The rumor mill has been churning out rumors of an Apple table for many years now, working especially hard since the latter half of 2009. Now the rumors have a physical form, yup that’s right, Apple has officially announced the iPad.

What’s the big deal, you ask? Read on to find out.

What I’m excited about?

All images from Apple.com/ipad

Though on first look it may not be very obvious, the iPad looks amazing. It’s got the slick, trendy and slim design we’re used to from the current range of Apple products. Here are some of the best features of the iPad.

• The form factor is perfect: The 9.7inch LED-backlit screen (with IPS technology – yeah I don’t know what this is either!) looks stunning, add to that a slim (0.5inch thickness) and a lightweight body (only 1.5 pounds, that 680g) and kickass product
• It runs ever so smoothly: from all the hands-on I’ve read and seen everyone has complemented how well the 1GHz Apple A4 processor performs. Websites render quickly, viewing/zooming in and out of pictures and videos is super snappy, and well basically there is no lag.
• There is no single orientation: as Jony Ive (Senior vice president, Design) puts it “I don’t have to change myself to fit the product, it fits me”. Want to show what the person opposite you what you’re looking at simply flip the device, and the iPad will modify the screen and orientation to suit.
• User friendliness: This is perhaps where Apple’s greatest strength lies. With millions of loyal fans and happy iPhone users, a lot of the target audience will already be familiar with devices’ UI before they even get their hand on it. For those that don’t the iPhone OS user interface is extremely easy to pick up and become efficient at. Did I mention that most of the 140,000 apps available [for the iPhone] will work on the iPad
• Price and portability: I have the say a $499 price tag is pretty appealing (we’ll have to wait and see how Apple will price the device in the UK and Europe), and of course it’s extremely portable. Of course the obvious question is “would you rather carry a netbook or the iPad?”

Does this mean the end of eBook readers?

I would think so, why buy a eBook reader (like the Amazon Kindle) when you can purchase something ten-times better (looks and functionality) for an extra $100 dollars. The problem Apple may encounter will probably be the same as Amazon – the availability of content.

It’s also important to note that although there is a Kindle app available for the iPhone and iPod Touch, this will likely not work on the iPad.

Does it mean the end of Netbooks

I think the iPad will change the notebook scene in the same way the Nexus one changed the smartphone scene – simply create a new category of unique devices. Will it replace the netbook? Quite simply, not anytime soon. There are still too many features missing, for example the ability to run more than one app at a time (see below).

Putting that aside, Apple has always had a very closed system and it will probably become more and more closed as time goes on. For those that want something a bit more open ended a Windows or Linux system will provide the answer.

What’s missing?

If I am to pick up an iPad to replace my trusty netbook then at the very least I want to be able to run more than one program at a time. The lack of multitasking has to be the biggest disappointment I have from the iPad. It’s not too farfetched to imagine the scenario where I’m working on a document and want to listen to music whilst I do so, and want to check my email. I should be able to do all those things at the same time! Come one Apple, this is pretty basic stuff.

To add to this there is no webcam, again this seems like a simple implementation Apple has overlooked. This isn’t really a big deal for me, but for those users who teleconference frequently this would certainly be a major issue. I can’t understand why Apple has overlooked this very basic feature!?

There is also a cloud of uncertainty that still surrounds the Apple tablet, hopefully these will be become clearer before the worldwide launch, a few of the highlights include:

• Will there be flash support? Whilst HTML 5 video is great it’s nowhere near as widespread as flash content; most sites still rely on flash for content and for revenue (via ads)
• How much for the extras? This is quite a real concern and for many this could become a deciding factor. A lot of accessories were demonstrated on release, but there is no word on the pricing for these. Personally I would really like to know how much the keyboard dock will cost?
• What’s the “real” battery life? It wouldn’t be the first time that phone manufactures exaggerate the battery life. Apple claims the iPad can run for 10hours or last up to one month in standby. I wonder if this is with the system running the absolute minimum or under some pressure.
• What’s the typing like? The onscreen keyboard looks great in the photos, but from the promotional video typing doesn’t come across as a comfortable experience (which would make the pricing of the keyboard dock even more critical).
• Which apps won’t work? During the event Steve Jobs mentioned that “almost all” of the iPhone apps will be supported on the iPad, it’ll be interesting to know which one’s won’t be supported. (Though I’m sure a replacement will pop-up soon for any popular app that is not supported).

