Spoiler Free GTD® - Episode #174 of CloudFocus Weekly

Machine transcript generated in 2026 from the episode audio (Whisper speech-to-text with automatic speaker separation). Speaker labels are automatic and may be wrong in places. Timestamps shown every few minutes.

00:10 Jason Atwood: This is the 174th episode of CloudFocus Weekly for the second to last week of April 2014. This episode is titled, spoiler free GTD. CloudFocus Weekly is brought to you by the Per, Force permission in. I'm just reading the articles we're going to talk about right now. Edelstein!

Justin Edelstein: Steen, Steen. Why do you have to call me out like that? That was so unnecessary.

Jason Atwood: It's been two weeks. It's been two weeks. I was on vacation last week. So you're so tan. I'm so relaxed. You-you're so tan.

Justin Edelstein: Like the top of your head a little bit. A little color. Like where the hair's supposed to be? Yeah, right there. A little bit. Right here. Where the hair's supposed to be. Right. Yeah. Bye.

Jason Atwood: I was swimming in the island of Bermuda.

Justin Edelstein: That's awesome. Did you go snorling and see the fish animals? I did fish animals.

Jason Atwood: I did not. I I was just down there. I like that's a family unit. We go almost every year now to Bermuda. We have a good friend who lives there. and he basically has like a farm at this point... So I don't know. Anyway, it's... it's...

Justin Edelstein: Very nice. Do we have an agenda today aside from your vacation?

Jason Atwood: We do. We do. We have an agenda. And it is called three, four things. We had the blog post of last week getting started with GTD. We have two streaming type of. news. We love streaming. Yep, we have the Game of Thrones crashes HBO Go and Netflix and I have a network story, a travel network story and then we have MB versus MZ which we'll explain later. Alright. So let's dig in and then we'll do our quad focus at pick of the week. Cool. So let's kick it off with Since i'm here the blog master you asked this to be done actually did to be followed up after my Ten years on gt. Do you like let's get a newbie

Justin Edelstein: To write her experience Let's go noob get in there and and write it up So on blog arca sink calm

Jason Atwood: Is getting started with gtd Which is a I guess six seven month maybe even less When I started......practicing... What's just GTD getting used on productivity methodology that we are big fans of?

03:48 Justin Edelstein: I, a a a a or or Zero to 60, way too fast. And then you realize, moving in, you know, this methodology, and her challenges, some things gotta be some things that are worked, so some successes, successes that have worked, and then things that feel like struggles, I think she did. It's definitely, as I find it. I think we both just the typo at the same time. We both made the same face. Yes, we just log in and fix that. Why don't you fix that while I talk. We'll log into the website. You just talk. Alright,

Jason Atwood: Yeah, definitely. You know, I think in my one, I talked about how, you know, one thing I said is just take small steps. Because it is a lot. And again, even someone who SB been doing it for 10 years, I'm still... I'm still learning new stuff. I'm still mastering it. It's not something you just... It's not like you just pick it up and, you know And so now the way I see the world is like, you know, little bits and pieces and they all, you know, their commitments and next actions and projects and context. And I don't see it as sort of the way I saw it before. And that takes a while. It takes years. It takes years. So it is a lot. Definitely little pieces you got to to chew on. As someone who helps train people on GTD now, you know...

Jason Atwood: I just basically throw it at them. But then you have to keep digging in. And I think, as you've said, even years later, you went and listened to that, I think it was the weekly review piece and it like hit huge more aha moments like even oh Wow, I had another aha moment and you do you'll have them for forever. I mean I even re-listened to I mean re-listening to the other night one of his audio tapes I was I was having a hard time sleeping in Bermuda. That's what we do we have a hard time sleeping. I do because it's really because I've listen to it so many times it's just like background noise and when I'm having a hard time sleeping we'll just go rat hole. When I'm having a hard time sleeping the reason I had a hard time sleeping is because my brain's spinning it's going And it's just something that my brain focuses on.

07:26 Jason Atwood: Like I'm listening to David Allen. it could be like sometimes it's podcast. I'm listening to podcast then my brain then just shuts down. It goes, okay, you're. Listening listening anyway. I just finished a book called start with why, which I'm kind of really excited about. And then I was really listening to David Allen and he brings in this point and like I saw another, I saw like a connection of two things and I went, boom! And I went, oh wow, those two things were connected. So, definitely tons of stuff. It is tough. Don't give up. If you're new to GTD, don't give up. Keep going. It will start to make sense and it'll get easier and easier and eventually it just becomes what you do. It's literally what you do. There's no, I don't feel like I try to do it.

