Month: January 2025

  • Protect your future self

    Many decisions that I have made over the years seemed like good ideas at the time. However, with the benefit of hindsight, I can see that I could have made different decisions that would have had greater long term benefits. Three examples to illustrate. ExtJS 0.33 Alpha When Marketo first started, I was part of…

  • Social Media Stages

    Social media has been a fascinating experiment for civilization. Something in our DNA craves group interactions and the internet has created so many different ways to connect. The digital evolution from bulletin boards (old school method) through MySpace and AOL, to Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, Reddit, and TikTok has shown interesting patterns. I think they…

  • A Little Tech History

    I remember watching The Pirates of Silicon Valley. (The documentary, not the dramatization) It was a series of interviews about the Silicon Valley world in the 1970s – 1980s. It covered the birth of Microsoft, Apple, Oracle and other giants. You can’t tell their story without talking about Xerox. Xerox dominated the photocopier space and…

  • Breaking down a problem

    One of the most important skills of a designer is the ability to break down a problem into coherent building blocks. Unfortunately, I find most designers struggle with this task. It seems that there is an expectation that breaking a problem down is a PM or Engineering thing to do. This is the kind of…