[Aside: I don’t how rest of the tech community feels about the name, but I’m not particurlaly digging iPad. Putting aside the obvious jokes, I was hoping for Apple to rid of product name with “i” prefix. iPad just doesn’t sound right; maybe I’ll get used to it over time, but it just doesn’t sound natural]

Pricing and availabity

The iPad will be available in three different capacities:

• 16GB – $499
• 32GB – $599
• 64GB – $699

And two different flavors Wi-Fi only and Wi-Fi + 3G (with the second option incurring extra per monthly chargers). You can find out more here. Again we’ll have to wait for the international pricing, hopefully to be released in a couple of weeks.

Wrapping up

As with Apple’s recent releases the iPad is highly polished, looks amazing and just captures you the first time you see it (and probably even more when you hold it in your hands).

I’m obviously a little biased in that all this techy stuff really excites me. Will your everyday Joe go out and buy the iPad? I think so, there are plenty of useful features offered to lend the tablet to become an everyday item.

Although it may not become as big a success as the iPod or the iPhone it will most certainly sell well. Then again I’ve been known to get these things wrong!

What do you think of the iPad? Will you be picking one up? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Additional resources:

• The official iPad site
• Engadget’s first hands-on
• Gizmodo’s first hands-on and visual guide to iPad’s interface

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you would have heard of the recently and much hyped Nexus One.

I was eager to get my hands on the phone and to find out where the phone lives up to the hype, or is it just another over-hyped empty shell. I’ve now had a little time to play around with the phone, and I can tell you that it completely dominates the field.

Read on to find out more.

[All the images for the post are at the bottom of the post in the image gallery]

Initial impressions

Before you get even lay your eyes on the phone the box instantly grabs your attention (at least it did for me). Google have opted to go for an extremely minimalistic approach (see image below). There are no specifications, no product images or anything.

Personally, I welcome this approach – I’ve already bought the phone why does it need to resold to me to again?

In the box: Once inside you will the handset, battery, sync cable, a soft case, and charger.

On the surface

The first time you hold the phone in your hands, you realise just how sleek and light the device is. It really is a pleasure to just hold it in your hands.

It’s got a beautiful and bright 3.7-inch AMOLED screen, running at a resolution of 800×480 pixels. It has the only four buttons on the front (back, menu, home and search (of course!)), plus a trackball, which by the way is able to display multiple colours.

Other than that there is the usual volume buttons on the side, the power and 3.5mm headphone jack on the top and usb port and dock connectors at the bottom.

All of this is house in a gorgeous and thin chassis (it’s thinner than a #2 pencil!), and with the battery attached weighs only 130g.

I should mention that setting up the phone is extremely easy to do. When you first turn the phone-on you simply sign-in or sign-up to a Google account and within minutes your phone is populated with your emails, contacts and calendars.

N.b. You can also get the phone custom engraved, I chose not to, but from the examples I’ve seen it looks pretty cool.

Under the hood

Under the hood the phone is running a 1GHz ‘Snapdragon’ Qualcomm QSD 8250 processor – which basically means a really fast processor – and it is exactly that.

The processor handles the the visual enhancement that come included with Android 2.1 (live wallpapers, 3D effects on menu, and other animations) extremely well. During general use I’ve not noticed any lag.

Although there was occasional lag if I had Twidroid (twiter app), music player and browser running at the same time but this only seem to be apparent if I chose to go to the home screen – and even then only occasionally.

Elsewhere the phone has the usual GPS, stereo Bluetooth, digital compass, light and proximity sensors and accelerometer onboard. It also features two mics for active noise cancelling, which I’ve found to work like a charm.

Wi-Fi is provided in B and G variety also I have read at several instances that the phone is capable of wireless N, though whether this is true or not remains to be seen.

Camera

The camera’s 5 megapixel with an LED flash, and the quality compared with my previous phones (HTC Touch Pro 2 & HTC Hero) is great. There is 2x digital zoom, with autofocus from 6cm to infinity.

Of course, the camera is also able to capture video at 720×480 pixels at 20fps (or higher), and you are able to upload the videos directly to YouTube (this works very well, though due to the size of the video files you are only able to upload videos via Wi-Fi).

The single LED flash seems to work well enough, but perhaps it may have been better to have two. The only real complain I have with the camera is that sometimes it can take a little too long!

Have a look at the sample images and video below to gauge the quality for yourself.

