The personal goals for this week of guest blogging were to share some perspective on working at MSFT in the Silicon Valley, learn what its like to blog on a widely read Microsoft related blog, and tell some stories about "growing up at Microsoft".  It was both an opportunity and an experiment that would hopefully benefit all parties involved.  Robert would continue to have some time/space to find the right balance for himself.  Readers would continue to get a "human driven perspective" of Microsoft and get some interesting links.  Interesting content would still get linked too and found by people who could benefit/add value to it.  I would grow in a way that can only happen by doing something different from my normal life.   

Robert will be back after this post and will hopefully share how his thoughts have evolved over the last week or two.  Personally, I'm really looking forward to hearing them as this week has deepened a friendship that we started loosely two years ago. 

Anecdotally speaking, it appears that people enjoyed reading another perspective here on the scoblizer blog.  However, not everyone feels the same about guest blogging (not me personally, but the idea in general) and a conversation appears to be brewing.  It will be interesting where the town ends up on this from an etiquette and practice point of view. 

The guest blogging experience was fun, challenging and in the end personally very worthwhile.  Thank you to everyone who sent mail with links, thoughts on a post, or a kind words about this stint as a guest blogger.  Some things learned this week:

Blogging is a labor of love.  You have to be willing trade off other life things you could do to really engage and continue a conversation/perspective.  It is a tough balance and one that can easily take over other important things in your life.  The bigger the blog the harder it is to find the right balance. 

Blogging is a huge source of connections & re-connections.  My high school computer lab manager found me through scoble's blog.  We hadn't talked in many years and I'm looking forward to an upcoming lunch with him.  People on the SVC campus reached out to say hello which generated more friendships and information sharing in our little piece of Microsoft here in the valley.

Blogging is emotionally challenging.  Like anything where you share opinions, thoughts and feelings it is bound to generate responses.  Some will be the positive and some will be negative.  While a thick skin can help regulate the emotions you also learn to face your "stage fright" on a regular basis. 

Blogging creates great offline conversations.  The diversity and breadth of conversations you end up having outside of the public space of your blog is wonderful.  It is really fun to get more in touch with the people around you and nothing facilitates that like having something to talk about. 

These points may not be all that world shattering, but they were drilled into my noggin this week.  Sometimes no matter how much you read or think about something it doesn't become real until you live them. 

Finally, the measure of whether you really liked something is if you would do it again…and I most definitely would! In this case, I'll continue to blog over on spaces.  My goal is to post one of these story type entries once a week or so. 

Some links before I head off (mostly from the segment of the world I read regularly):

Oshoma Momoh has an interesting blog on technology, business and startups.

Toread.cc puts webpages you want to read in your inbox (via Trevin).

Heather posted about Onfolio (now a part of the Windows Live Toolbar) and how the product management team use it for research. 

Torres talks about some culture change he'd like to see at Microsoft. 

Fast OS switching on Mac Intels, a video.

Fil posted a screencasts from his Mix06 talk on XAML.

Jamie Buckely shares that search results for a holiday name now gives the upcoming dates…neat!

Looks like a new Vista build has been released to the public and Kristan is re already writing up tips and tricks!

Guy Kawasaki posted his top ten favorite books.  In other news, I added 9 new books to my reading list.

And last, but not least, the silicon valley campus turned on the largest bay area solar power installation on earthday.  The official press release has all sorts of great info about the environmentally friendly nature of the SVC campus. 

Robert, thanks for the trust, support, and opportunity! 

And now back to your regularly scheduled programming…