Publications
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Don’t try this at home: Implementing the e-mail vendetta
Today I declared war on e-mail. Well, not all e-mail: just the tyrannical assumption that we should all reply to every single message we reply. In a blog post for the Harvard Business Review, I called for a vendetta on the mandatory universal reply. That means...
Tied to technology
My latest toy is an iPod nano watch. It's just a plain old iPod nano, but it slides onto a watch strap specially designed to watch-ify it. I loved it for being red and iSomething and tiny but even so I wasn't particularly sure that it was a wise (read: financially...
Kenneth Cole’s Social Media Marketing Lesson
Milions are in uproar in #Cairo. Rumor is they heard our new spring collection is now available online at http://bit.ly/KCairo…
Could you imagine life without Facebook?
Progressive Media Concepts recently posted an interesting question: What Would You Do If Facebook Shut Down Tomorrow? One I recovered from my blackout (it's my body's automatic self-defense mechanism when faced with the unthinkable) I read on, curious to hear PWC's...
Internet tunes: Craiglist Hookup – Missed Connections
Kate Allen has a great article in yesterday's Toronto Star about the phenomenon that is Craigslist's Missed Connections. It features the true story of a couple who met through MC two years ago...so yes, you can find love that way. Kate interviewed me for the story,...
Social media for the 28th day: 9 tech tips for easier periods
Today's post is a special for my female readers. Gentlemen, please avert your browsers as I'm about to discuss icky girl things that would constitute a betray of my gender if you all keep reading. Ladies, now that it's just us, let's talk about how to optimize your...
There are motherf&!#ing blogs on the motherf&!#ing plane!
About an hour ago I tweeted the following: Desperately trying to think of a tweet that makes it clear I'm tweeting from the plane, w/out making it sound like that's the point. The responses to this tweet were so fantastic that I just have to round them up:...
Mac users, meet your menu bar
Can you recognize the signs of SMBB? Selective Menu Bar Blindness affects millions of Mac users, but has yet to be widely recognized as a chronic and debilitating condition. Patient X -- let's call her "Shmalexandra" -- was treated for a classic presentation of the...
Silence the voice of your inner blogging critic
On especially bad days this is what the voice in my head says: [soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/9856414" params="show_comments=true&auto_play=false&color=ff7700" width="100%" height="81" ] But here's the good news: there's nothing like hearing your...
15 resources to accelerate your social media learning
I just got back from a fantastic day at the 20th annual Dynamic Women in Business Conference at Harvard Business School. What an incredible event! If the students who organized it weren't going to be busy running the world's next generation of startups, non-profits...
The Harvard Business Review
Don’t try this at home: Implementing the e-mail vendetta
Today I declared war on e-mail. Well, not all e-mail: just the tyrannical assumption that we should all reply to every single message we reply. In a blog post for the Harvard Business Review, I called for a vendetta on the mandatory universal reply. That means...
Tied to technology
My latest toy is an iPod nano watch. It's just a plain old iPod nano, but it slides onto a watch strap specially designed to watch-ify it. I loved it for being red and iSomething and tiny but even so I wasn't particularly sure that it was a wise (read: financially...
Kenneth Cole’s Social Media Marketing Lesson
Milions are in uproar in #Cairo. Rumor is they heard our new spring collection is now available online at http://bit.ly/KCairo…
Could you imagine life without Facebook?
Progressive Media Concepts recently posted an interesting question: What Would You Do If Facebook Shut Down Tomorrow? One I recovered from my blackout (it's my body's automatic self-defense mechanism when faced with the unthinkable) I read on, curious to hear PWC's...
Internet tunes: Craiglist Hookup – Missed Connections
Kate Allen has a great article in yesterday's Toronto Star about the phenomenon that is Craigslist's Missed Connections. It features the true story of a couple who met through MC two years ago...so yes, you can find love that way. Kate interviewed me for the story,...
Social media for the 28th day: 9 tech tips for easier periods
Today's post is a special for my female readers. Gentlemen, please avert your browsers as I'm about to discuss icky girl things that would constitute a betray of my gender if you all keep reading. Ladies, now that it's just us, let's talk about how to optimize your...
There are motherf&!#ing blogs on the motherf&!#ing plane!
About an hour ago I tweeted the following: Desperately trying to think of a tweet that makes it clear I'm tweeting from the plane, w/out making it sound like that's the point. The responses to this tweet were so fantastic that I just have to round them up:...
Mac users, meet your menu bar
Can you recognize the signs of SMBB? Selective Menu Bar Blindness affects millions of Mac users, but has yet to be widely recognized as a chronic and debilitating condition. Patient X -- let's call her "Shmalexandra" -- was treated for a classic presentation of the...
Silence the voice of your inner blogging critic
On especially bad days this is what the voice in my head says: [soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/9856414" params="show_comments=true&auto_play=false&color=ff7700" width="100%" height="81" ] But here's the good news: there's nothing like hearing your...