Battery

Of course being a cell phone, the battery life is quite an important factor, Google promises:

• Up to 7 hours talk time on 3G (up to 10 on 2G)
• Up to 250 hours standby time on 3G (up to 290 on 2G)
• Up to 5 hours of Internet use on 3G (up to 6.5 on Wi-Fi)
• Up to 7 hours of video playback, and
• Up to 20 hours of audio playback

These seem to be more or less on par with what I found during my time with the phone. However, I would emphasise that if you use the phone on a regular basis, then likely you will need to charge the phone on a daily basis.

The good news is that the battery is removable which means that you can purchase and keep a spare with you for emergency use.

Software

The nexus one boasts the latest build of Google’s mobile OS, Android 2.1 (Eclair).

If you’ve used an android device before (one that isn’t running a custom skin like HTC Sense), is that it packs a lot of eye candy – from the home screen, to the menus, to certain applications and widgets.

There are certain features that there purely for cosmetic value, such as the live wallpapers (theses are wallpapers that you can interact with), and others that make the device much more fun to interact with.

Here are some of features that I thought were particularly neat:

• The home screen: the home screen now boasts five tabs or pages to place your apps, up from the previous three. The screen you’re on is shown by dots on button corners of the screen, and if you long press on these you get a card like overview of all your pages.
• The menu as well as the icons have also been given an overhaul. The icons look great and the menu has a 3D rolodex thing going on.
• One of the best features is voice search (though this was also available in Android 2.0), and the brand new speech-to-text ability. The most impressive thing is that this works for almost all text field (except fields for things like username and passwords for obvious reasons!). This is an extremely useful feature, for things like texting whilst driving etc. It is accurate (as long as you speak as if to a little child), but the only problem is that it seems to require the use of an active data connection so it doesn’t work a 100% of times.
• There are also a couple of very useful widgets – first is a “Power control” widget which allows for one-click toggle of your wireless, Bluetooth and other settings. Secondly, there is the “news and weather” widget which gives you minute-by-minute history of the weather at your location as well as the top headlines.

Being an Google phone obliviously it works wonderfully well with Google Apps. Gmail is quite simply amazing, providing push-email as well as other features such as labels and a handy “undo” feature.

On the software side my only gripe with Google is that there is still no dedicated Google Docs app. You can view your documents and edit spreadsheets via your browser but that simply isn’t enough.

All-in-all the OS is excellent, which looks beautiful and runs smoothly. It’s easy to learn and navigate your way around as the OS is quite intuitive, though perhaps not as much as on the iPhone.

What’s missing

The phone is not perfect, there are a few features that are certainly missing here.

First, and perhaps the most important omission is multi-touch support. If you’re switching from an iPhone to this, this will become apparent and annoying very quickly.

Being able to pinch and zoom in an out of pictures, web pages, etc., as trivial as it may seem, is quite an important one. However, this feature is enabled in the hardware just not implement in the OS itself.

For example if you install the free Dolphin browser you are able to use multi-touch there. I’m guessing Google didn’t enable multi-touch as to not infringe on any patents that Apple may hold – or else there would simply be no reason to do it.

Secondly, the virtual keyboard is crappy. I think I might be a little harsh here as I’m used to an actual qwerty keyboard. Though the keyboard is certainly better than on the HTC hero (the only other Android device I’ve used), it’s not as good as on the iPhone. Again, this may be due to the lack of multi-touch, as you can only press one key at at time!

The only other major complain I have is the connectivity with my computer. Currently there are too many steps involved, this process needs to be more streamlines and efficient.

More specifically for non-US users the  Google Maps Navigation is not available (you can learn more here), and the same goes for Google Voice (learn more here). Both of these services seem absolutely amazing and have been received very well in the US – so why not make them available in the UK?

The good news is that, these all seem to be software problems – so hopefully Google will take some of the feedback onboard and improve these features in the next update for Android.

The competition

Obviously a lot of people will be asking the ,supposedly, all important question – “is this an iPhone killer?”. Whilst at the same time it’s not unreasonable to draw a comparison between the nexus one and the Palm Pre and Motorola Droid (aka Milestone).

Thankfully BillShrink [via] have come up with a very handy chart to help us out here:

How much and where can I get one

The phone can be bought directly from google.com/phone; unlocked it will cost you $529 unlocked, or £374 or us UK folks (this includes a UK adapter and delivery).

If were thinking of getting the phone on contract then unfortunately you’ll have to wait until spring, when it should be available through Vodafone. [US customers can get it on contract now for $80 p/m on T-mobile, and from spring also from Verizon and Vodafone).

[Aside: I have to take my hat off to DHL (the carrier Google ships the phone through, at least to the UK). I ordered my phone on the early morning of 6th and I had the phone in my hands on the morning of the 8th – considering the handset is coming from the states, this is great service.]

