Just stumbled upon a YouTube clip of one of the best Ignite presentations I've seen, by Hilary Mason, a computer scientist at Bit.ly. Mason wrote a series of scripts that auto-respond to email with particular content, and auto-nag folks she's emailed but hasn't gotten a response from yet. Hit the play button to hear more. She says once the code's fit for sharing she'll put it up on GitHub. Cannot wait.

In the past three months Anil and I have been to events in six different cities talking about Expert Labs and how the White House used ThinkTank to compile feedback on the Grand Challenges initiative. At Fast Company's Innovation Uncensored event in New York City last month, Anil absolutely killed it in a 12 minute presentation that hits the nail right on the head. Press play to check it out.

In the past five installments I addressed some old and new issues any tech savvy digital worker encounters: keeping track of passwords, wasting time leaving and listening to voicemail, being a productive freelancer (or just work-at-homer), syncing files across all your computers, and, for fun, a few things you didn't know your cameraphone can do. Hit play on any of the 2-3 minute segments inside.

Taming Your Voicemail in Two Easy Steps

Leaving voicemail and listening to voicemail is painful. There are some tricks for skipping right to the beep, and never having to suffer through a long-winded message from Uncle Bert again. Here's the full video transcript.

Freelance Survival Skills

"How do you work at home and actually get things done?" It's not easy, but in this video I share some of what's worked for me. Here's the full video transcript.

3 Useful Things You Didn't Know Your Cameraphone Could Do

It's amazing what your smartphone can do given apps and a great camera built in. Here's the full video transcript.

A Single Trick for Remembering Countless Passwords

Every week you sign up for another site or service and have to set up yet another password. Pick good ones that are unique--without writing anything down. Here's the full video transcript.

3 Apps for Syncing Home and Office

You use more than one computer at work and at home. Here are a few ways to make sure your files are where you need 'em. Here's the full video transcript.

What, you haven't bought your copy of The Complete Guide to Google Wave yet? And you've been meaning to? My friend, today is your lucky day.

Because I like you, and because I'd like to sell more books, I'm signing every single copy of The Complete Guide to Google Wave that gets ordered today, March 31st, between now and midnight Pacific time.

Just head on over to the book's web site, order up a copy of the paperback book, and before we pack and ship it your way I'll sign it with my favorite pen. I won't sign a sticker that someone else will slap into your book, I will sign YOUR ACTUAL BOOK. With care. First thing tomorrow morning, before the dude in the uniform comes to pick it up and happily delivers it to your doorstep. The paperback book is full-color, fits great in your hand and in your laptop bag, and costs $25. Half of that purchase price helps employ a developmentally disabled adult in my community.

Wave is made of the best futuristic stuff on the web, and it's worth sinking your teeth into. Grab a copy of the book, learn how to get your wave on, help out a great charity, and get a firsthand look at my chicken scratch handwriting. It's a win-win-win.

Did I mention that this virtual signing is for books purchased today only? The clock's a'ticking. Buy one now. (And thanks.)

The Complete Guide to Google Wave

The topics are very much related. Once you've let yourself dread something long enough, you get stuck in a cycle of procrastination that makes you feel like crap. But my big secret is this: some of my best work got done while I was putting off doing something else. When you're procrastinating, you're highly motivated to avoid something for as long as possible. Which means you've got both the will and the time to knock out something OTHER than the dreaded task you're putting off.

On the other hand, if you see that dreaded task looming on the horizon, you can set yourself up to tackle it first thing in the morning, before anything else happens. I jacked the title of a book I love, Eat That Frog, to describe that one. Here are the two clips.

First, on turning procrastination into productivity (here's the the full transcript):

Second, on eating your frog--or doing your worst task first (here's the full transcript):

Production note: based on the viewer reaction to the first batch of videos, when I was looking off to the side, we changed my eye line for these so I'm looking directly into the camera. (Everyone said "Why are you looking out into space?") The change was a little weird for me, because before I was talking to my director during the shoot, and it's much easier to feel like you're having a conversation looking at a person's face. Looking at a camera lens is more disconcerting--it feels like you're talking to an emotionless robot. But, I like the results of the direct-to-camera eye line a lot better, and I hope you do too.

Besides being created by a woman (Ed: that's me!), we've been able to start up an active, vibrant community that is supportive and inclusive of new members. I think that our habit of mentoring our newest contributors is part of why we were one of the youngest apps to be selected for Google Summer of Code students to participate in, and I think it also explains why we have a mailing list and community that's never had a single flame war, personal attack or ego battle. It also helps that we're doing meaningful work that helps government make better decisions every time we fix a bug in our application. Even if you've never considered yourself a coder, there are instructions on how to participate that make joining the project as easy as editing a file in Google docs.

ThinkTank hasn't been around long enough to have accumulated any cruft--either in the source code, or in the community's politics. If you join now you have the opportunity to make a major impact on early decisions that will shape ThinkTank's roadmap. I hope tomorrow's Adas will consider getting in on the ground floor and help us grow these seeds into something amazing in a helpful and supportive environment. Interested? Join the mailing list and dive into the code on GitHub.

Thanks, Ada.

Tomorrow's Adas [Anil Dash]

Had a blast recording the latest episode of This Week in Google in person with Jeff Jarvis and Leo Laporte in Austin at SXSW this past Saturday. We had a live audience in-studio of friends and supporters there too, with guest appearances by Matt Haughey, Adam Pash, and Jake Jarvis rotating in on the fourth mic. It was so cool to see what happens beyond my Skype headset every Saturday and finally get to give Leo a big hug in person. Speaking of Leo at SXSW, if you haven't seen him crowdsurfing at the Diggnation party, you must get yourself to the YouTube clip of that stat.

The time blocking piece is actually a personal confession about my hermit tendencies. Sometimes I just shut everything off, fall off the face of the planet, and have some uninterrupted me-time. I've had co-workers say to me, "Um, where did you go today?" and the answer is usually "To my happy place, a distraction-free zone." As you'll hear in the video, at my last office job, I actually used to schedule a meeting with myself complete with a conference room to get away and focus on something for awhile. Here's the 2 minute, 37 second clip.

Read the whole script at Fast Company: Avoid Office Distractions with Time Blocking.

The second clip is my quick answer to the age-old question about Google Wave: "But what do you actually use it for?" Here are three use cases for Wave in your business.

To dive deeper into Wave use cases, check out 8 more in Chapter 10 of The Complete Guide to Google Wave.

As they do every day at their blog, in Rework the Signals break down their minimalist philosophy into a series of essays written in uncompromising language. Expect a table of contents full of sections entitled things like "Learning from mistakes is overrated," "Planning is guessing," "Outside money is plan Z," "Throw less at the problem," "Skip the rock stars," and "Meetings are toxic." While it's billed as a business book, at its core Rework is a get-up-off-your-ass, stop-talking-and-start-doing book--a productivity book that uses 37signals as its main case study.

People who follow 37signals online know that they are opinionated and contrarian--sometimes to the point of abrasive. At least one person thinks their small business philosophy is downright dangerous. Personally I give 37signals credit for having a strong point of view, a well-executed shtick, and for having shipped some fantastic software products. (At Lifehacker we lived in Campfire.) My advice? Take the book with a grain of salt. After reading it you don't have to cancel every meeting you have at your company. But, if you shorten a few, you've gotten something out of it.

To get a taste of how the book reads, download this PDF excerpt with essays on why workaholism, business plans, and meetings don't work. The book is available today in bookstores and on Amazon.

Rework