The shorter story is that I've left the confines of idealab to work on lots of things.
That's okay, because I realized that my skills are best suited to doing new technology.
I realized that Idealab was too marketing-focused for me. I think there's a hugely important
difference there. I was working on a product that, at first, elicited the "need that!" reaction from all
my friends. It's because I needed it too, and so I built it the way I wanted it to be.
It's said in the software industry that some of the best software happens when you build something
to "scratch an itch." In the graphics business,
Photoshop, Flash, Lightwave, KPT, Infini-D, all were built like this:
two guys put together something because they wanted to do something, and they
solved that set of problems for millions of other people.
I think that one of the most crucial elements of a piece of software is that it has a kind of
integrity -- a sort of direction and a reason for living. Recognize I'm talking about version 1
software, where you're breaking new ground, not incremental revisionware, which serves a necessary
but different need.
In any case, I lost track of this whole "need it" idea sometime in the last few months, and it
really killed my motivation and productivity. I realized that I don't find motivation in the money --
I think that doing good work is worth a lot, and I pay very careful attention to the marketability of
my ideas. But I don't do the work because I want to make the biggest
possible business. In short, it's really the code, the hard problems, and the new ideas that make me
really stay up late.
In any case, I'm going to try consulting for a while. I realized that this
makes sense for a few reasons. First,
I'm extremely good at juggling multiple tasks, and second, it's a very efficient way to work. You
can set aside one problem when you get stuck, and work on a second, unrelated thing. And always,
when you come back to the first, it's much clearer than before. I think that working on 2-3 tasks
at once makes me much more productive than working on just one.
Also, it gives me control of my free time, and (ahem) there are several secret projects in the works. :)
On another note, I spent the past week in New York City.
I realized two things: I love my car, and I'm a wimp about the weather.
It's almost like I'm adapting to California.
But still, people in NYC just don't look annoyed if they have to stand on a platform for 15 minutes
waiting for a train. They just stare on in their stony isolation, and it's so completely strange.
I got back to L.A., was riding the shuttle to the long-term parking, and one of the guys on the bus
had that annoyed, "I could be driving my Jag right now, so why do I have to put up with this stupid vehicle?"
look, and I actually appreciated it, just for a minute.
It was 65 degrees here, and I could drive really fast, and it was just too much fun. And then today
I realized that this stupid town has valet parking for fast food restaurants (validated!), and I appreciated
that too, just for a minute.
Because I haven't adapted yet, but they're getting to me, see?
The really good parts of the trip: I stayed with Kevin and Lorna, and they have the most wonderful
townhouse in Hoboken, and it was really great to see them again. I've visited them twice now, so I owe
them big. They also took me to see this show called Copenhagen, which was a kind of historical
fiction take on Heisenberg and Niels Bohr, the acting was incredible (2 rather intense hours with three
actors on stage the entire time), the writing was incredible, I felt like one of the intelligentsia,
just for a minute.
It was fun to see the old Metastream crew -- spent a lot of time geeking out with Sree,
and that's just fun. We hacked on inner loops like I haven't done in a while, and did some stuff
that is pretty close to unbelievably fast. I love being around smart people.
I got to give the presentation I always wanted to give: "Premultiplied alpha and why it will
save your soul" to the Viewpoint (new Metastream) engineers, and that was also very fun. Maybe
someone even knew what I was saying?
John Wilczak had me meet Helene DeLillo
(read around the Apple blah blah) while I was out there. She's an incredibly cool Photoshop artist and
photographer. She does all of this amazing retouching work for fashion and cosmetics clients.
With an emphasis on realism and subtlety -- her work is beautiful.
Anyway, I never can wrap this stuff up. Guess it's done for now.
