Geeze did I get pwned today. On an April Fool’s joke that doesn’t apply until tomorrow….
Ya see, there’s this blog I read by author Tim Ferriss. He wrote a book about outsourcing elements of your life to the point where you only have to work four hours per week. I’m not too interested in the book because I love what I do and don’t want the lifestyle he follows. But I find his blog fascinating. The header on his blog is “Experiments in Lifestyle Design”. That’s why I read his blog – he really does think outside the box on many aspects of life and he takes chances that I would never bother with. I learn from his efforts, and I really love doing that.
Well, today (day before April Fool’s Day), he made a post that for the past year his blog hasn’t been written by him – he has outsourced it. It’s all been a huge outsourcing experiment and we were his test subjects! I was pissed. I posted a comment. I tried to be polite. At the end of my comment, I put this “btw, a personal blog shouldn’t be work, it should be a passion. If you need to outsource it, you have the wrong motivation.”
As my opening line mentioned, it was a joke by Tim, who is in Japan, so April Fools started earlier. As luck would have it, I saw his post just after it went up and my comment was one of the early ones. It has over 100 as I write this. Evidently, a *lot* of people were pissed that he was ‘outsourcing’ his blog. So much so that he quickly put up another post to explain that it was an April Fool’s joke. He even sent an e-mail to explain that it was a joke. Another good move.
The e-mail, to me, shows he’s not an egotistical jerk. I think he realized he had really pulled one over, but perhaps too well. So – rather than let people fume for a full day – he straightened things out. That was the third action by Tim that I’ve respected today. I recommend that you check out his blog. Like I said, a lot of really good ideas, perspectives, and philosophies. If his book strikes interest, you can read some of it online at his site. I haven’t read his book because my work is my passion and I don’t want to limit it to only 4 hours per week. Other do, so hopefully Tim has helped those people.
Oh, and the quote I referenced above – he put that in the letter and his explanatory post. I’m proud! Thanks Tim! 