Conclusion

At the present, I would say this is one of the best phones around, even more so if your life revolves around Google apps like Gmail and Google calendar. The phone is not perfect, though it does very close, and certainly a lot closer than any other model out there.

The bottom line: The nexus one is sleek, sexy, functional and fun to use and have. If you are looking for a new phone (especially an Android variety), this is the one to get.

Besides, who knows maybe with the next update of Android we might be able to access features like multi-touch, better music app and better synchronisation. Here’s hoping…

Do you own or plan on getting a nexus one? Or do you feel repulsed by the idea of owning one? Share in the comments

Image Gallery

Click thumbnail to see higher resolution image (this may be a little slow with slower internet connections).

[View with PicLens]

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Alright, so this might not be the dream for everyone, but nonetheless you’ll agree that it’s pretty impressive.

Image by: Incase Designs

These two guys with relatively little coding experience, created a simple a simple but useful iPhone app over 12 hours and 6 cups of coffee.

Weblog Gizmondo has the full story of how they did it.

How 12 Hours, 2 Guys, 6 Cups of Coffee = 1 iPhone App [via]

Facebook has over 350million users, and as a long time and heavy user of the service I’m always looking for ways to improve my experience.

It seems that my prayers have been answered, one of my favourite blogs – Mashable – has published a Facebook Guidebook full of tips, tricks and guide explaining how to do just about anything on facebook.

From managing information overload in your feed to finding worthy Facebook applications to best practices for brand-building, the Facebook Guide Book is chock full of tips and tricks to help improve your Facebook experience. We hope everyone from beginner to advanced users will find something of value in the resources we’ve collected; and we’ll continue to cultivate and maintain this space as Facebook itself continues to grow and change.

The guide is perfect for users of all experience level, and if you find it useful please pass on the link to someone might enjoy it as well.

You can access the guidebook here.

I was reading Family Lore blog’s review of the year and it reminded me of some interesting stories that made it to press during 2009. I decided to do highlight a few that I found remarkable.

Image by: walknboston

(Click on the link to read the full stories)

1. An American man who donated his Kidney, wanted it back as part of the divorce settlement, or the value of the kidney ($1.5m)
2. A Florida judge ordered make-up artist to cover up tattoos of a neo-nazi gang member before each trial
3. Oldest divorce in the world, a couple both aged 98 filed for a divorce in the UK after 36 years of marriage
4. A Taiwanese women filed for divorce because her husbands penis was too big – and surprise, it was denied
5. High Court approves injunction via Twitter
6. Malaysia state offers honeymoon in effort to halt divorce rates
7. Facebook blamed for divoces
8. Intel fined a record $1.45 billion by the European Commission for not playing nice
9. Homer Simpson was referenced in a case
10. Mother fined for calling her son too often
11. Women was held for being too noisy during sex
12. Nuns caught speeding, try and use the ‘God defence’

Lets hope for more of the same weirdness from 2010.

What else would you add to the list, let me know in the comments below.

If you are a drunk driver in Montgomery County, Texas then it may prove to be risky business. Apparently (via), the Montgomery County district attorney’s office has decided to tweet the names of all those that are driving whilst intoxicated between Christmas and New Year’s eve. Is it just me or is this a really stupid idea?

Image by: dreamglow

On face value it doesn’t seem like that bad a idea that might in fact deter people from drunk driving – you don’t really want your family, friend and neighbours to know that you got busted do you?

I’m not an expert in US law (or Texan law). but apparently the information is already publicly available, so what’s the problem?

On the other hand I can see two problems straight away. First, the tests aren’t a 100% correct, false positives aren’t exactly uncommon, and secondly,  it rains all over the maxim “innocent until proven guilty”.

The names of the guilty will be posted on the Montgomery County DA’s twitter page (@MontgomeryTXDAO), and they want to do this during other holiday seasons as well. Good luck to them.

What do you think?