Jason Atwood: I just, it just happens and it does... Alright, so that's on blog.arcasynch.com. You can go see that. Next up, a spoiler free version for those of us who DVR or Tivo, things like Game of Thrones. While I was away or the week, I think before I left. The week before you left. HBO launched their Game of Thrones season four. to the wildly successful most ripped off most bit turned to show a And it crashed. They're very good highly a former cloud focus pick of the week from you HBO go yes, they're streaming that is now basically everywhere. It's it's on Chrome. It's on Comcast. It's on Roku it's on Apple TV, and it's on all the devices It's everywhere. It is it is probably the best part of a HBO I

Justin Edelstein: Think as we get to the next one the next article will be interesting I feel like I pay for HBO go and then HBO just happens to be on my TV, and I don't care about it Yeah, it's just happens to be there. I mean you do not watch Game of Thrones though on HBO go No, I watch it live right as it happens, but I do not watch Silicon Valley or Veep live. Oh yeah, no. I wait for those and I watch them on HBO Go. Yeah. HBO Go is great, but it crashed. So interesting enough, because they... My sister watches HBO Go because... Because she has an HBO Go account? She may or may not have an HBO Go account?

Jason Atwood: Well, there was that story that we came up with the other day, so just to help your sister,

Justin Edelstein: Whose name we won't mention. Her name may and as Edelstein, it may not.

Jason Atwood: You have two sisters, so it does protect one of them. Sure does. They actually admitted, the HBO admitted that they're not, they do not protect their, you know, like Netflix, they watch and they'll make you sign anything in. HBO Go doesn't. I think they don't care because they kind of, hey, you know, if you're hooked on us, eventually it'll turn you like how you'll start to pay for it. It's a little bit of giving you the free, the freemium version. So they said they were not cracking down on people, so what she's doing... Well, she was pissed.

Justin Edelstein: I was like, offer a free thing? Well, I was texting her at like 855 and I was like, you know, capital G, capital O, capital T, exclamation mark. And she's like... It's not on HBO Go! And I was like, what do you mean it's not on HBO Go? I didn't think it was actually ever there. I don't know, because I watched it on TV. But apparently it's like there when it's airing live. I thought it was like you had to wait for the episode to be over. And then it showed up at like 10 o'clock or something. We're talking Eastern time. But no, no. She's like, it's not on. She was like all pissed off. Like. Thank you. Too bad later watching the show.

11:01 Jason Atwood: .. But was that... So, was that... Did they protect themselves or was it just a glitch?

Justin Edelstein: I think it was just a glitch. Like, she was able to get on it... I didn't really talk to her about it, but from what I understand, she was able to get onto HBO Go, the service, but the show itself wasn't there. Right. I,.. You know, not sure about, like... You know, it looks like people are having trouble just getting onto the service itself

Jason Atwood: Well, they just they basically got they basically got slammed by all these people who own HBO who log in HBO go Because they don't have HBO right if you're looking at the two there's no reason to watch it on go No reason to watch it on each location like I could have been it sure right so interesting stuff I mean Netflix used to crash and go down. Or if you're in your second house. Your second house, true enough. Well, speaking of Netflix, they came out with their earnings report and one of the things they said, actually in their earnings report, was that they might be considering raising prices. For new subscribers, so currently, currently there's a $7.99 plan. They actually changed their plans. They created a $9.99 like... More people can eat and then there's a 799 only three people can have the same time then they made like a lower ones Like if you just want standard death, it's like 599 I'm on the 799 have been for years Honestly, don't even consider it at this point.

Jason Atwood: Yeah, I know 799 and this is where I don't want Netflix to hear this But I want HBO to hear this For a months long of something that I use and especially in a family situation if you're a family and you have kids You know this Netflix is like a

Justin Edelstein: Godsend and I know I've seen your Netflix accounts. It's it's I've logged in as you In your apartment. Yeah, and then like oh, what's he recently been watching or what are his suggestions? Oh, look at all these cartoons kids stuff. Yeah.

Jason Atwood: Well now that we have a separate accounts the daughter walks into her account, but it is.

Justin Edelstein: Mine just comes right out of my PayPal. I don't even think about it. Oh, I don't even see it. I mean, it hits my credit card for $7.99. I mean, it's such a low. I should probably get a little more control over that situation, like, please donate my, it just hits my PayPal. PayPal, wow, I can't do that. Why not? Honestly,

Jason Atwood: I just. I wish two things fine you want to raise your price and their and the new black is coming up supposed to be crazy like our streaming follow up. Here's a fun story so a year ago or maybe two years ago when I was in Bermuda I booted up Netflix and I'm like Netflix let's check out. Eh, you're not in the right country.

