Working In The 21st Century

Working In the 21st Century is a field guide to learning how to think, work and prosper in a changing economy. The world complicated and quite large from what people tell me, but the fancy box filled with transistors sitting in front of you and the Internet trapped inside of it are opening up opportunities that can, at present, change the way you look at work. With the tools available right now, a whole lot of moxie and some of the skills in this guide you should be able:

• Put together an inexpensive (or free) virtual office.
• Find a job (or four) that will allow you to work from home or Guam or wherever and make decent money.
• Find a part time gig that lets you take your talents
• Learn a little more about how we think and therefore why your fancy, shmancy marketing book is so often wrong.
• Earn, save and invest your money to get it to start working for you.
• Get more time to do the things that you enjoy like Kite boarding or saving the world.

The guide is always growing, with new sections being added as new tools turn up on my radar. I challenge you to go through the entire thing, and realize that working from the web has never been easier and anyone, anywhere can be an entrepreneur.

Understanding The World

A collection of really smart videos from really smart people. Honestly, it is a lot more interesting than most of those college credits you slept through.

Human Nature

Laurie Santos Monkeynomics (Human Nature/Economics) [Visit]
Sheena Iyengar On The Art Of Choosing (Human Nature) [Visit]
Michael Shermer: The Pattern Behind Self Deception (Human Nature) [Visit]
The Dangers Of Science Denial (Human Nature) [Visit]
Daniel Kahneman: Experience Versus Memory (Human Nature) [Visit]
Dan Ariely: Are We In Control Of Our Own Decisions (Human Nature) [Visit]
Dan Ariely: Our Buggy Moral Code (Human Nature) [Visit]
Steven Pinker And The Blank Slate (Human Nature) [Visit]
Brain Damage And Delusions (Human Nature) [Visit]
Al Seckel: Our Brains Are Miswired (Human Nature) [Visit]
The Paradox Of Choice (Human Nature) [Visit]
The Frinky Science of the Human Mind (Human Nature) [Visit]
Superfreakonomics With Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner (Human Nature) [Visit]
Michael Specter – Denialism (Human Nature) [Visit]
The Upside Of Irrationality (Human Nature) [Visit]
Steven Pinker: The Stuff Of Thought (Human Nature) [Visit]
Steven Pinker: Indirect Speech And Social Relationships (Human Nature) [Visit]
Sway: The Pull Of Irrational Behavior (Human Nature) [Visit]
Superfreakonomics Challenging The Way We Think (Human Nature) [Visit]
The Tyranny Of Positive Thinking (Human Nature) [Visit]

Storytelling

Elif Shafak The Politics Of Fiction (Storytelling) [Visit]
Michael Sandel: The Art Of Democratic Debate (Storytelling) [Visit]
When Games Invade Real Life (Storytelling) [Visit]
We Are The Stories We Tell Ourselves (Storytelling) [Visit]
The Danger Of A Single Story (Storytelling) [Visit]
Videogames And Life (Storytelling) [Visit]
The Role Of Fiction In A Well Lived Life (Storytelling) [Visit]
Electronic Arts Game Development (Storytelling) [Visit]
Tribeca And New Storytelling Forms (Storytelling) [Visit]
Building Real Worlds From Scratch (Storytelling) [Visit]
Games People Play (Storytelling) [Visit]
Malcolm Gladwell At City Arts Lectures (Storytelling) [Visit]

Complexity

Benoit Madelbrot: Fractals And The Art of Roughness (Complexity) [Visit]
Lies And Statistics (Complexity) [Visit]

Happiness

Chip Conley: Making Life Worthwhile (Happiness) [Visit]
Happiness And Why We Want It (Happiness) [Visit]
We Don’t Really Know What Makes Us Happy, But We Think We Do (Happiness) [Visit]
Matt Ridley – The Rational Optimist (Happiness) [Visit]

Work

Cameron Herold: Raising Kids To Be Entreprenuers (Work) [Visit]
The Power Of Time Off (Work) [Visit]
Dan Pink: On Motivation (Work) [Visit]
Joseph Pine: On What Consumers Want (Work) [Visit]
Citizen Engineer (Work) [Visit]
Crowdsourcing Work (Work) [Visit]
Revolutionizing How Engineering Is Practiced And Taught (Work) [Visit]
What Still Matters About Distance? (Work) [Visit]
Daniel Pink: A Whole New Mind (Work) [Visit]
Take Complexity Out of Your Company (Work) [Visit]
The Truth About What Motivates Us (Work) [Visit]
Umair Haque: Achieving Behavioral Innovation (Work) [Visit]

