.Twitter lists are a way to group and organize the people you follow on Twitter, and you don’t actually need to follow someone in order to include them in your list.  Once a list is created, you can view a tweet stream of only those included in the list.  Here is a good “how-to” guide for using Twitter lists.

(5) Get Twitter clients on all your electronic devices so you can access Twitter from as many places as possible

Small bits of free time will pop up frequently, and these can be good times to catch up on the latest Tweets. Twitter clients are available on just about any device with Internet access, so make sure you have access wherever you are.  NOTE: There is also value in escaping from the Internet sometimes, so don’t take this too literally.

(6) Participate

Posting your own informative tweets and retweeting tweets that you find useful is a great way to add value and attract followers who may become new recruits in your filtering army. Check out the people who are following you. The more you participate, the more likely you are to have followers that you can benefit from. Reciprocation is a great thing that only happens if you participate!

The caveat: When used the wrong way, Twitter can add more noise than it filters out. You want to avoid this by limiting the people you follow to those with good S/N. Like a garden, you will need to nurture your favorite plants with retweets and encouraging direct messages. You may also need to prune or pull the weeds that aggravate you by applying additional filters or un-following people.  It does take some maintenance, but I would argue that Twitter is worth the trouble.

Here are some people that I believe have a good S/N in the areas related to Fogo Media, and this blog:

@smashingmag

@ideasproject

@JohnEi

@VenessaMiemis

@visualthinkmap

@DanielPink

@Good

We would love to hear who you follow, as well as any other techniques for making Twitter more useful.

Additional Resources for the Curious Reader:

• Here is a very good guide for learning just all the Twitter basics.
• This is a highly-recommended article called How to Use Twitter to Build Intelligence.  Some similar points are brought up in this post, but it goes much deeper.
• There are those who believe Twitter makes the information over-abundance problem worse, not better.  Here is a well thought-out article on the impact of “activity streams” that claims our current toolset is not good enough.
• A video discussing why Twitter is such a big deal.
• This is a tool called Twiangulate that helps you find people to follow based on the connections of other trusted people
• A personal account of Twitter use that has lead to increased awareness, personal enjoyment, and fascination.  Also some good tips for how to use Twitter in a positive manner.
• What is the typical progression for Twitter usage?  I think The 46 Stages of Twitter comes pretty close.

So, how do you increase the odds that your documents will be read?  Here are 10 ways to create documents people will actually read:

1. Use Headings

Use headings to break content down into smaller sections. Headings allow readers to quickly scan the structure of your document and determine which sections are worth reading. This is particularly important for longer documents (over 500 words) that people will tend to avoid unless they can quickly jump to parts of the document that interest them the most.

Here is an online text book with more information on the use of headings.

2. Get to the point

Unless you have the skills to captivate readers with Shakespeare-like prose, get right to the point. Don’t add words, sentences, or paragraphs that are not needed. You may have heard this concept referred to as “Keep It Simple, Stupid”, or KISS.  This is another tactic to help save readers time and ensure that you get your point across.

3. Begin with the end

Most documents should state the key conclusions, takeaways, or purpose near the beginning. If you have one big build-up to the end, you risk readers never making it there. It is better to summarize the key conclusions up front and then use the rest of the document to support those conclusions.

4. Know your audience, your intentions, and desired outcome

You must know who you are writing for and what you are trying to accomplish. This sounds obvious, but is often overlooked. Before writing anything, think about who is going to read your document and what you hope will happen as a result. The desired outcome is particularly important, as this will often influence the way to structure your document.

5. Make visually appealing

This is more art than science, but there is no doubt that visually appealing documents are more likely to be read. To be clear, I am not suggesting aesthetics at the expense of good content. Rather, good content can be enhanced by clear visual layouts. Strategies for making documents more visually appealing could fill a book, but here are a few suggestions:

• White space – content should not cover every inch of whatever surface the reader is using. Margins, blank lines, and purposeful white space are very important. White space focuses readers on the content, by making the content stand out.  It also reduces the perception of clutter, which tends to make readers want to move on to something else.
• Contrast and color – use contrast and color to make different elements look different. This can be as simple as using bold, underline, and italic text to add meaning or emphasis.  It can also involve the careful use of different colors, but be careful not to overdo it.
• Alignment – alignment of visual elements is a key way to make documents look visually appealing.  Check out this page for more information about how grids can be used to enhance the layout of documents.

6. Add pictures, drawings, diagrams (when possible)

Whenever possible, it is a good idea to replace text with pictures, drawings, and diagrams. Visualizing information is a powerful way to communicate information and maintain the interest of readers. The key here is making sure the visuals help drive key points. If they are informational, but not relevant, they should be omitted or added as an appendix at the end.

7. Use bullets and lists

Bullets and lists help focus readers attention. To be effective, keep the number of list elements to 7 or less. Three is a magic number, but it isn’t always possible to boil things down to just three key point. A useful technique is to first summarize the contents of a document in a bulleted list (tip #3) and follow with headers (tip #1) that correspond to each bullet. Each header can then be expanded with more content about the specific topic. This technique helps readers target the sections of your document that interests them the most.

8. Link to reference material at end, or use external link

Keeping with tip #2 (get to the point), you should try to cut documents down to the most essential content if you want readers to read what you write.  If you want to include something that is interesting, but not essential, then add it to the end of the document (with reference in the main body) or include a link to an external source.  This gives hungry readers, who want to learn more, the opportunity to digest this information without scaring off readers who just want to take away a few key points.

9. Use appropriate writing style

To write documents that consistently engage your intended audience and get read, you need to develop a repertoire of writing styles.  Different writing styles are appropriate in different situations, and you should learn to use the most appropriate style for your target audience. Clear, unambiguous, language is essential when communicating technical information, but this style might appear repetitive and boring when talking about pop culture.  Storytelling, with vivid imagery, can capture the attention of readers and make a concept stick in their minds forever, but this same style may backfire if the attention span of your reader is 15 seconds or less (e.g. teenager reading celebrity gossip).

10. Proofread

The last tip is to proofread.  Your documents don’t need to be perfect, but a lot of careless errors can be fixed by proofreading your documents.  Proofreading is also an opportunity to work on improving your document with tips #1-9. Without proofreading, you run the risk that careless mistakes and unclear wording cause your reader to get distracted, and distraction is likely to result in your document getting pushed aside. Getting good at proofreading increases the odds that people read your documents and benefit from your hard work.

Further Reference:

Carnegie Mellon online course on Designing Technical Documents