Harry Chen Thinks Aloud

I’m the process of cleaning up my study room. I’m surprised by the amount of books and CDs that I have collected. In past, I was a strong opponent of throwing away books and CDs. I believed that they are valuable assets. Today, I no longer believe this.

I decide to either sell my collections to used bookstores or donate them the public library. There were few good reasons why I should have kept my books and CDs. They are memories of the past. Each book and CD represent a moment of my life — when I bought it, why I bought it and whom I shared it with etc. Good books can serve as a reference. A chronological ordering of the CD collection displays a change of my music taste and a change of the popular culture. It would seem be an easy choice to keep all my collections. But, think again, there are many reasons why I should discard my collections.

First, books and CDs take up physical space. Because I rarely go through all my collection, they simply sit on the shelf collecting dust. Until I physically picked out each one them from the shelf recently, I had forgotten many of them. Second, the value of books and CDs diminishes when they are “consumed”. Once I read a book, the knowledge it contains becomes part of my knowledge. Some books may require multiple readings in order for it to be fully understood. But, that’s rare. CDs are like books. They get old quickly. When a CD has been played repeatedly within a short period of time, it gets old. They ended up on the shelf collecting dust. Lastly, to properly maintain book and CD collections require significant amount of labor and furniture investment. I’m tired of expanding my shelves and cleaning them.

After some serious consideration, I decide to keep only books that are timeless and CDs that have significantly influenced my life. I digitally converted many of my CDs. I wish I can do the same for my books. I decide to sell my books to local used bookstores for pennies before donating them to the public library. I believe used book business could contribute to the growth of local economy. If the owners can make few dollars from my old books, it’s better than having them sitting in the public library.

I hope a new wave of 21st century technology will completely eliminate the existance of physical books and CDs. Everything should be digital. Once we’ve reached that stage, our study rooms can be compact and free of mess.

Recently Wii partnered with YouTube to create a new type of video ad. Instead of creating a separate web page to feature Wii games, the game’s video is seamlessly embedded in a typical YouTube page. As the video plays, audiences experience some “awesome” surprises.

Watch this video on Wario Land: Shake It

The US financial market is in a state of extreme stress. Triggered by a sub-prime mortgage market collapse, banking institutions, both investment banks and traditional banks, are having trouble raising cash and afraid of leading money. Recently the US Government steps up its action to calm the market by issuing a massive bailout plans to save troubled financial institutions.

A constant reporting of these news events in different media streams can create confusion. It’s important that we keep our head straight in order to make sound decisions for our financial futures.

Important questions that people should know are as follows:

1. Why does the US Government want to bailout troubled financial institutions?
2. How will government actions affect an individual’s personal finance?
3. What actions should we take to protect and secure our financial future?

A1: The US Government is very concerned about the current crisis. It worries that if a significant number of financial institutions are to close doors within a short period time, a series of chain reactions will destroy any potential for the US economy to recover in the near future.

A2: US taxpayers should expect greater inflation and higher taxes in the near future. The government’s bailout plan will require a large amount of government-back bonds to be issued. Most likely that they will be sold to foreign countries. The effect of this is equivalent to printing cash, which will lead to inflation. Greater national debts will reduce foreign investors’ confidence in the US-dollar-backed investments. To reduce the national debts, unless the government finds others way to fund it’s current operations, it will raise taxes.

A3: Don’t panic. We’re in a tough situation, but it’s not the end of the world. The best way to protect our financial future is to diversify our investments. Diversify means putting your money into different vehicles of financial instruments. If you have money to invest and don’t yet own a home. Go buy a house — if you plan on staying at the same place for years and enjoy maintaining your own home. Remember to invest in retirement funds. In a down market, increase your investment funding if you can. Find ways to reduce your income taxes. Owning a home and invest in qualified retirement plans (401K and IRA) can reduce your income taxes.

When it comes the US economy, I’m an optimist. I believe that the US has the best governing system in the world (though imperfect) and with a culture that will allow a fast market correction and recovery. Most of the world’s countries are in a deep financial crisis. My belief is that the US will be the first to come out of the woods. The question is when.

Additional Reading: Wall Street Bailout Plan

We live in a world of information overload. Like many people, I face the problem of information overload constantly. Recently I revisited this problem and found some solution to the problem.

Here is a brief description of the problem and where the issues are. Information overload can be observed from two different perspectives: (1) information requires you to process and (2) information about specific tasks that need to be executed. An example of the former is tracking RSS feeds. I monitor many RSS feeds. As the number of feeds increases, the amount of time that I can actually spend on reading each feed item decreases. This is a classic example of information overload. The latter is not about absorbing information but remembering what need to be done and how to complete them on time. Personal projects (e.g., home improvements) and work projects (e.g., must complete X by the end of month) are examples of this kind information overload.

There are many different ways to attack information overload. Few online applications can help to improve people’s productity. Evernote is a popular web application that allows users to take notes and sync notes between the web, mobile devices and desktop applications. A competing web application is Google Notebook.

After some research, I decided to give Google Notebook a try. I like the idea of using Google Notebook to implement the Getting-Things-Done (GTD) algorithm.

• Getting Things Done With Google Notebook