Let's be Fwends

Nuance 2025~06~25

Nuance is an important part of meaningful conversations. Unfortunately, the way we talk often means nuance is lost in strong opinions.

Trees, AI, And Singing in Old English 2025~06~07

A new Meeker Report on AI is out, a directory of ancient trees, Lorde's Royals in old english, and more

Weeks, Webs, Wandering and Wondering 2025~05~28

Why a basic building block of our temporal structure is completely made up, the future of the web and cities that vibe just like you.

The Hidden Costs of Saving Time 2025~05~14

Beyond a certain threshold, no technology saves time without forcing someone else to lose it

How Long It Takes To Form a Habit, and Other Tales From the Internet 2025~04~30

I'm afraid it's faster to pick up a new habit than to undo the damage of Big Tech.

On Sleep 2025~04~16

Sleeping and resting is important; But we're not really sure why.

Noise 2025~04~02

Yet another thing we humans excel at.

The More Things Change ... 2025~03~19

... the more they stay the same. Or so it seems, when it comes to cycling software.

Self-Defeating Thoughts, Screen Inferiority and Hooks 2025~03~05

There's always something you can do.

The Rule of Reciprocity 2025~02~19

Kindness and generosity are great things. In order to protect them, consider when they might be misused.

The Bacteria Issue 2025~02~05

Did you know that the microorganisms in your body outnumber your body cells by nearly 25%? And they're not just sitting around minding their own business.

If a Decision is Sold Before it is Made, does it Make a Sound? 2025~01~22

With the advent of AI agents, we enter a new type of economy.

Walking as a Method for Getting Unstuck 2025~01~08

Rigidly clinging to finding a solution when stuck will get you no-where. But walking will.

Systems, Action, Work and Interviews (and Birds) 2024~11~11

The four-workdays-week is working, and so is taking action.

How the Robots Will Overthrow Humankind 2024~10~27

The pen is mightier than the sword, they said.

Make, See, Learn, Do 2024~10~13

Still thinking about how to progress towards a more human world.

Brains, Schools, And One Wild Sustainability Hack 2024~9~30

What do you change? What do you keep? Not everything old is bad, but also not everything is good, just because it is old. What things need to be made better, and what things are alright just the way they are?

Unlearn, Hum, and Put Down That Phone 2024~9~16

Crowbars, plastic fish, micromanagers: This one has it all.

Take Value Stream Mapping Beyond Process Improvements 2024~9~02

How value stream mapping can help your organization break down silos, streamline processes, and spark impactful cross-functional collaboration.

If it's working, it helps 2024~09~25

Dogma is seldom useful.

Please, Slow Down 2024~09~20

Speed ain't everything.

Thirty-Four-Thousand Steps 2024~08~21

Watching a bike race is hard work.

Does Your Name Sound Like You, or Do You Look Like Your Name? 2024~08~07

And more answers to questions you never asked yourself before.

Making Decisions, Building Trust 2024~07~24

We're all interconnected, whether we like it or not. How we're handling decisions and building trust shapes these connections

A Change of Environments 2024~07~17

Want to change how you're acting? Change your context.

Relying on AI Will Impede Your Growth 2024~06~26

Delegating too much to AI will rob you of deliberate repetition

The Vacation Edition 2024~06~12

One Map, One Meme, One Rabbit Hole

Do We Need a New Internet? 2024~05~29

Is the longing for the 'Good Old Days' of the Internet the beginning of a rebellion, or just harmless nostalgia?

You Really Shouldn't Sit That Much 2024~05~15

The optimal amount of standing, and other tales from modern life.

Take a Peek Inside Thought Processes 2024~05~01

We're mostly unaware of how much of our thinking is intransparent. Here's a tool to uncover those parts and create shared understanding.

Exit Criteria over Deadlines 2024~04~17

Why defining stop conditions is better than setting time expectations

Transformative Work 2024~04~10

Changing how work works.

The Relation between Self-Control, Power, and Lofty Goals 2024~03~27

Why people with perceived self-control come to power and how lofty goals can taint your reputation.

