Spring Cleaning #28: Don't Clutter Up Expensive Cyberspace

The explanation of GTD made me tired before I even read about it. GTD was TMI -- 3 models, a 5-step work flow process, 6 levels of "focus" and 5 stages of the natural planning method. You do the math.

Since one of the steps in the work flow process was "Spend more time doing than organizing", I decided to follow that advice and pass on most of the GTD theory. The one thing I have absorbed is the suggestion that "If it takes less than two minutes", do it now."

I complained to one of my staff members that I had too many files (electronic and paper), too much e-mail, too many pictures, too many notebooks. Her response was -- "You have to. It's YOUR JOB."

There is an element of truth in this. Part of the branch manager's job is to preserve some record of what has gone on at the branch. To provide some sense of tradition, to aid continuity, to honor the value of past endeavors.

The ideal is to keep only the items of most worth, so that the accumulated bulk of the past does not prevent moving forward. This exercise has encouraged me to be a better evaluator of the worth of what is saved.

Which makes me think. Right now we are worrying about cleaning up our local "neighborhood." We are encouraged to store things "out there" on the Internet. Is there a maximum capacity that the Internet can handle? With more and more people storing semi-useful things like their blogs, their libraries on Library Thing, their photos on Flickr, their videos on YouTube, etc., how long will it be before we get messages asking us to clean up our larger mess in Cyberspace? Will Google ever grind to a halt because there is just too much junk to look through?