The sic executives at the IQ reducing, productivity destroying and ridiculously over-valued media company BuzzFeed have tapped into a universal human weakness – we love lists. Lists by their very nature reduce one of the cognitive qualities which sets us humans apart – the ability to create categories. This is not to say that lists don’t have purpose or can’t create value. Indeed, physician and public intellectual Atul Gawande, author of The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right documents eloquently how, in the case of applying known and tested best practices to fully understood problems, lists can save lives.... Read more

Some medieval scholars believe that institutional information management originated in 540 AD with the scriptorium created by Flavius Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus [Cassiodorus]. A scriptorium is a room, typically at a monastery but sometimes in the castle of a king or a lord, purpose built as a place for the collection, copying, and preservation of texts. The scriptorium Cassiodorus built at Vivarium [southern Italy] featured self-feeding oil lamps, a sundial, and a water-clock. There were desks for the monks to sit at and copy texts, as well as ink wells, penknives, and quills. This could be considered the first “data center” of the Dark Ages.... Read more