Risk

Six Steps To Avoid Civilization’s Collapse (Risk) [Visit]
Max Barry On Risk (Risk) [Visit]
David Cameron In Conversation With Nassim Taleb (Risk) [Visit]
Leonard Mlodinow: The Drunkards Walk (Risk) [Visit]
Nicholas Taleb: A Crazier Future (Risk) [Visit]

Education

Rethinking the MBA (Education) [Visit]
Higher Education Is Broken (Education) [Visit]
The Digital University (Education) [Visit]
The Digital University: What’s Next (Education) [Visit]

Adversity

Aimee Mullins: The Opportunity of Adversity (Adversity) [Visit]
JK Rowling: The Benefits Of Failure (Adversity) [Visit]

Economics

Alex Tabarrok Foresees Economic Growth (Economics) [Visit]
What’s Working In Content Monetization (Economics) [Visit]
A Global Investing Perspective Where The World Is Going (Economics) [Visit]
Evolutionary Approach To Financial History (Economics) [Visit]
Nassim Taleb And Daniel Kahneman Reflection On A Crisis (Economics) [Visit]
Burton Malkiel – A Random Walk Down Wall Street (Economics) [Visit]
Ramit Sethi – I Will Teach You To Be Rich (Economics) [Visit]
Dan Ariely: Tendencies Of Irrational Behavior (Economics) [Visit]
Daniel Kahneman On Behavioral Economics (Economics) [Visit]

The Future

Headset That Reads Your Mind (The Future) [Visit]
Susan Blackmore: Memes and Temes (The Future) [Visit]
The Democratization of Ubiquitous Computing (The Future) [Visit]
The Past, Present and Future of Digital Memories (The Future) [Visit]
The Design of Implicit Interactions (The Future) [Visit]
Augumented Social Cognition (The Future) [Visit]
Minds For Sale The Future Of The Internet (The Future) [Visit]
Revolution In Personal Fabrication (The Future) [Visit]

Creativity

Temple Grandin: Different Kinds of Minds (Creativity) [Visit]

Skills You’ll Need

Right now this section is heavy on what to do with your money once it’s burning a hole in your bank account, but in the future it will have everything from Roth IRAs to Objective C. Take a look around and learn something new.

Personal Finance

Compound Interest (Personal Finance) [Visit]
Get Rich Slowly (Personal Finance) [Visit]
Personal Finance (Personal Finance) [Visit]
Motley Fool: Personal Finance (Personal Finance) [Visit]
Bankrate Banking Rates (Personal Finance) [Visit]
Understanding Life Insurance (Personal Finance) [Visit]

Investing

13 Steps To Investing Foolishly (Investing) [Visit]
Exchange Traded Fund Investing Guide (Investing) [Visit]
Morningstar Mutual Fund Screener (Investing) [Visit]
GE Interest Plus (Investing) [Visit]

Retirement

The World’s Easiest Guide To Understanding Retirement Accounts (Retirement) [Visit]
Traditional IRA Versus 401k Choosing The Retirement Account (Retirement) [Visit]

Saving

Money Saving Mom (Saving) [Visit]
30 Easy Ways To Save Money (Saving) [Visit]
Budgeting For Lazy People (Saving) [Visit]
Retailmenot Online Discounts (Saving) [Visit]
Groupon Group-Based Discounts (Saving) [Visit]
Redlum Coupons and Savings (Saving) [Visit]
Coupon Mom (Saving) [Visit]
Free Frequent Flyer Miles (Saving) [Visit]
Points Manage Loyalty Programs (Saving) [Visit]
Seekingalpha Investing News (Saving) [Visit]

Debt Management

How I Paid Off $35,000 In Debt (Debt Management) [Visit]
Credit Card Guides (Debt Management) [Visit]

DIY

Do It Yourself Projects (DIY) [Visit]

Tools Box

Need a theme? Some stock photography? Maybe some javascript to help save you a few late nights slaving over code? There are piles and piles of fantastic tools on the web to make it easier for you to build whatever bit of crazy inspiration you would like. Below are a few of them for everyone from web designers to garage tinkerers.

