2009.09.04
Our manager Scott asked us to do weekly staus reports at end of day on Thursdays. I thought it would be easy to forget that, so I set an iPhone alarm to remind me, and then figuring the rest of the team was in the same boat, I decided to get in the habit of nudging people. To do so, I invented a persona for our group Skype chatroom called "Nagbot 3000". In theory I could have made up an automated script to do the reminder, but A. that would be work and B. It was kind of fun trying to think of variants to keep things lively.
Nagbot 3000 was generally appreciated by my coworkers. Here are some excerpts I saved at some point...
[Aug 2 2007 16:31:21] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: status reports for sbruce.
[Aug 16 2007 16:30:20] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: status tonight!
[Aug 23 2007 16:30:31] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: STATUS
[Aug 30 2007 16:54:51] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: STATUS
[Sep 6 2007 17:12:06] NAGBOT SEZ; geez, i guess there's status though everyone seems hipdeep in demo prep...
[Sep 20 2007 16:30:31] NagBot sez: DO YER STATUS
[Sep 20 2007 16:30:48] NagBot sez: *beep*
[Sep 27 2007 15:02:45] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: status
[Oct 4 2007 16:31:28] NAGBOT 300 SEZ: DO STATUS
[Oct 11 2007 16:17:57] NAGBOT SEZ: STATUS
[Oct 18 2007 16:52:39] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: DO STATUS
[Oct 25 2007 16:31:02] NAGBOT 3500 (now with politeness module) SEZ: DO YOUR STATUS REPORT PLEASE
[Nov 1 2007 16:30:25] NAGBOT 3000 [NOW WITH POLITENESS MODULE] SEZ: KINDLY DO YOUR STATUS REPORT, THANK YOU
[Nov 8 2007 16:30:48] NAGBOT 3000 (W/ POLITENESS MODULE UPGRADE) SEZ: IF YOU WOULD BE SO KIND, PLEASE DO YOUR STATUS.
[Nov 15 2007 16:47:22] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: DO STATUS
[Nov 29 2007 16:33:46] *************NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: DO STATUS**************************
[Dec 6 2007 16:30:31] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: DO STATUS. PLZ.
[Dec 20 2007 16:30:14] NAGBOT SEZ DO STATUS
[Jan 3 2008 16:31:47] NAGBOT 3000 W/ NEW "X-TRA SASS" CIRCUIT SEZ: try to scrape together some kind of decent status report for this weird, holiday-stricken no-man's-land limbo of a week
[Jan 10 2008 16:37:17] NAGBOT 3000 (Freeware Basic Edition) SEZ: do sta.
[Jan 17 2008 16:32:11] NAGBOT 3000 (with music upgrade) SEZ (to the tune of Howdy Doody theme):
IT'S DO YOUR STATUS TIME,
IT'S DO YOUR STATUS TIME,
SCOTT WANTS TO KNOW WHAT YOU DID DO,
SO TELL HIM AND BE TRUE
[Jan 24 2008 16:40:47] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: IT IS ABOUT TIME TO DO YOUR STATUS REPORT.
[Jan 31 2008 16:31:11] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: SEND IN YOUR STATUS PLEASE.
[Feb 7 2008 16:30:34] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: STATUS STATUS RAH RAH RAH
[Feb 14 2008 16:44:56] NAGBOT SEZ: DO STATUS, CHA CHA CHA
[Feb 21 2008 16:35:07] NAGBOT 3000 (RHYMING UPDATE) SEZ:
The Time Has Come
The Walrus Said
To Write Things Done and Not:
Plus Obstacles, And Take All That Stuff
And Send It O'er Scott
[Feb 28 2008 16:31:22] NAGBOT 3000 (NOW WITH NEW BELLIGERENCE MODULE) SEZ: HEY YOU YA I'M TALKIN' TO YOU YOU GONNA GET YOUR DUMB STATUS INTO SBRUCE OR WHAT
[Mar 6 2008 16:36:01] NAGBOT 3000 (NOW W/ POWERPOINT MODULE) SEZ:
----------------------------
Status Reports
* Due Thursday E.o.D.
* Send to Scott
* Report 3 things:
-what you did this past week
-what you plan to do next week
-obstacles in your way
----------------------------
[Mar 13 2008 16:31:05] NAGBOT 3000 (JAPANESE EDITION) SEZ: 自分のステータスレポートをご覧ください。
[Apr 10 2008 16:30:56] NAGBOT 3000 (Mr. T Special Edition) SEZ: I PITY TH'FOOL WHO DON'T CUT OUT ALL THAT JIBBAJABBA AND DO A STATUS REPORT!
[Apr 17 2008 16:45:20] NAGBOT 3000 (with a little help from NagNAGBOTBot) SEZ: DO YOUR STATUS REPORT
[Apr 24 2008 16:28:01] NAGBOT 3000 (late 80s hiphop edition) SEZ: LOOKIN' AT MY GUCCI IT'S ABOUT THAT TIME
[May 1 2008 17:00:51] SLIGHTLY DELAYED NAGBOT 3000 SEZ: do your status!
[May 8 2008 16:30:30] NAGBOT 3000 (special Matrix Bullet-Time FX Edition) SEZ: dddddddddooooooooooooooooooo yyyyoooooooooooooooooouuuuurrrrrrrrrr sssssssttaaaaattuuuuuuuuuuuusssssssssssss rrreeeeeeeeepppooooooooooooooorrrrrrttt
[May 15 2008 17:23:45] NAGBOT 3000 SEZ (SUPER SECRET ENCRYPTION MODULE ENGAGED): qb lbhe fgnghf naq pbatenghyngvbaf ba xabjvat ebg-guvegrra!
[May 22 2008 16:33:20] NAGBOT 3000 (limerick edition) SEZ:
there once was a guy from rockport
whose career was nearly cut short
his work went unheeded
cause all that he needed
was to do his status report!
http://www.thebigmoney.com/articles/judgments/2009/09/03/emotional-rescue - how moods are almost literally contagious, and what that means for the economy. "f you put two people in a room facing each other, without talking to each other, their moods will converge, or more likely, the mood of the less expressive person will move towards the mood of the more expressive person." What are the implications of that for how I want to live my life?
on my car, the first leaf of fall? AARGH!
(eh, maybe just from a dead branch but still)
http://magweasel.com/category/reading-room/ - has an amazing translation of "Phantom of Akihabara", about gamers after a Japanese censorship apocalypse. Also the site is a good PC-Engine blog too.
http://www.care2.com/greenliving/the-9-types-of-intelligence.html - Amber sent me the link. EVERYTHING needs to be evaluated in a many dimensional kind of way.... though you end up sounding too much like that "evaluating a poem's greatness" shtick Robin Williams has all the students rip out of the book in Dead Poets Society.