Justin Edelstein: Oh, get out of town. You,

Jason Atwood: So and so, you, X-Cast. And so then, I was like, whatever. So then, I was there just now, and I would boot it up, and it was like, oh, welcome, sign in, welcome. Sign in as yourself, fine. And then, so the wife and I, it's a couple shows we're very, very, we love. And one of them is Sherlock, which we watched all on Hulu Plus. I wonder if the new season is out. So we go and look and it's there. I'm sure I'll see. Like this is awesome. So we watch an episode and a half. They're an hour and a half episodes. They're great. I'm telling you you should watch them. They're awesome. So we watch an hour and a half. or watch an episode in half because literally they're an hour and a half long.

14:32 Jason Atwood: We then get home. We then go to Netflix and type in and go, all right let's watch the end of that episode and not there. Only in Bermuda. It's because they're in a different region. They launched it. It's a BBC show. Oh yeah. They launched it into Netflix wherever I was. Somehow, I mean they can figure out where I'm coming from, but somehow gave me the European version of Netflix content while I was in Bermuda. You need to go back. Well no, then I went and bought it on iTunes, the last episode. $6.99 an episode.

Justin Edelstein: That's a lot, but I guess it's like a movie. They are.

Jason Atwood: Kind of like an expensive movie. Well, movies are like $14.99. It's a cheap movie.

Justin Edelstein: So I had to buy a new one. We had a bit of rent TV shows. You used to, I thought. I thought it was like a 99 cents. 99 cents. I only bought this once. So that's my Netflix in Bermuda story. Thanks for that.

Jason Atwood: Really awesome. Here it is. Sherlock, watch it. It's very good. Very, very good. Seriously some of the best TV. I have too many things on my plate right now. Well you watch really crappy TV I That's not appointment television, that's right Game of Thrones like appointment television.

Justin Edelstein: I gotta watch it Do you actually have it in the family calendar? No, no, no, it's understood. It's Sunday night. It's just understood. Sunday night, it's 9 o'clock. It's game of Thrones time. Okay. HBO owns it Sunday night or it's back to owning Sunday night. For this go-around, they've got those two hours that are pretty locked down, although Mad Men is on at 10, so.

Jason Atwood: Oh yeah, so many shows stacking up now. Yeah. It's getting into that season. Shivo's getting nutty. Last but not, speaking of nutty. Tech article on salon saloon salon I see tech Titans throw some shade at Mark Zuckerberg so this is actually been coming up more and more because there's been lots of articles about Mark Benioff who's been known for his giving to the philanthropic

Justin Edelstein: Endeavors that too

Jason Atwood: But he's been getting more and more vocal. It's funny because on one side he's just gonna take, they're selling off that land, which is weird. They were gonna build this huge campus. They're not gonna do it anymore. He's now putting them in this huge tower. They're gonna call Salesforce Tower in San Francisco. Which, it's being built. It's not theirs, but they're gonna rent the most space in it. And I think they're gonna name it and like put the logo at the top. Yeah, they're naming it.

Justin Edelstein: .. It's gonna be the tallest building in the city. For a while, apparently.

Jason Atwood: And then there's another tower that's right behind it. But he's been getting more and more vocal, and I know when we were at Dreamforest, Dreamforest Oh, he was all over it. He was talking a lot about making real big jabs at Twitter founders for when they went to IPO, not giving money, not putting aside money like the 111 and giving money to 501c3s. And here he is, kind of coming out after Mark Zuckerberg, who they're kind of buddies. I mean... Facebook's a big Salesforce customer, so I'm not sure you should be throwing, and there's lots of interconnection between the two, but he basically comes out and it was it was interesting because Zuckberg I guess put aside like 1.1 billion dollars but Mark said saying well where'd it go? Did you just put aside a set of money and it's just like fake money?

17:54 Jason Atwood: Or are you actually putting it towards something? Are you watching it where it goes? Are you making sure it's making a difference? Because $1.5 billion is a crap ton of money and should be able to help, but it's more of a media blitz than it is a true sentiment. So interesting. thoughts? By the way, that's what you're supposed to do on this podcast.

