LifeDev

Mr. Mann has a great collection of work hacks to filter the noise around the workplace. Here’s my favorite email filter:

Smoking the bacn - Similar to my “no press releases” trick, filter any email that contains the string “to unsubscribe.” Although many of these certainly will be valuable (sign-ups, Google lists), that string means there’s a good chance they’re also bulk messages that are being generated automatically. And some folks want to only see those sorts of emails, again, once or twice a day — and only when they have extra time (read as: don’t interrupt me whenever someone on Facebook wants me to be a zombie, or whatever).

These rules can be easily set up on many popular email programs (Apple Mail, Outlook, Gmail, etc.), and are a great way to cut through the daily email sludge.