Luc Beaudoin

Who are you?

I am President of CogZest. We help boost our customers cognitive productivity. We draw on a broad spectrum of Cognitive Science for the design of all our products. I’m also Adjunct Professor of Education at Simon Fraser University. My Ph.D. is in Cognitive Science. I was a first-round employee of two of Canada’s most highly-valued tech startups (Abatis Systems and Tundra Semiconductor).

We’re about to release a very innovative cognitive science-based app to help people fall asleep more rapidly: Sleep contributes to productivity!

Can you describe your Leanpub books? Are they in-progress or complete? What types of books are they?

I’m writing Cognitive Productivity: The Art and Science of Using Knowledge to Become Profoundly Effective. It is 99% complete. Cognitive Productivity addresses this problem: We process an enormous amount of information using technology designed for “surface processing”. Most workflows are designed to “get things done”, not to develop ourselves. Cognitive Productivity proposes ways of working with information that help readers learn deeply from knowledge gems. The goal is to be able to apply more of the knowledge gems that we process.

What do you think about Leanpub?

Leanpub is a publishing platform that works very well for authors and for readers. It enables them to synergize.

Why do you use Leanpub?

I selected Leanpub because I wanted to be able to reach readers before the completion of the book. I wanted them to have an opportunity to contribute to the development of my book. My book is very pertinent to knowledge workers, and hence to Leanpub customers.

Leanpub is also aligned with my book. Cognitive Productivity explains why learning from PDF is a great way to learn. I’m opposed to DRM. Also, in my book, I use Lean Startup as an example. Leanpub enables me to practice all these things that I preach: It leanly provides DRM-free books in PDF and other formats.

How did you discover Leanpub?

I believe I was searching for self-publishing platforms. Leanpub caught my eye. Peter Armstrong’s O’Reilly presentation made a big impact on me.

What’s your favorite Leanpub feature?

Being able to push the publish button frequently! I also ADORE writing in markdown.

How have you reached out to potential and existing readers of your books?

I haven’t done a lot of marketing yet. I offered free coupons to several people. I also blog, tweet, and occasionally respond to related posts on the Internet.

What are your thoughts on the Lean Publishing approach? What types of books, and what types of authors, do you think it is good for?

I love the lean approach. It’s great for technical and scientific books. It gives readers early access to cutting edge knowledge. It allows authors to have their work reviewed by a much larger number of people. It is also a great platform for peer review. I have several peers reviewing my book. Peer reviewers can pick up the latest copy from Leanpub just like everyone else, without me needing to coordinate closely with them. My copyeditor also gets the copies straight from Leanpub. That’s huge.

How long was your first Leanpub book when you first clicked the publish button? Would you publish earlier or later next time?

I had written 13 of the 15 chapters in Scrivener. In hindsight, I waited too long. I would star-toff in Markdown. (I’ve switched all my business’s internal documentation to Markdown too.) And I would publish earlier next time. My next books will also be a lot shorter.

How can we improve Leanpub?

We need to find a way to make PDF annotations robust under file changes. This will require modifications to Skim.app. Otherwise, when people receive a new revision, their annotations may be in the wrong locations. CogZest might address this.