Photography, Video, and Audio

Alamy (Stock Photography, $5+) [Visit]
Every Stock Photo (Stock Photography, Free) [Visit]
Corbis Images (Stock Photography, Various) [Visit]
Stock Vault (Stock Photography, Free) [Visit]
Shutterstock (Stock Video, $10+) [Visit]
GIMP (Photo Editing, Free) [Visit]
Audacity (Audio Editing, Free) [Visit]

Content Management

Simple Themes (CMS Themes, Free+) [Visit]
Elegant Themes (CMS Themes, $39/year) [Visit]
Wordpress (CMS, Free) [Visit]
Joomla (CMS, Free) [Visit]
Drupal (CMS, Free) [Visit]
phpBB (Forum, Free) [Visit]

Electronics and Crafts

Arduino (Electronics, $29.95+) [Visit]
SparkFun (Electronics, Various) [Visit]
Bug Labs (Electronics, $449+) [Visit]
Maker Bot (3D Printer/Crafts, $750+) [Visit]

eCommerce

SugarCRM (CRM, Free+) [Visit]
Magento (eCommerce, Free+) [Visit]

Presentations

Prezi (Presentations, Free) [Visit]
CamStudio (Screencasting, Free) [Visit]
Dia (Mind Mapping, Free) [Visit]

Integrated Development Environments

#develop (IDE, Free) [Visit]
Eclipse (IDE, Free) [Visit]

Other

37Signals (Project Management, Free+) [Visit]
Osalt (Opensource Alternatives, Free) [Visit]
Nuance (Speech Transcription, $99+) [Visit]
Mint (Personal Finance, Free) [Visit]
Points (Loyalty Points Manager, Free) [Visit]
SciLab (Numerical Computation, Free) [Visit]
The Game Creators (Game Creation, Various) [Visit]
VirtualBox (Virtualization, Free) [Visit]

Home Office

HRBlock (Tax Preparation, Free+) [Visit]
Xero (Accounting, $19/month+) [Visit]
Freshbooks (Billing, Free+) [Visit]
Bizfilings (Incorporation, Various) [Visit]
Legalzoom (Legal Documents, Various) [Visit]
GoToMeeting (Remote Meetings, $49/month+) [Visit]
Skype (VOIP Phone, Free+) [Visit]
LogMeIn (Remote Logins, Free+) [Visit]
OpenOffice (Office Suite, Free) [Visit]

Email

Thunderbird (Email Client, Free) [Visit]
Mail Chimp (Email Marketing, Free+) [Visit]
Constant Contact (Email Marketing, $15/month+) [Visit]
Feedly (RSS Reader, Free) [Visit]

Cloud Computing

Dropbox (Cloud Storage, Free+) [Visit]
Mozy (Cloud Backups, Free+) [Visit]
Rackspace (Cloud Hosting, Various) [Visit]
Amazon S3 (Cloud Storage, $0.15/GB/month+) [Visit]

Media Shelf

These are books and movies that will help round out your education on some of the topics covered in this guide. I’ve read (or watched) all of these and liked them enough to include. Even if you are not a “reader” all of the books are available in audio form from the good people at Audible. (P.S. buying one of the books from this site earns me a few pennies from Amazon)

Books

The Blank Slate (Human Nature) [Visit]
Denialism (Human Nature) [Visit]
Being Wrong (Human Nature) [Visit]
The Social Atom (Human Nature) [Visit]
How Pleasure Works (Happiness) [Visit]
The Invisable Gorilla (Human Nature) [Visit]
A Random Walk Down Wall Street (Economics) [Visit]
The Upside of Irrationality (Human Nature) [Visit]
The Drunkard’s Walk (Risk) [Visit]
The Science of Fear (Human Nature) [Visit]
On Intelligence (The Future) [Visit]
Social Intelligence (Human Nature) [Visit]
The Black Swan (Risk) [Visit]
The Big Short (Economics) [Visit]
How Market’s Fail (Economics) [Visit]
Fooled By Randomness (Risk) [Visit]
Nudge (Complexity) [Visit]
Predictably Irrational (Human Nature) [Visit]
The Hidden Brain (Human Nature) [Visit]
Freakonomics (Economics) [Visit]
Drive (Work) [Visit]
The Tipping Point (Work) [Visit]
This Will Change Everything (The Future) [Visit]
Enough (Economics) [Visit]
Ignore Everybody (Work) [Visit]