What Everyone Should Know About Metrics 2024~03~06

Don't fall into this trap.

Finding the Right Question To Ask 2024~02~21

Asking good questions is a key skill, so why not improve on it?

The Mindset for Creating Rude Coworkers 2024~02~07

Context creates mindset, and mindsets can create difficult people.

A Popular Spy-Movie Trope is Coming to AI 2024~01~24

A proof of concept LLM changes it behaviour when a trigger condition is met.

Staying Positive in an Eroding World 2024~01~10

Even if things don't always look bright, letting go of optimism will make matters only worse.

Cycling, Music, Fear, Age, Soda Cans 2023~11~20

In that order.

Should we Start to Ignore the Internet? 2023~11~15

Will Generative AI taint our online experience to a point where it becomes meaningless?

The Kingdom behind the Techno-King 2023~10~29

Are we heading towards a new era of feudalism?

Lossy Compression Thoughts about Organisations 2023~10~15

Abstraction is more prejudiced than you think it is

The End of the Internet (as we know it) 2023~10~01

Platform decay may mark the beginning of something new.

Growing 2023~9~18

How to grow, how to grow old, how to make sandwiches, how to climb, and how to smash.

Good Work 2023~9~04

The path to humanised work is long and winding.

Measure What Makes Sense 2023~09~27

Measuring stuff, reading minds, pseudoneglect and pain

Commitment and Compliance 2023~06~28

What happens when you combine two concepts that are at odds with each other?

Efficiency is Not Your Friend 2023~03~22

It leaves you ill prepared for many futures

Thoughts about Difficult People 2023~03~08

Everyone's a bit difficult, but some levels of difficult need to be managed

Why not simply embrace uncertainty? 2023~02~22

Have you ever tried to eliminate uncertainty by requiring 'more' upfront? More details, more requirements, more process, more meetings?

Perfection will be AI's Doom 2023~02~08

Count the 'The's to spot AI-generated Text

What's the worst that can happen, and can you handle that? 2022~11~28

Writing down your catastrophic thoughts creates room in your mind and can stop endless worrying

Make the Zeigarnik Effect your best friend 2022~11~14

Stop holding on to thinking about tasks to complete to free some mental capacity.

Navigating knowledge space - The Idea Compass and Greimas Square 2022~10~30

Two thinking tools to kick-start your creativity

Pictures and Words 2022~10~16

A picture says more than a thousand words, they say.

Sometimes, the Answer is to Remove Options 2022~06~09

Boundaries that strenghten the thing you want to do.

Unblocking Your Organisations' Agile Adoption 2022~05~25

Six areas of conflict you have to address and overcome.

If Time is an Illusion Anyway, why do we Change it Twice a Year? 2022~05~11

There are days when a broken clock is right thrice a day

Cognitive Gadgets against Brain Overload 2022~04~27

More or less blinky lights?

Our Computers Would be Pretty Secure, if it wasn’t for Us. 2022~04~20

Any system is only as resilient as the human operating it.

The Many Levels of Hype 2022~03~16

Hypes are real, and not necessarily a bad thing. But they can reach levels where they are troubling.

The Six Spokes of Life 2022~03~02

Leading a well-rounded life can bring a lot of positive things into your life. Keeping the different aspects of your life in balance will make you happier, and perform better, in all of them.

In Search for Powerful Questions 2022~02~16

Do you want to start a great conversation? Ask a powerful question!

Do You Have Your Priorities Straight? 2022~02~02

One really great life hack is to have a good, deep look at your calendar and do a time audit. Does the way you spend your time reflect what's important to you?

Is Web3 the Future of Web Technology? 2022~01~19

Is Web3 really the next big thing, or just a giant fad because when a technology in search for an application and VC money in search for an investment meet, marketing happens?

Why are Digital Services so Broken? 2022~01~05

If it was a desease, it would be called 'Featureitis', but people call it 'crud', 'feature creep' or similar unpleasant words.

A Couple of Things About Deep-Learning 2021~11~22

Machines that can learn from their experiences were Alan Turings dream. Now, they're mostly used for parking cars.

