On a not infrequent basis, as an IT professional, I’m asked for recommendations of software, services, and hardware.
I have some very technical friends who tend to buy things I recommend purely on my recommendation. Their thought process, they explained, was that I was thorough in my evaluations and they trusted my opinion, so if I recommended it, there really wasn’t much reason to put huge amounts of effort into doing the same, as they’d more than likely reach the same conclusions.
Recently, I recommended a couple of products to a new coworker. He came in this morning and asked for a comprehensive list of everything I use and recommend, because I clearly thought the same as he did and it would save him time, money, and effort if he just chose the same ones.
This gelled with an idea I’ve been having for a while to have a place I can send people to see my recommendations (and occasionally condemnations). I’ll tag all the blog posts with at minimum the “What I use” category for easy searching later.