By way of Dorine Ruter’s blog–at least, I think that’s where I found it, after taking a look at Dorine’s public Bloglines feeds (cue Donald Fagen, “I.G.Y.”)–I’ve been learning a ton lately from Kathy Sierra’s “Creating Passionate Users” blog. Because I’m always about one cognitive millisecond away from analogy-mode (I almost said allegory-mode) in most of my daily interactions, I have formed the unshakable conviction that Kathy’s blog is sending important messages about teaching and learning, as well as about the work I and my team do every day as we try to encourage and empower our colleagues to transform their work as scholars and professors.

Kathy’s blog post on “Which user’s life have you changed today?” is one compelling example of what I’m talking about. I’m betting that most writers, teachers, and students would find the post just as inspiring and insightful as I did. And during the tough days when I’ve got (at last count) 30 papers and 61 exams left to grade, along with discussion forum portfolios and a few other odds and ends, and that’s before I get to the admin stuff, this tale of a simple owner’s manual that changed a life gets my chin up and my determination on full. Thanks to Kathy for telling the story, and thanks to Nick for writing that manual (Nick says, “Our goal is that the user has to do something cool within 30 minutes”), and thanks to Edward for being passionate, and thanks to O’Reilly for rewarding that passion–and, it seems, prodigious talent.

None of this magic happens automatically. That’s one reason I’m so grateful for every human being who helps make it happen, despite the real possibility that he or she will never, ever know that magic was the result.

And thanks again to Dorine, one of the most recent additions to my personal suite of inspiring and trusted experts.