Movie

Maxed Out (Economics) [Visit]
Enron: The Smartest Guys In The Room (Economics) [Visit]
I.O.U.S.A (Economics) [Visit]
Frontline: Ten Trillion and Counting (Economics) [Visit]
In Debt We Trust (Economics) [Visit]
e-Dreams (Work) [Visit]
Food, Inc (Health) [Visit]
We Live In Public (The Future) [Visit]
Born Rich (Work) [Visit]
Mind Over Money: Nova (Human Nature) [Visit]
American Experience: The Crash of 1929 (Economics) [Visit]

Making Money

Whether you write code, write novels or just like surfing the web, there are ways to make money if you have the passion and the persistence to do it. Each of these opportunities are described as follows (skills needed, relative difficulty, relative earning potential). Be warned, almost all of them will require at least a dash of marketing talent.

Code Canyon (Scripts, Hard, $$) [Visit]
Graphic River (Graphic Design, Medium, $$) [Visit]
Video Hive (Stock Footage, Hard, $$) [Visit]
Theme Forest (Themes, Hard, $$) [Visit]
Audio Jungle (Stock Audio, Hard, $$) [Visit]
Active Den (Flash/Flex, Hard, $$) [Visit]
Mochimedia (Game Advertising, Hard, $$$) [Visit]
Zazzle (Graphic Design, Medium, $$$) [Visit]
SEED (Writing/Photography, Medium, $) [Visit]
Job-A-Matic (Job Advertising, Medium, $$) [Visit]
Helium (Writing, Medium, $) [Visit]
Demand Media (Writing, Medium, $) [Visit]
ChaCha (Research, Easy, $) [Visit]
SocialSpark (Blog Advetorials, Medium, $$$) [Visit]
Videoegg (Video Advertising, Hard, $$$) [Visit]
Technorati Media (Blogging Advertising, Hard, $$$) [Visit]
Job Syndicate (Job Advertising, Medium, $$) [Visit]
Lulu (Book Publishing, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
e-Junkie (Content Publishing, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
Kindle (Book Publishing, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
Smashwords (eBook Publishing, Hard, $$$) [Visit]
IndieFlix (Independent Film, Hard, $$$) [Visit]
KGB (Research, Easy, $) [Visit]
Etsy (Crafts, Hard, $$$) [Visit]
iStockphoto (Photography, Hard, $$) [Visit]
Text Link Ads (Blog Advertising, Medium, $$$) [Visit]
Project Wonderful (Blog Advertising, Medium, $) [Visit]
Kontera (Blog Advertising, Medium, $$) [Visit]
iPhone App Development (App Development, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
Android App Development (App Development, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
Leanpub (Blog Publishing, Medium, $) [Visit]
Amazon Affiliate (Affiliate Program, Hard, $$$) [Visit]

Finding Funding

Softech VC (Seed Capital) [Visit]
First Round Seed (Seed Capital) [Visit]
Y Combinator (Seed/Mentorship) [Visit]
Techstars (Seed/Mentorship) [Visit]
Betaworks (Seed Capital) [Visit]
Founder Collective (Seed Capital) [Visit]
Angelsoft (Deal Flow) [Visit]

Freelance Jobs

RFPDB (Various, Very Hard, $$$$$ ) [Visit]
Freelance Switch Jobs (Various, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
Aquent (Marketing/Design, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
Krop (Creative Professionals, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
Guru (Various, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
oDesk (Various, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
eLance (Various, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]
Authentic Jobs (Various, Hard, $$$$) [Visit]

Outsourcing Your Life

There are a lot of things that require a personal touch, but it doesn’t necessarily have to be your own. Between freelance work and virtual assistance, with a little forward planning you can unload a lot of the work you don’t need to do so you can focus on those things that require your time.

