Photo: Guitar Town by Thomas Hawk. Fine shot. Thank you!

"I don't read music. I don't write it. So I wander around on the guitar until something starts to present itself." James Taylor

"The guitar is a small orchestra. It is polyphonic. Every string is a different color, a different voice." Andre Segovia

"Constantly review developments to make sure that the actual benefits are what they were suppose to be. Avoid Newton's Law." William Swanson

Swanson's Unwritten Rules of Management: unwritten rule number seven...

"Follow-through is just as important as good decision-making in the first place. When deciding on a course of action, set measurable objectives that can be monitored over time to make sure the decision is yielding the intended benefits. By "Avoid Newton's Law," I mean that "for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction." Assume that your decision may have second- and third-order effects. Monitor the progress of the actions you set in motion to make sure these effects are not counter-productive, and if they are, that they are addressed early.

At Raytheon, our program managers use various process disciplines that enable them to evaluate how well the program is proceeding and whether mid-course corrections are needed.

When used properly, these disciplines are a powerful management tool to keep programs on course. However, it is essential that the manager use the disciplines to gain insight into his or her program and its progress, and not simply as a way to 'check the box.'"

Excellent counsel from William Swanson. One of the subjects touched on in my brief talk at French Lick this past week (Broadcast Management Futures Summit) was the critical importance of measurement. My suggestion is you need to employ a daily dashboard as an approach to keeping current on what is happening and what is not happening in your enterprise. Daily. Weekly or monthly is simply not current enough, you need fresh data points, feedback loops need to be tight enough, close enough to be actionable.

Housekeeping: Added the blog of Tom Asacker to the Other Voices column at left. Impressed with Tom (first meeting him earlier this week) and find his writing interesting. You may find his blog here. Added current reading to my reading list which always seems to lag, all apologies. Click book titles for links to Amazon info. David Weinberger - Everything Is Micellaneous. Howard Moskowitz and Alex Gofman - Selling Blue Elephants. William Ury - The Power of a Positive No. Finally, one of my summer fiction reads Granta - Granta 97: Best of Young American Novelists.

The $225,000 parking space: Only in the city; Vivian S. Toy has the story via NYT here.

Save Net Radio: My friend Kurt Hanson continues with those out front and leading the charge to encourage congressional action that keeps internet radio alive. The latest news here. This is one of the most important issues of 2007. Please click on the Save Net Radio banner, at left, and contact your members. Let them know you want and need congress to take action to protect the rich and growing diversity of voices.

Doc on the social nets: "For all their goodness, these 'networks' are silly. They are also as temporary and annoying in their competitive isolation as Compuserve, Prodigy and AOL were, back in the day (or the decade). Those things were Net-unfriendly long before their surviving members became Net-native." Bravo Doc, well said! Read Doc's post here.

The shopping cart: Working on building an online store for the retail shop. Your suggestions on shopping carts, hosting, software (browser based and packaged goods) and any/all other e-commerce solution issues welcomed and appreciated. Please use the contact me utility in the left column. Many thanks.

Bonus: Jack Pendarvis

Bonus 2: Postel's Law. Thanks to Dave Winer.

Bonus 3: Meet Me at the Fountain. A mad cool indie music news site. Thanks to Bruce Ravid for the tip.