• Cloud computing will explode: Cloud computing is basically the process of doing what you do on your desktop, online. Whilst many services are already in place (Google Docs), it requires users to trust their data with 3rd Party companies. The benefit is obvious: you’re able to access the information anywhere, providing there is a internet connection. With release of Office 2010 later on the year, and Microsoft allowing free access to a lightweight online office suite, more people will be doing more things on the cloud.
• Facebook and twitter will take over the world: killing all other services in the process. And, and all th while people will keep publishing more and more personal information then complaining that others saw it.
• Netbooks will take a back seat to smartphones: netbooks are great, to many they provide a virtual home away from home, but in the end it’s a separate piece of equipment to carry. With the smartphones getting more powerful and more capable (I’m rooting Google Android), and of course more portable I think netbooks will have pretty stringent competition.
• Android will be accepted by the masses: I think maybe 2010 will be the year when people realize that the the platform matters a lot more than then number of apps available. Don’t get me wrong I’m not hoping for an iPhone killer but a harmonious world where the two can live happily together. Wishful thinking,
• Apple will breath new life into tablet PCs: If the rumours are correct, and lets hope that they are, then Apple will be releasing a tablet PC later this year rumoured to be called ‘iSlate’. Looking at Apple’s past success this could finally breath new life into tablet PCs. Additionally, as supposedly the iSlate is suppose to be an excellent eBook reader, this could mean some healthy competition to the Amazon Kindle and co.
• The web becomes even more influential: With the growth of twitter and facebook (see above) and the inclusion of real-time search results by Bing and Google, people will have instant access to each others opinions.
• Television grows up: with 3D movies becoming a common sight, it should help carry the 3D market to out living room with affordable 3DTV’s. Couple this with integrated internet and we have on-demand TV like never before.

Of course these are all what I’m hoping for to happen in 2010, but with technology and more so the tech companies being as spontaneous and unpredictable as they are, anything is possible.

I recently read Scholarship in the digital age by Christine Bergman, and I found it to be quite a thought provoking book.

Image by ArtNow314

Note: this is not a review, just a discussion of some ideas raised by the book and others that occurred as a result!

Though I am sure the thoughts that came to my mind reading this book weren’t the kind the authored (probably) intended. The book “explores the technical, social, legal, and economic aspects of the kind of infrastructure that we should be building for scholarly research in the twenty-first century.” You may be thinking – why should I care?

That’s a perfectly good question. The truth is I don’t care about that. I do care about some other issues that came to mind as a result of the book. For example, consider the original use of the internet – it was to communicate research finding amongst scholars. Obviously, over time the internet has developed to much more than that, and as a result the internet has become full of both verifiable and unverifiable data.

The problem for most people is in distinguishing between that verifiable and unverifiable data. This is something that, I believe, we should all care about. And it is something that pops up each time I research an article or topic. Is the information I’m reading concrete or just based on loose opinion?

Of course, there is nothing wrong with opinion, but opinion labelled as factual data can do great harm.

As Bergman argues, with the ever increasing complexities of the modern society we need equally advanced infrastructures that are able to support and manage this vast amount of data.

The second interesting point that is brought up is whether printed publications will remain practical. Though the author is specifically talking about scholarly publications this is something that is affecting pretty much all printed media.

More and more printed material is being digitized. The burning question here is – will printed publications go extinct in the next few years?

As someone who loves technology, I still love to hold a book in my hand and read it. The physical appeal is too strong for me. I believe this is the case for many others. However with the release of devices such as the Amazon Kindle, the tide may soon turn.

Overall the book, though primarily aimed at policy makers and information scientist, was a interesting read that bring forth many thought provoking topics. It is clearly a well researched book that will become a good reference point for future developments and debates.

“People who achieve the most are selective as well as determined.”

- Richard Koch

Although the 80/20 rule, or the Pareto principle, sounds like a statistical formula, believe me its far from it. The 80/20 rule is something that I came across a little while ago, and it has c0mpletely changed my thinking. I believe that it is vitally important principle wheter you apply it in personal life or in your business.

Photo by kevindooley

In this post we look at exactly what the 80/20 rule is, and how it can be used in a professional and personal capacity. Read on to find out more.

Where it all began

In the early 1900s an Italian economist, Vilfredo Pareto, was studying the distribution of wealth in Italy. Pareto noticed the unequal distribution of wealth, he noticed that around 20 percent of people owned around 80 percent of the wealth.

What is the 80/20 rule?

In the late 1940s Dr. Joseph Juran, working in the US, observed a universal principle – that 20 percent of something usually accounts for 80 percent of the output. He accredited it to Vilfredo Pareto and named it the Pareto Principle.

When 80 and 20 doesn’t add up to 100

If looked at more closely, then the 80/20 has nothing really to do with the numbers 80 and 20. The rule just observes the fact that most things in life are unevenly distributed. The 80/20 ratio doesn’t have to add up to 100. The ratio doesn’t matter, it could be anything, 70/10 or 90/15.