Justin Edelstein: Yeah, I mean, you know, this is not to me something that I'm interested in. Mark Benioff's personal, you know, his personal beliefs in, you know, politics or philanthropy or whatever. I mean, those to me are, that's his business, that this is a story is a little bit like I don't even think this is like a story we're talking about. Like so what? So what? Mark Benioff is blasting Mark Zuckerberg about where Mark Zuckerberg chooses to spend his money. Who cares? Here's why. You ready?

Jason Atwood: Please. Because the company that we know and love and spend a lot of our time talking about and basically working in for eight to ten hours a day, one of the reasons that people are so enamored with Salesforce. is because a the cult of personality that Mark Benioff is and b because it's a company that has you know i don't want to sort of crappy expression but has a heart and that people really enjoy that sales force is not just. global conglomerate it's got this piece behind it that is about making things better. And they point it out, they show it, they put it in videos, they spent two hours and, or 45 minutes at Dreamforce at the keynote talking about it. It's what makes Salesforce part of what makes Salesforce on air quoting now.

Jason Atwood: Cool. They've got this personality. It's a company. of the company that you deal with all the time is sort of making waves about other cults of personalities of other tech firms. It kind of starts to like, it's an interesting take on, you know, calling out other tech leaders. It's not something that most tech leaders do. And it's what makes him interesting and what makes Salesforce the company interesting.

Justin Edelstein: What is Salesforce the company without pushing up? It's not that interesting to me. Let me put it that way. I don't care that he did this or that he said something about Mark Zuckerberg. It just means nothing to me. What more can I say? I mean, just it doesn't matter to me at all. It doesn't affect me. I don't really have an opinion on it. I don't really care about it all that much.

Jason Atwood: There you have it. It's not something that's- I'm glad I had this recorded.

Justin Edelstein: It's just not that interesting. I mean, you know, when we were sitting there at that Mark and Parker keynote, when, you know, he was blasting Twitter, it was like, all right, enough. You're like you built a hospital you do the 111 like it's very important. I understand But don't you find it important? Yeah, but I don't feel the need to blast others for not finding it important Okay, well, there's your opinion on it Is that I think that mark

21:13 Jason Atwood: Benioff is stepping over lines that he shouldn't be doing there my opinion

Justin Edelstein: Thank you for articulating it welcome Best podcast ever. He's not the number one in the business for a reason. There he is. There I am. Monty.

Jason Atwood: Awesome. All right, we'll move on... By the way, we have to start scheduling our double days. Double damps. Because, if I check the website, which I have bookmarked. is only 18 days ago so I'm pretty close we need to get some double double podcasting in here I've got I've got stuff for next week that we could probably double dip on

Justin Edelstein: OK we like time we've got we've got yeah we've got like a good we have that all day thing that we're doing next week that we can definitely do a podcast on in addition like that is a little more timeless yeah Interesting.

Jason Atwood: Yes, we can do something. Absolutely. That's gonna be interesting.

Justin Edelstein: And we're gonna leave it at that. Yeah. No teas. No spoilers.

Jason Atwood: All right, let's get on to spoiling your CloudFocus app picks of the week. Let's do it. Now, this is the segment of the podcast for all of you newbies where we- we pick, two apps which are supposed to have something to do with the cloud but rarely do. Really,

Justin Edelstein: If ever- You access them via the internet. Yeah, or some connected device. So I'm gonna speak for myself and a lot of people. I mean back in the day when you had your Nintendo, one of the games that you played was RBI Baseball. Yeah. Guarantee. You had RBI Baseball. So RBI Baseball 2, RBI Baseball 3 with the cool black cartridge. Cool stuff. So RBI Baseball is back on the iOS platform. It's universal. $4.99. I like universal. You get it on the iPhone and the iPad. And it's literally just like the... I like that they didn't add any frills or anything. It's really just like the Nintendo version. It says, it's back and fully reimagined. It's not fully reimag I got it. It's just like RBI baseball was on Nintendo Nintendo you hit the same way You pitch the same way.

Justin Edelstein: It's like it's just on a touchscreen You only need the two buttons or the one thing like it

Jason Atwood: So much fun, so I were 99 are you following up that I think Mark Benioff shouldn't be sticking his nose into into getting other companies to give to charities with, I like RBI baseball 14. Yeah. That's the best.

Justin Edelstein: That is awesome. What do you mean? I don't know. What's the, what does that even mean? It's all the waves of our last conversation rolling over me. I don't even understand like where that even ties together. It doesn't. It's why they're so incongruent. But why do I have to pick prospective something that has anything to a do with anything? It doesn't. Anyway, RBI Baseball by MLB.com, which I found weird, because I don't think Major League Baseball made RBI Baseball. They must have bought the rights to it at some point.

