March is highlighted by chance opportunities and my ability to capitalize on them, while managing my regular commitments. I love the challenge of seizing up a short-lived opportunity, and creating the foundation of future work. Doing this requires a certainly level of comfort with putting different hats on, which is what a good generalist is able to do effectively. My mind has gotten into a groove that’s very much like the sweet spot every car engine has when it reaches a certain speed: maximum speed with the highest level of efficiency. It does require regular maintenance, like getting enough sleep, taking breaks away from work, and trusting your own ability to work ‘smarter’, not just ‘harder’.

At my KMDI talk, I met the co-founder of a tech start-up that deals with music and computation. My area of expertise is a little ‘softer’ compared to the technical know-how they have. I am interested in the flow of information from the ‘front’ end (interface design, visual communication, visual flow, etc) and the structure of information and knowledge for the user (information architecture, knowledge classification, etc.). Ultimately, we deal with the same ‘stuff’, just different objectives that compliment each other. Knowing how small the community dealing with technological research specific to the music domain is, it was a pleasure to learn that they are based in the city.

In other news, the On-Demand Book Service (ODBS) got a huge injection of money to move some of the current projects forward. The catch? We need to spend all of it before March 31st. I admit, it’s a nice problem to have.