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Herbert Simon on information

"What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention, and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it."

I'm going to divulge a piece of strange digital behavior on my part with hopes that you may be able to make some sense of it (or at the very least, provide some guidance). Note: I've turned on the comments for this one, so have at it. I recently turned the comments feature off, because managing the spam was killing me.  I'm sorry.

So here's my curious proclivity (please be gentle). I have multiple email accounts, as I'm sure many of you do.  Any way, I use one of them to accumulate "information;" various opt-in newsletters, blog feeds, etc. So, if something in that email account appears to have "value" and requires little time to process, I'll get to it in short order (read it online, print and read it, etc.).  And if it's vapid, I get to it in very short order (hit delete).  However - and here comes the strange part - if it appears to possess value and it will take some time to sort through, I'll archive it and . . . never look at it ever again.

Strange, huh?  Any insights? :)

Posted December 14, 2007
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» Is information truly valuable or merely useful? from Marketing Interactions
Every time you create a marketing communication you believe it's truly valuable to your audience—right? But, how do you know if you've hit on their Value Factors? This blog post was generated by a comment made over on Tom Asacker's blog by a user named... [Read More]

Tracked on Dec 27, 2007 5:26:27 PM

Comments

You've just described my thousands of del.icio.us bookmarks. "This is cool. I must get around to really processing it." Cut to a shot of the warehouse at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Tom, you aren't alone.

Posted by: ADB | December 14, 2007 at 06:24 PM

I have found myself doing this also, now I ask myself, "is this information truly valuable or merely useful?" Since this has been in practice my archives are now much, much smaller.

Posted by: pt | December 14, 2007 at 07:00 PM

Tom,

I agree. You're not alone. In fact, I'd bet dollars to donuts that this is very common.

And on the comment spam front, check out Akismet. It's done wonders for my blog.

Be well,
Bob

Posted by: Bob Souer | December 14, 2007 at 08:13 PM

Thanks everyone. I feel better. :) And Bob, I'll definitely be checking out Akismet. Thanks.

Posted by: Tom Asacker | December 16, 2007 at 10:28 AM

Hi Tom,

I do it too!

But it's not really a surprise, as I've always been a pack rat. So seeing these tendencies transfer to the information one gathers via the Internet and email would be quite predictable.

Just nice to know I'm not alone.

Pack rats, like the information they collect, also like to have lots of friends.

Dick

Posted by: Dick Taylor | December 18, 2007 at 08:33 AM

Tom,

It's not just digital stuff. In one of the piles on my desk are numerous clipped journal articles and newsletters. They seemed interesting enough to clip and keep when I first saw them. I probably read one of the little summaries on the margin and decided they all had merit. When I clean my desk every month or so, I toss dozens that haven't been read.

Posted by: John Schick | December 18, 2007 at 11:35 AM

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