improve 43 things

As I mentioned earlier, several of the comments I’ve made - and received - are (or intended to be (or perceive as)) encouraging. I often thank the person via a reply to a comment, but it would be nice to have a mechanism, like the “cheer” mechanism, to simply and explicitly acknowledge those who have been helpful in their comments (or cheers). This could, in turn, allow for helpful people to have a representation for how helpful (or cheerful?) they have been shown on their own 43 Things page.

Note that I do not share my insights or experiences based on any expectation of acknowledgment or other “return”, nor do I beleve others do either … it might be fun, though, to be able to track something like a “mensch factor” (a la Guy Kawasaki’s notion of a mensch: http://www.thinkinglike.com/Essays/Becoming_A_Mensch.html).

As I spend more and more time on 43 things, I’m feeling more fragmented. My primary representation of digital identity is m primary blog (http://gumption.typepad.com). However, as I focus more on goals, I’m recognizing how some of my blog posts reflect these goals. I’d love to be able to simply add a trackback from a Typepad post to one or more of my 43 Things goals. This would help me achieve greater integrity (vs. fragmentation) ... at least for my digital self :-).

In the comments I’ve seen so far, they seem to fall into two general categories: encouragement and caution. There is already a built-in “cheer” mechanism (though I think this can be improved—see earlier comment) ... perhaps a built-in “caution” mechanism would also be useful.

I just posted a second comment entry for the goal “improve 43 things”. I wanted to post a third comment entry for that goal, but the interface only allowed me to post additional comments in that same thread. It would be nice to be able to easily go back to the original goal (without using the browser “back” button).

When I post a comment on someone else’s goal, I don’t see any way to also cheer them on (via a “cheer this goal” button). Most of my comments are suggestions to help people accomplish their goals, and thus can be correctly construed as implicit cheers, but I do think it would be handy to be able to explicitly cheer them on as well - I see very few cheers … maybe I should post a goal of “be more cheerful” :).

I really like this site, and want to have a place to suggest improvement / feedback. I couldn’t find a tool for this during my browsing aroud, so am creating a goal here as a repository. Others are, of course, welcome to comment / contribute as well.