A Minneapolis/St. Paul magazine, The Rake, has a fascinating article revealing the history and development of the humble, ubiquitous Post-It Note. An intriguing tale of a dedicated visionary working the system to bring an innovative product to life in a monolithic, tradition-bound organization.’ From the article: ‘Two and a half decades later, as the little yellow notes celebrate their silver anniversary, it’s easy to forget what a recent innovation they are. Thanks to their material simplicity, they seem more closely related to workplace antiquities like the stapler and the hole-punch than integrated chips. Instead, they’re an exemplary product of their time. Foreshadowing the web, they offered an easy way to link one piece of information to another in a precisely contextual way. Foreshadowing email, they made informal, asynchronous communication with your co-workers a major part of modern office life.
(Via Slashdot.)

Asynchronous communication? A post-it-note is a post-it-note is a post-it-note. But I admit they are very cool. Right up there with velcro and the safety belt.