When life isn’t fair

Basically, what the take home message is that a select few individuals, tasks or whatever are responsible for the majority of the result or output. So to put things in perspective this could mean:

• 20% of customers are responsible for 80% of your business
• 20% of customers are responsible for 80% of complaints
• 20% of input creates 80% of work
• 80% of results come from 20% of effort

Remember we said that the 80/20 doesn’t have to add up to 100. So we could have 10 people working on a project, in this case 20% (or 2 people) could be responsible for 30% of the result, or 50% or 90%. We could have just one person actually working, whilst the other nine don’t do anything. In that case that one person (or 10%) is responsible for 100% of the work!

The point is that the 50-50 relationship between two related sets of data is an exception rather than a phenomena. However, we still have this notion that there is a direct correlation between input and reward. The age old saying ‘what you put in is what you get’ doesn’t hold true.

How it can help you

The 80/20 rule is an invaluable principle. Once you understand the principle (and hopefully you have a good understanding now), you will notice the 80/20 ratio everywhere. The key, however, is to determine which or what the key activities are. Your aim should be to stop wasting time on the 80% of the activities that cause you dissatisfaction. Instead devote your resources on the 20% of actives that produce the best outcome.

The 80/20 business

In a business environment, this is usually easier to identify then it is in your personal life. In your work, consider the things you do day-to-day. Only around 20 percent of all of these tasks really  make a difference. That may sound harsh, but I challenge you to analyse your work and I’m sure you will come to a similar conclusion.

Now identify and focus on those 20 percent of things. If you need to push things off your to-do list then make sure it’s not one of the above things. If you’re in a management position, then you may realise that about 20% of your staff are responsible for 80% of the output. Make sure to reward those staff members.

Similarly, identify the 20% of the customers that are responsible for 80% of your revenue, then make sure to look after those customers.

That does not mean that you should fire or stop looking after the other 80% of the staff or customers. Instead, you should focus as much of your time as possible in looking after and improving/encouraging these staff/customers. This may seem somewhat illogical, but you will get better results turning good to better than you will making the better into great.

The 80/20 lifestyle

It can be a bit more tricky to try and apply the 80/20 rule to your life, but it can potentially yield higher results.

This quote pretty much sums it up for me:

You can have anything you want, but you cannot have everything you want

My understanding of this quote is that you should be focusing on a small number of goals, that will get you closer to the dream that you will achieve. As oppose to doing a bit of everything and not really getting anywhere.

So you need to decide on what your true passions are and what your true values are and focus most of your efforts on that.

Most people tend to be working towards something that requires 80% effort  to only produce 20% of results. What you need to do is to slowly start shifting these two ratio’s around. You need to start chasing your passion.

This does not mean that you quit your current job and start your own business (if that’s your passion). But, you could start your business part-time whilst working and start shifting more and more focus on to your business over time. You will not only benefit from the monetary rewards but will also find more fulfilment because now you are focusing on what you want to be doing.

Final thoughts

The point of the Pareto principle is to realise that most things in life are not evenly distributed. Choose to and focus on the 20% of things that are most important. Don’t just work harder but work smarter. And work smarter on the right things.

It is important to understand that the Pareto principle is only a rule, and not law. It doesn’t apply to everything. if you’re seeking quality then you need to focus on all the detail, you need all 100%. However, If you’re trying the get the most bang for your buck then focusing on the critical, high yielding information is the best strategy.

Lets hear from you. What are your thoughts on the 80/20 rule? Do you think it applies to you?

The personal MBA (PMBA), created by the bold headed and enterprising Josh Kaufman, has been around and continuously updated since 2005.

The PMBA is aimed at those that are serious about getting the same education as an MBA program but without the fees! Check out the manifesto to get a better idea:

MBA programs don’t have a monopoly on advanced business knowledge: you can teach yourself everything you need to know to succeed in life and at work. The Personal MBA features the very best business books available, based on thousands of hours of research. So skip b-school and the $100,000 loan: you can get a world-class business education simply by reading these books.

The PMBA is a collection of the best business books that are currently available. There are currently (2009 list) 94 books included in a range of categories. From books on the human mind and opportunity identification through to entrepreneurship and sales.

It is a extensive and excellent reading list, even if you are currently on a MBA programme.

What’s new in the 2009 version

The 2009 version adds 15 new books to the list, with a redesign of the list (which I personally like more) and with each book getting its own summary page.

Additionally Josh has added a new feature, the Business Book Recommender. With this, Josh’s goal is to help you find the perfect business book in 30 seconds or less. [for more on the update see here]

You can check out the Personal MBA website for more information, or visit the Reading list directly.