There's a mindset and level of effort that's necessary when you're writing a long book with a short deadline that can only be defined as "obsessive." As I'm writing CRM at the Speed of Light's 4th edition (does anyone mind if from time to time in posts in the future I refer to it as either CRMSOL4 or "the book."?), I'm finding that I'm getting immersed into a 24 hour, 7 day a week sticky cloud that allows me to do things other than the book but only when I'm thinking about the book during that time. In other words, I'm writing, writing, writing, writing, getting a haircut (thinking about writing something in particular, or someone who I need to get involved in the book - just thought of someone actually....back...I had to put his name on my To Do list), writing, writing, driving (thinking about something CRMSOL4....), writing, doing a blog entry (thinking about "the book" related stuff)....
What I'm also finding is that in order to be mobile for the writing of this book and to engage resources and to hang out with friends at least the digital ones during this obsessive, immersive period (to end August 10), I'm relying more and more on tools that are actually voice-related to do my work and to be more effective. They are translation tools for the most part that involve speech to text and they allow me to take care of tasks both book related and "necessary to let people know I'm alive related" - most are mobile and are favorited on my iPhone (and will be on my new 3G iPhone come July 11).
Here's what I'm using and for what. Links will get you to them. They aren't all just iPhone apps. They are universal. They happen to work on the iPhone among others.
Cha Cha - This is an amazing service. Phone a number that you get after you register and you have a search engine that runs with human beings. Here's how it works. You call the specific number you get - a local number - ask a question of an automated response thingee. A human agent then researches it. You then - in a few minutes to an hour or so - get an answer via SMS to your question. For example, I was out with someone and told them that my wife and I are going to walk the Great Wall of China next summer. She asked how long the Great Wall was. Good question. I called up Cha Cha, asked them that, and within minutes had a text message saying it was 6400 km (4000 miles) long. Just-like-THAT. They've only failed to answer one question - though it was kind of important. It was "Are there any tornado warnings out in Fairfax County, VA now?" They didn't answer it. Kind of important since I was driving through it. Turned out there was. Maybe it was better I didn't know at the time....
Twitterfone - This one works better than expected. I simply hit my favorited number - it dials up to some location - I leave a short message. It shows up on Twitter. Thus I can query my Tweet-buds or simply vent or do whatever it is I do on Twitter. Works great for that.
Utterz - This one is new to me but works like a charm. I used to do Audioblogs but the service I used kind of went away. Now I can do it again. I can audio blog for free with Utterz and post text and video that will associate with the blog's audio entry if I do it within 10 minutes of the time I recorded and "published." Again, I call a phone number and I go for it. Works great and there are multiple ways to use this one - and multiple channels to access it.
Jott - This site translates my voice into email to particular people or groups or to messages to social sites friends. In a Twitter exchange between uber editor of CRM Magazine Josh Weinberger and social customer king of dudes Chris Carfi, Chris suggested using Jott to do rough emails that you send to yourself to edit when you get home. Hat tip (as Mr. Carfi would say) to Chris on this. Again, a very useful function.
All of this is usable while driving, though of course only if you're hand's free. Safe driving. Ahem.
I'm now thinking of Dragon NaturallySpeaking Preferred to help me with some of the book too. That's on premise but hell, anything to capture random thoughts in a way that makes this easier. Not sure of that one yet, but use the tools above. They are genuinely awesome and totally cool. Impressive in how accurate they are. Now if only I could be that accurate when I write this damned book.....
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