Remote Work can Make it Harder to Acquire new Information 2021~11~08

Switching from the office-culture to a remote work setting entails the danger of static social networks and silos.

User Research and Agile 2021~10~24

How to add a big chunk of product discovery into delivery-happy Scrum

Find a Gem to Start a Difficult Conversation 2021~08~17

It creates common ground, and fosters understanding.

Herd Mentality 2021~08~10

Why it's bad, and why it's so easy to fall for it. Plus: 10 faces to rule most of our facial recognition algorithms.

The End is Near. Wait, What? The End is Near? 2021~07~21

Is our economic system at its end? And what could replace it?

A Guide to Napping (Office Naps not Included) 2021~07~07

How to time your naps to match your desired outcomes, and what the office actually is good for nowadays.

The Perfect Number of Hours You Should Work in a Day 2021~06~23

But what is great in theory doesn't always work out in real life.

Hierarchies, Efficiency, Decisions 2021~06~09

Why it's hard for some people to work in flat organisations, what the quest for total efficiency does to your effectiveness, and a flowchart for making a big decision.

A quick burst of inspiration 2021~05~26

What feedback does to our inner narrative, how we can experience more wow, and other tangents of interest.

The Political Workforce 2021~05~12

Avoiding political debates in the context of work will hurt companies and their missions.

How does stuff work, anyway? 2021~05~01

In this issue, we look at a nice tool to kickstart our creativity when designing and have a look at OKRs and how they work. On the technical side, we dive into the workings of photo-finish cameras and see for ourselves how dishwashers - well - wash our dishes. And finally, there are 99 tips from Kevin Kelly.

Getting Real with Agile 2021~04~14

Often, there's a bit of a misunderstanding what Scrum is, and how it fits into an 'Agile landscape'. One factor amplifying this misunderstanding is that you can do some kinda Scrum without an Agile mindset.

Dealing with difficult People on Software Projects, and weaponising Thought. 2021~03~31

Different characters and their traits you find in software projects, a deep-dive into the typography of one of the most iconic science fiction horror movies ever made, fun with icebergs, maps and email, and finally a look at how you can weaponise a theory as a tool of destruction, even though it was meant to be a tool for progressing thought.

On Connections 2021~03~17

What does it mean to be connected - to yourself, and to others? And how can we get there?

On Conversations, Part 2 2021~03~03

Diving deeper into how to design conversations for better results

On Conversations, Part 1 2021~02~17

Everything you do is an invitation for a conversation.

Metrics and Maps 2021~02~03

When it comes to metrics, the important thing is to start somewhere. The same is true for nearly everything in life.

Sometimes we need to talk about what we don’t like. 2021~01~20

Especially when it's as interesting as this stuff.

One issue that is not about (new) work 2021~01~06

Sometimes, you have to bend a bit sideways to get some good inspiration.

Remote Work and the Future of Personal Productivity 2020~11~09

Personal Productivity needs to be embedded in a larger context - the context of work as a whole. Remote work increases the need for visibility and transparency in the work place.

The 2020 Scrum Guide, maps with a mission, and creating new points of view 2020~10~25

Life is not a zero-sum game, but treating it as such is incredibly common – and dangerous.

Half of the workforce will not return to the office 2020~10~11

Half of the employees currently on a Work From Home programme due to Covid-19 will quit their jobs if they are forced to return to the office full time after the crisis is over.

What can we learn from broken bones? 2020~9~28

Maybe the ability to take of each other is the surest sign of civilization.

How normal are you (according to this algorithm)? 2020~9~14

Facial recognition software is already in widespread use. What does it think of your face?

Let's call it a comeback! 2020~09~30

The Business Agility Report 2020 confirms what a lot of practitioners feel and sense everyday: Leadership styles and the (lack of) Agile Knowledge are the most common roadblocks when trying to adopt Business Agility.

Is it sabotage or just corporate culture? 2020~02~20

In 1994, US intelligence published a booklet on how to perform sabotage while looking like a dilligent, loyal employee. Their suggested tactics look a lot like everyday life in a modern corporate environment.