24:34 Jason Atwood: So for iOS. So what do you do? Is it literally just you play baseball?

Justin Edelstein: Yeah, it's a 9-inning game. You can play an exhibition. You can play a full season, or you can play playoffs. You say it's good. Yeah, it is. Because the football ones that have been around really are terrible. No, because they try too hard to like. Thank you for watching. is a hard game to put on an iPad. RBI Baseball is a Nintendo game. Right. That's the kind of game that works on these platforms. Like the games you like to play, like you like Candy crush like those are the kind of games that work because they're simple. It's like Tetris, you know, like like simple like Nintendo type of games really work and this really works because it's really simple like There's button to swing And to pitch I like it.

Jason Atwood: Yeah, you should try it. I'm not I'm so addicted at this point I've like I well, you've talked about my addictions to games There's like, I love the game that I can spend about nine minutes playing and then stop playing because nine minutes is either it's a good 20 minute if you have 20 minutes or if you just have 10 minutes it's nine minutes. I like nine minutes. So Plants vs Zombies 2, I love it. I just keep playing it and I played it a lot on vacation and it was awesome. I. I.............. Which is interesting. At a time where all these wearable. Things are becoming crazy. I think they had to do a huge recall of theirs. And the big rumor is, is putting a lot of this stuff into their new iWatch. Their iWatch is going to have this stuff built into it.

Jason Atwood: So my shine got lost. It popped out. It's actually the second one I've lost. It's terrible. And before I go spend, spend another hundred or 99 dollars to replace. R- chip yep, a sorry not iOS 7, iPhone 5s motion chip so it's built into iPhone 5s and and it's called Breeze and it basically does exactly what all these things do it It tracks your motion and how much you move and whatever.

27:52 Justin Edelstein: The only problem is have to have Right, well when you go running, But if you're on elliptical you can watch TV. On the treadmill, I don't like, I can't do it. I can't do it on a treadmill running.

Jason Atwood: No, I know, but like if you sat at the, whatever, you wouldn't bring this because you just watched TV in front of you.

Justin Edelstein: I'll text It's a you and and and witnessing this different thing.

Jason Atwood: I think this is where you're gonna see this show up in the next phone, whatever, and the iOS. So I'm kinda testing it here to see how it goes. Again, RunKeeper's video. How's the battery? I don't know, it's been only a couple days.

Justin Edelstein: RunKeeper, I like for keeping my runs, but from time to time it really fails with the GPS. For example, I think know because when I quit run keeper like close the app double click get rid of it and then reopen and go again it resets and it's fine So like I've gotten into the habit of just realize that I really need to just close it out completely and reboot it before I go for a run because the other day I I did run three and change miles, but it said I ran and once.

Jason Atwood: It's twice. It literally, it fl, it flopped and made a three mile run into a five mile run. I hate it. I'll tell you cuz when you turn it on I only turn it on when I leave the part building R not what I'm not what I'm in here you turn on in here I think it thinks something all you think it thinks I usually turn it on in here that Yeah.

Justin Edelstein: Something about something about going down the elevator, there's something about it. Yeah, it could be the elevator, it loses something or. And it thinks it goes somewhere. And it doesn't pick something. It's always a head. Yeah, yeah, it, yeah. When it messes up, it's always like when you get to like the five minute mark, it's like you've run 0UTF, I'm like no I haven't.

30:57 Jason Atwood: I think it's something to do with try not opening it up until you're outside outside. I will do that. Alright, that's my idea. I will also be doing the quitting. closing the app completely. My advice for everybody out there is to follow Justin at Justin Edelstein. Good advice. At Jason M. Atwood and the company at, at Arca Sync. Go to Facebook.com slash Arca Sync where we post all our blog posts and all of our podcasts and not much more. So we don't blast you. You basically get two a week. So if you don't want to talk to us. If you're lucky two. Yeah. Success Community Group. no longer in the Dreamforce group because the Dreamforce group is gone. So go to Success Community Group, LinkedIn, Google+, and remember to subscribe on iTunes. Leave us a review.

Jason Atwood: It's been a while. It really has been a while. And I think we should all look just- Yeah, where are you at, people? Where are you? Why have you not left a review on iTunes? Till next week, we'll be back with another episode. Justin and Jason saying enjoy those cloudy days.

Justin Edelstein: You