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(NOTE: This post first appeared on foofaraw: 🌎 Where in the World is Jack? Vol.3) A theme for the past month has been,

In my experience, a key skill to develop is the ability to separate one thing from another. To prevent the small from becoming the all. Take a policy, for example. Could be a government, or a school, or a home owner’s association, or something at work. Whatever it is, you don’t like it. You don’t agree, you don’t like the decision make...

Public commitment pledges are a surprisingly effective and free way to help you reach your goals. A public commitment pledge is simply writing what you will or won't do, perhaps something you know you find hard, signing it and displaying it publicly. In her excellent book, How to Change, Katy Milkman describes how the simple intervention of a public commitment pledge in doctors' offices significantly reduced prescriptions of unnecessary antibiotics—just through a poster on the wall. Commitment pledges are a form of what Katy calls a soft commitment device (of Odysseus fame). This strategy helps us stick to our commitments even when tempted to go astray. Pledges may work through our desire for consistency and create cognitive dissonance when considering going against the pledge. The benefits of what we desire to do, say "eat cookies," are pitted against the potential guilt or discomfort we'd feel by going against what we said we'd do, not "eat cookies." You don't want to let yourself down. The pledge gives us a greater chance of sticking to our actions and a defence against our present bias. Is there something you wish you'd do more of or less of? A simple public commitment pledge could help you on your way. Other free ways to help you achieve your goals: Temptation bundling, The Fresh Start Effect, commitment device, Nine-enders

Translations welcome! ([Português](https://meleu.github.io/artigos-traduzidos/aprenda-em-publico-hack.html))

A few things about me

Pitching Nirvana

Scrolling, scanning, skipping: How do users consume content online? Here’s what you need to know about reading behavior and design strategies to prevent harmful scanning patterns. An upcoming part of Smart Interface Design Patterns.

Most businesses are not fucking Coca-Cola. They don't have this secret recipe that's the foundation of their success. The vast majority of businesses succeed or fail on the basis of their execution and their timing. There just aren't that many profound secrets that completely alter the trajectory of wherever some company's going. But I...

Adopt our method for crafting legible, consistent, and elegant icon sets, developed over 12 years by our team of 8 icon designers.

Your Parents Are Getting Old, Here’s What To Do:

What ever happened to details? The red sole of a Louboutin shoe, or the elegant tag on a pair of Tom’s? The sweeping fenders of a Porsche 911 or the needless complications of a fancy watch… Today, …

There’s a better way to do email.

Read key ideas and quotes from "The AdWeek Copywriting Handbook," by Joe Sugarman

Since the beginning of Basecamp, we’ve been loath to make promises about future product improvements. We’ve always wanted customers to judge the product they could buy and use today, not some imaginary version that might exist in the future. It’s why we’ve never committed to a product road map. It’s not because we have a secret one in ...

In the late 80s, I discovered a discount bookshop on Shaftesbury Avenue, amongst the junk,  ‘Knitting For The Whole Family’ and ‘Fun With Chives’ were piles American adverti…

These are excerpts (emphasis mine) from William James's 1890 classic, Principles of Psychology, Chapter IV,

I found myself recently, as one does, watching the mini-documentary featurettes included on the DVD for the popular 2014 Keanu Reeves movie, John Wick — ... Read more

Which day have you been the most productive? Is there something you did that made it so productive? And is it something you can do every day?

Some of the most rewarding features to add to products are ones that don’t increase surface area, but increase depth. This is how you continue to make a product a whole lot better without it feeling like it got a whole lot bigger. Basecamp’s new References feature is a great example of this. Video + write-up: https://updates.37signals....


 
 
 
 
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An unusually simple spin-off story.It was 2014, and we decided to spin one of our products off into its own company. The product was Know Your Company and knew the perfect person to run it. Her name was @clairejlew.There are a million ways to spin-off a company. And most of… pic.twitter.com/ahgRlT8Ixs— Jason Fried (@jasonfried) April 11, 2024

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Having a style collapses hundreds of future decisions into one, and gives you focus.

If you want to progress faster, write concise explanations. Explain ideas in simple terms, strongly and clearly, so that they can be rebutted, remixed, rewor...