Freelance

Freelancer (Programming/Marketing/Sales, Bid) [Visit]
iFreelance (Design/Bookkeeping/Data, Bid) [Visit]
vWorker (Design/Administrator/Writing/Translation, Bid) [Visit]
GetACoder (Programming, Bid) [Visit]
Mechanical Turk (Various, Set Price) [Visit]
Cloudcrowd (Various, Quote) [Visit]
Clickworker (Various, Various) [Visit]
LiveOps (Call Center, Quote) [Visit]

Virtual Assistants

Get Friday (Virtual Assistant, $15/hour+) [Visit]
Office Details (Virtual Assistant/Concierge, Consultation) [Visit]
Tasks Everyday (Virtual Assistant, $6.98/hour) [Visit]
Virtual Assistants (Virtual Assistant, Various) [Visit]
Find Virtual (Virtual Assistant, Various) [Visit]

Coworking

Tired of working out of coffee shops? How about working out of places with coffee and other entrepreneurs! Coworking spaces a popping up all over the country, and they are looking for people like you to make them more interesting.

Coworking Wiki [Visit]
Cobot [Visit]
10 Very Cool Coworking Spaces [Visit]

Theory

From propaganda to behavioral economics, understanding how human beings relate to the media they consume is the first step to producing something useful. It’s also a lot of fun and may give you superhuman powers of perception.

Media Techniques

Propoganda (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Ad Hominem (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Appeal To Authority (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Appeal To Fear (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Argumentum Ad Populum (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Big Lie (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Black And White Fallacy (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Cognitive Dissonance (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Cult Of Personality (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Demonization (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Door In The Face Technique (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Fear, Uncertainty And Doubt (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Foot In The Door Technique (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Glittering Generality (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Half-Truth (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Milleu Control (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Reductio Ad Hitlerum (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Operant Conditioning (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Causal Oversimplification (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Red Herring (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Scapegoating (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Straw Man (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Third Party Technique (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Thought Terminating Cliche (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Transfer (Media Techniques) [Visit]
Unstated Assumption (Media Techniques) [Visit]

Behavioral Economics

Prospect Theory (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Status Quo Bias (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Gambler Ruin (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Self-Serving Bias (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Mental Accounting (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Inequity Aversion (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Intertemporal Consumption (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Present Biased Preferences (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Herd Behavior (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Sunk Cost Fallacy (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Equity Premium Puzzle (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Efficiency Wage Hypothesis (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Price Stickiness (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Dunning Kruger Effect (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Homo Economicus (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Affect Heuristic (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Informational Cascade (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]
Swarm Intelligence (Behavioral Economics) [Visit]

Social Science

Signaling (Sociology) [Visit]
Risk (Economics) [Visit]
Reciprocity In Social Psychology (Psychology) [Visit]
Social Proof (Sociology) [Visit]

Creative Economy

Creative Class (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Creative Economy (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Information Society (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Knowledge Society (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Information Revolution (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Infollution (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Network Society (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Information Economy (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Knowledge Market (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Knowledge Organization (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Knowledge Economy (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Cyberocracy (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Netocracy (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Attention Economy (Creative Economy) [Visit]
Post Scarcity (Creative Economy) [Visit]

Cognitive Biases

Focusing Illusion (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Anchoring (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Bandwagon Effect (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Base Rate Fallacy (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Confirmation Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Congruence Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Endowment Effect (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Expectation Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Framing (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Illusion Of Control (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Magical Thinking (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Information Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Irrational Escalation (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Loss Aversion (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Mere Exposure Effect (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Need For Closure (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Neglect Of Probability (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Normalcy Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Outcome Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Planning Fallacy (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Reactance (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Semmelweis Reflex (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Wishful Thinking (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Zero-Risk Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Ambiguity Effect (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Availability Heuristic (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Availability Cascade (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Clustering Illusion (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Disposition Effect (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Gambler’s Fallacy (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Hindsight Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Optimism Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Overconfidence Effect (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Recency Effect (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Regression Toward The Mean (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Subjective Validation (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Survivorship Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Egocentric Bias (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
False Consensus Effect (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Fundamental Attribution Error (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Illusion Of Asymmetric Insight (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Illusory Superiority (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
System Justification Theory (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Rosy Retrospection (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Cognitive Dissonance (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]
Attribute Substitution (Mental Shortcuts) [Visit]