Inhale, exhale, now you’ve got a free mind. 2020~02~12

There’s a thing called mind-body problem, wondering how you can reconcile a Free (unpredictable) Will with a perfectly predictable physical brain.

Landing Pages, A/B-Testing, more maps and the world’s ugliest color 2020~01~29

What does it feel like to be the world’s ugliest color? We don’t have an answer for that, but we think we know what it looks like.

Generative Poetry, Maps, and getting People to draw 2020~01~15

What do you get when you combine OpenStreetMap data and weather information? Something not even remotely similar to what you get when you engage people in drawing exercises. And both is incredibly fun.

Criticality means everything is under control 2019~11~18

A nuclear reactor – once powered up – needs to be carefully monitored to stay critical, but won’t become reactive. The parallels to being an agile coach or a scrum master is not lost on me. This issue of Let’s be Fwends talks about complexity.

Giving Digital Assistants a new Voice 2019~11~04

Beautiful News, beautiful Animal Minds, and beautiful You. 2019~10~20

What You See Is All There Is, says Daniel Kahneman. Your mind is really bad at reminding itself that there’s information out there which it is not considering at this very moment. It’s time to remind yourself that there are some really good news out there, that ducks are pretty darn smart and you, you are a really, really cool person.

A new initiative wants you to keep your data to yourself 2019~10~18

It is yours, after all.

What meetings do to you and how to start doing what you want to do 2019~10~08

What happens when you cut meeting time in half and send everybody home for the weekend on thursday without a pay cut?

The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge 2019~9~24

Why the pursuit of useless knowledge often leads to the greatest discoveries.

New Approaches 2019~9~23

Everything is changing. Again.

How much have we figured out yet? 2019~9~09

When we look at the stuff people are figuring out all the time, it makes you wonder: Why didn’t we know this all along? But it’s ok, it’s all a process!

What do your personal Wellbeing and a Spaceship have in common? 2019~09~25

Both are better off hidden behind a “Somebody Else’s Problem” field.

Just a bunch of cool things. 2019~09~11

A font for websites that comes with its own JavaScript library, a cannon that shoots fish up a river, a short introduction to my new project and a bunch of other cool stuff. Including a cat getting smothered by little puppers.

Google is a walled garden, and women might be the better athletes. 2019~08~28

Google is turning from a network aggregator to a closed garden, and ultra endurance events are turning into a showcase of gender equality.

It’s either this, or that. Or something else 2019~08~14

Anonymous datasets aren’t, huge differences in europe are, Forever21 has lost it, you did maybe too and that’s the reason why you pat down your pockets.

How we’re gonna work in the near future 2019~07~31

What are the main influences that change our workspace? And can logic bombs be an insurance against job loss?

The weird side effects of things in vastly complicated ecosystems. 2019~07~17

It’s pretty hard to predict what will happen if you change something in a complex system. Like, a city, or technology.

You see Failure, I see Feedback 2019~07~03

What’s better? Not taking a decision until you know you’re right, or taking one and try to revert it if it turns out to be the wrong one?

Valuable Experience Design Tools and Resources 2019~06~19

A collection of interesting and valuable ideas, concepts and frameworks on Experience Design.

Gender defaults harm society, your phone is easily identifiable, and what comes after capitalism? 2019~06~05

Why are virtual assistants always female? And what does that have to do with our perceived gender stereotypes? Plus: Your phone can be fingerprinted without you knowing it, and what will come after capitalism?

A Data Scientist on why Data Science is mostly Marketing 2019~05~22

Data Science, Big Data, Artificial Intelligence … we’re all in awe about what all those data-powered products and services are capable of. But what are they actually capable of, and what is just PR?

Three Trends that will interest you, plus Bonus Content 2019~05~15

What’s up with web design? Is there a trend that makes trends last shorter? And what about the trend of leaving the city behind and moving to the country?

Can we make ourselves obsolete? 2019~04~10

Is a “runaway” AI that keeps producing better version of itself without human intervention even possible?

