Thursday, July 27, 2006

TV is good for the gums

As I've blogged before, I'm a big geeky fan of Battlestar Galactica. I bought my brother in Vegas the first season dvd set. Then I sent my brother in Nairobi, Kenya my dvd set so he could get hooked on the show too. It worked.

As adults, my brothers and I rarely communicate with each other because we don't have as much in common. Having our own families changed that some but now that we're all hooked on Battlestar we email each other more often about the show. I even bought us all BSG logo t-shirts. Yes, I did.

I'm pretty amazed at the quality of writing these days on television. In the 70's there was some pretty groundbreaking stuff which are re-imagined into films because Hollywood can't find any original ideas elsewhere. In the 80's it was pretty darn shite. The 90's was mediocre at best. But at the turn of the century all of a sudden we have serious shit on TV. Writers have the freedom to take chances with their characters and stories. Maybe it's because of cable and HBO, maybe it's because studios are more willing to loosen up because they're losing eyeballs to the internet. Whatever.

I don't have time to watch all of the acclaimed dramas on TV. I catch the syndicated "Law and Order" and it's "SVU" counterpart every now and then because it's essentially on 24/7. "House" is on reruns until the fall. One new show called "Rescue Me" is pretty darn funny. My wife likes to watch "The Closer."

The point is, I like TV.

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

The Comfortable Gig Question

Since I left Yahoo! in 2001 there have been waves of people who have left and then there were single exits. I loved it while I was at Yahoo! It was an exciting time, like the wild west, where we were launching stuff out the door left and right. Much of it was crap (designed by yours truly). Some of it was ok, a few were gold. But I learned a ton and worked with lots of completely different product groups. As Yahoo! grew and grew I felt like it was becoming more of a traditional media company in one respect - it's become a comfortable gig.

There's nothing wrong with being comfortable. If a company is paying you well and you got lots of options and you're vesting, and/or you can work from home once or twice a week, still have the great bennies, vest, etc etc. - it pays to stay (golden handcuffs and all.) Again, nothing wrong with that. It's a good gig, a comfortable one.

Everybody has a risk vs. reward meter especially when it comes to making professional career choices. How highly does an employee value the comfort of consistency?

How does that affect the culture of a company?