Nature hasn’t built us to sit in the same position and stare at a 19"-Universe. We are built for movement and endurance, not pushing pieces of plastic.

Modern life has created a paradox situation (for example here in Thailand): many Mahouts and their Elephants don’t find work.

Since they don’t have any money to feed their beloved beasts they let them go, but the elephants don’t return to the jungles, but stay near or in villages and cities.

Chaos ensues.

I am sure it’s a great thing that machines have "freed" these gentle beasts, but I wonder if the ancient work team man & elephant was not better for the environment anyway?

I already love him for his "Dirty Jobs", but this lecture is insightful, amusing and deeply honest.

Highly recommended.

2008 was good for business – although most projects and most clients were incredibly boring.

Maybe the web business has lost it’s spark – and is just an industry like any other? Maybe my personal excitement about the information age has come to an end – or it’s simple become mainstream and is therefore boring?

What a great workplace! You are literally on top of the world and nobody can check what you are doing out there.

Just because you and an your drunken mates can afford to go into a strip club doesn’t mean you suddenly turned into George Clooney and all the females are crazy for you middle management wankers.

Before the industrial revolution there was plenty of work for everyone – not always pleasant and nice – but there was a huge demand for muscles and brains.

Mechanization took most low level, handcraft, agricultural and production jobs away, so humans had to train to be smarter than machines to keep working. Most of today’s productive work (= producing goods) is done by machines, while we have kept and expanded the so called service industries and administration (and boy, do we love our bureaucracies).

I wonder: when we run out of oil and don’t come up with an adequate supply of alternative fuel if human work might be back in demand? There are six billion of us and not everybody fancies burger flipping and filling out forms & papers.

I think I want to go back to old school kinda work. No computers, no cell phones, no copy machines, no answering machines – instead every male had his own personal sexy secretary who did all these jobs for him.

Plus she made sure his day was a pleasant one.

I am always suspicious about people who tell me they are overworked in their jobs. It usually means that they either can’t organize their jobs or their try to make themselves irreplaceable by sucking up every bit of work and responsibility they can lay their hands on.

The motivation is fear – fear of being replaceable and not important. But instead of being a useful coworker these people become bottlenecks, because they turn into control freaks.

And nobody like bottlenecks – not matter how ‘important’ or overworked they are …

The feminist movement certainly has blessed woman with many new role models. I just wonder if the CEO really appeals to little girls and their natural breeding instinct?

Will CEO Barbie be is overstretched as modern moms or can she afford an immigrant brown Barbie to do her shopping, feeding the kids and blowing Ken, when she is at work making money?

CEO Barbie – preparing girls for the stressful lifestyle of a successful woman – who is able to still look like slut after working all day.

Anything born in the last 25 to 30 years is called Millennials – because they are the bulk of the workforce of the new Millennium.

Raised by overcaring soccer moms and freeform hippie parents, still living at home with 30 and a very pampered bunch.

This generation is the special needs generation, that needs constant attention, constant gratification and loads of ‘creative space’ for their mostly empty brains. Most of all they need constant stimulation to stay on the job. Even when they work their own jobs their parents call employers and challenge reviews and their salary – like they called their teachers and professors in school or university before. This is overprotective individualism gone wrong.

My Mom said it’s oke to show off my skills …

I am actually very happy that now the first studies and articles about the awkwardness of this generation are coming out – because it confirms my experience in many companies working with these ‘youngsters’.

I guess every generation says that the next one is softer, stupider and more pampered. This is mostly true, since most kids in western countries had the LUCK to grow up in ever better living conditions, education, spoiled consumerism and a highly expanding ‘fun culture’. It’s better to work your Nintendo instead of working the coal mines.

Classical Hero figure transformed into a multimedia cash cow.

Kids and young adults  have become highly targeted consumer groups since the 1950’s. Youth culture didn’t exist before that. A total media sphere for kids and young adults didn’t exist before the 1970’s. And total consumerism didn’t arrive before the 1980’s. The sheer amount of media archetypes, lifestyle choices, trends, weird and cool stuff only aimed at youngster is incredible and aggressively enforced by companies.

Plus we are now experiencing the total ‘digitization of social behavior’ since the arrival of cheap cell phones, broadband and social networks on the intranets.

Yes, kids have spent less and less time doing sports or experiencing nature in the last 25 years. They have spent more time shopping and in front of a screen.

On the Internet everyone can see your IQ. Thanks for sharing!

The attitudes and goals have changed. Hardly anyone wants to be an Astronaut, Pilot or other Hero figure these days. Too much effort, too little coolness.

Most teen idols are either ‘human products’ invented by companies or the media like lifestyle choices like ‘Gangster Rapper’ or ‘Super Model’. Shows like Big Brother and the whole mechanism of media whoring by being a slut (I am looking at you Paris and Perez Hilton) shows kids only that you don’t need ANY ’skillz’ to be a gazillionaire.

There has never been a Generation that grew up in in such a safe environment and with so much constant distraction. Life is no longer just about the ‘basics’ to them – they want more, more and more – and they are used getting it without much effort apart from bitching.

The Queen of the Millennials.

It is GOOD that less and less kids grow up experiencing hunger, war and poverty – like still way too many kids do in Africa, Asia, Russia, South America and the Middle East. The global society overall is getting richer. Teenager in Tehran have as often facial surgery as in LA. Millennials all over the world grew up with MTV, Madonna, McDonalds and Mobiles. Theirs styles and attitudes are very similar.

The are now enjoying the fruits of the war and post war generations, the new creative and sexual worlds of the hippie revolution – and the blatant consumerism of the Reagan years.

Apart from being nice, being loved, being entertained, able to shop and fuck something this generation hardly has an agenda. It is hardly a political generation – apart from passively ’saving the earth’ – probably by shopping Al Gore T-Shirts and blogging about it.

I am oke, you are oke. Together we watch DVDs about saving the Earth or pirate it from the Intranets!

Unlike the Hippies or Yuppies they don’t know the hunger for change or power. As long as it’s cool and entertaining anything goes. If angry give them a promotion, a hug or a Amazon.com coupon and they are happy again.

Without the absence of real dangers and challenges any human being softens up and relaxes – and after over 60 years of peace and prosperity in western nations there are hardly any direct challenges left. How can you feel like REALLY doing something, when you can stuff your face with organic burgers, surf the web on your iPhone and travel to India for Yoga?

It’s all so nice and pink. Life is almost like being with mom.

More: Wikipedia on Generation Y and read this Managers Guide to Millenials