The EU decided to nuke the Internet because voting 2019~03~27

The European Parliament voted to pass the new and highly disputed copyright directive without any changes because some MEPs made a mistake.

Sleep to repair your brain 2019~03~13

Thinking damages the DNA of your neurons, and sleep repairs it. But how much sleep, and when, is good for your health?

Is this the future of Fake News (and Social Media) 2019~02~27

Current developments in AI-driven content generation suggest a new wave of sophisticated Fake News is coming our way.

I skipped a Beat 2019~02~18

Sadly, modifying the flow of time is out of our reach.

Multitasking is a pretty bad Idea. 2019~01~30

At least, if you do it simultaneously.

I made a terrible, terrible Mistake. 2019~01~16

Confessions of a serial quoter.

This ain't the worst year evar. 2019~01~04

Own your Data! Or don’t? 2018~11~19

It’s always a mixed bag, innit?

How we got the wrong impression about will power 2018~11~05

“Too good to be true” usually is.

There’s money to be made with women’s health 2018~10~07

“Femtech” is the latest darling of venture capitalists.

A man, a horse and a typeface walk into a bar … 2018~9~10

How’s your joke memory lately?

The Internet of things still doesn’t care about your privacy 2018~09~26

When your voice-activated microwave is connected to the Internet, who knows what happens next?

Innovation, taking Risks and Failure 2018~09~12

Obviously, innovation and failure are linked. But how?

Patterns, Dark and Light 2018~08~29

Sometimes, you shouldn’t do what you can.

All the Things hidden from You 2018~08~15

Will they stay in the shadows forever?

This nonsense of earning a living 2018~08~01

Work, Labour, and Action.

Keeping track of Things 2018~07~19

How writing things down can improve your life.

Just act naturally 2018~07~04

Smile and wave, just smile and wave.

On Work that makes unhappy 2018~06~20

When good practices have unexpected results.

The Adjacent Possible 2018~04~11

No idea is an island.

Breaking the Ludic Loop 2018~03~28

When you feel like you’re running to stand still, it’s time for a change.

The Tools that make us think 2018~03~14

It’s not just that we create the tools, they also create us.

Standing on the Threshold of Brilliance 2018~02~28

Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time.

Consistency is the playground of dull minds 2018~02~14

When your parents asked you: “What do you want to be when you grow up?” you didn’t answer “Consistent.”, did you?

A Change of Perspective 2018~01~31

Sometimes, you change the perspective. And sometimes, the perspective changes you.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. 2018~01~17

Or, as George W has said: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me – you can’t get fooled again.

This is not the dawn of Artificial Intelligence 2018~01~03

It is, however, the dawn of clumsy robots.

What 2018 will bring to UX Design 2017~11~20

If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail 2017~11~06

The tools at your disposal define your view of the world.

Bots – Humans new best friends 2017~10~17

When Facebook knows more people you know than you know (or know to know).

Technology will not make cyclists safer 2017~10~08

But it will keep the tech giants busy, and get them even richer than they already are.

What the heck is going on with Social Media? 2017~9~11

And if the bots will rule us, is their interface going to be flat? 2017~09~13

The future of influencers, the past of a tree, and everything in between. 2017~08~30

Panta Rhei. Everything is changing.

Illusions 2017~08~16

When you cannot trust your senses, and it’s still fun.

The Mid-Summer Edition 2017~08~02

It’s summer, it’s hot (again), everybody wants to be outside and not reading emails.

Make sure everyone wins 2017~07~19

Life is not a zero-sum game, but treating it as such is incredibly common – and dangerous.

Staying (or getting) calm 2017~07~05

Time for a throwback! 2017~06~21

When did ‘intelligent’ become ‘scary’? 2017~05~24

Crows are jerks 2017~05~10

Crows are jerks

Outliers 2017~04~26

Outliers

Iteration, not repetition 2017~04~12

In Praise of Airplane Coffee 2017~03~29

It’s not about the new; It’s about the good. 2017~03~15

A Preface 2017~03~10