15 resources to accelerate your social media learning
I just got back from a fantastic day at the 20th annual Dynamic Women in Business Conference at Harvard Business School. What an incredible event! If the students who organized it weren't going to be busy running the world's next generation of startups, non-profits...
OneZero
On the dangers of crowdsourced surveillance
My blog post for Harvard Business today looks at the troubling online reaction to last night's riots in Vancouver. Reflecting on the widespread enthusiasm for using social media to track down criminals, I wrote: I don't think we want to live in a society that turns...
8 ways to beat the urgency trap in online communications
In a thoughtful post about The Pitfalls of social media, Aleksandr Voinov writes Social Media exerts pressure on us to do things immediately and respond to everything immediately. I'm not sure about you, but sometimes I like to think things through and discuss it with...
5 signs that you’ve mastered the art of online discretion
I sometimes think that the most useful preparation for my career in social media came not from my academic research into online politics, but rather, my practical experience with electoral politics. Working on the political staff of a senior elected official (the...
The pajama test: An open letter to my Facebook “friends”
A year ago today, this blog post was the turning point in my relationship with Facebook. In my life affair for Twitter I'd pretty much lost sight of how Facebook could possibly be relevant to me. Then I made the decision that Facebook would be my personal space -- the...
11 best practices for managing your social network memberships
Between the Wordpress.com hack, the Honda Canada hack and the Playstation hack, I feel like my favorite online identities have been seriously compromised. Nor am I the only one: the recent attack on PBS servers has also created potential identity risks for PBS...
10 ways Microsoft Kinect will change our world in the next decade
Six months after our Kinect arrived in our lives, it's mostly unused. But that doesn't mean it's any less transformative than I'd hoped...just in different ways than I predicted. In our household the Kinect's shining moment came on New Year's Eve, when our first...
Social media for small organizations: Why size matters
10 ways you can tap the value of the Delicious community
A social bookmarking service that draws value from both its user and developer communities, Delicious makes it easy to keep track of your favorite web sites. Here are 10 ways you can tap into the unique value of the Delicious.
JSTOR DAILY
On the dangers of crowdsourced surveillance
My blog post for Harvard Business today looks at the troubling online reaction to last night's riots in Vancouver. Reflecting on the widespread enthusiasm for using social media to track down criminals, I wrote: I don't think we want to live in a society that turns...
8 ways to beat the urgency trap in online communications
In a thoughtful post about The Pitfalls of social media, Aleksandr Voinov writes Social Media exerts pressure on us to do things immediately and respond to everything immediately. I'm not sure about you, but sometimes I like to think things through and discuss it with...
5 signs that you’ve mastered the art of online discretion
I sometimes think that the most useful preparation for my career in social media came not from my academic research into online politics, but rather, my practical experience with electoral politics. Working on the political staff of a senior elected official (the...
The pajama test: An open letter to my Facebook “friends”
A year ago today, this blog post was the turning point in my relationship with Facebook. In my life affair for Twitter I'd pretty much lost sight of how Facebook could possibly be relevant to me. Then I made the decision that Facebook would be my personal space -- the...
11 best practices for managing your social network memberships
Between the Wordpress.com hack, the Honda Canada hack and the Playstation hack, I feel like my favorite online identities have been seriously compromised. Nor am I the only one: the recent attack on PBS servers has also created potential identity risks for PBS...
10 ways Microsoft Kinect will change our world in the next decade
Six months after our Kinect arrived in our lives, it's mostly unused. But that doesn't mean it's any less transformative than I'd hoped...just in different ways than I predicted. In our household the Kinect's shining moment came on New Year's Eve, when our first...
Social media for small organizations: Why size matters
10 ways you can tap the value of the Delicious community
A social bookmarking service that draws value from both its user and developer communities, Delicious makes it easy to keep track of your favorite web sites. Here are 10 ways you can tap into the unique value of the Delicious.
THE VERGE
Love in flames: finding the joy in hostile comments
"I don't know why you care about the shit that a bunch of total strangers say about you on the Internet." This was my mom's delightfully candid and potentially comforting response to this week's comment eruption on my Harvard Business Review post. My mom is quite an...
Saying goodbye to pen and paper
My latest blog post for Harvard Business Review has provoked a strong reaction to the idea of saying goodbye to the paper notebook. Here's my own take on the experience of giving up on paper and pen. 4.00 22.95 Alexandra Samuel Those 25 characters, comprising a tip, a...
13 New Year’s resolutions for a better life online
As you start the new year with the best intentions for your personal, professional and emotional development, don't forget to put your tech life on the list. Here are 13 resolutions to choose from, depending on your own tech challenges and commitments; you'll know...
Please help me launch my new Harvard Business ebook, Work Smarter with Evernote
On December 18th, Harvard Business Review Press will release my first ebook: Work Smarter with Evernote. This short guide shows how Evernote can help you become more focused and effective on the job—and get ahead in your career. I'd like to ask for your help: please...