joshuago’s Bookmarks

Pity the culture snob, as Kindles, iPods, and flash drives swallow up the visible markers of superior taste and intelligence. With the digitization of books, music, and movies, how will the highbrow distinguish him- or herself from the masses?

You can build a great startup in any of the dozen to two dozen startup hotbeds around the world. Pick a place you want to live and work and possibly raise a family. And then get busy.

A horror story about one company's ordeals with the city of Los Angeles. LA classified them in a lower tax bracket in 1994 and then arbitrarily bumped them up in 2007, ignoring its own ruling. Explains why business is fleeing LA and why one would think twice about establishing a business in Los Angeles.

Most software developers if given the choice of maintaining their own code or someone else's code, will choose their own. That's unfortunate. Editing other people's code is one of the best things that can happen to a developer. It's a great way to see what works and what doesn't.

Just like an extremely lethal virus dies out, terrible business practices also never quite see the light of day. It is these stealthy, annoying, nasty, creepy, sneaky, and irritating, pains-in-all-sorts-of-bodyparts practices that tend to persist. They don't kill instantly, but gradually wear a firm down.

Niche social and political movements try to argue with everyone they run across and convince the whole country, but that's stressful and hopeless. Why not just do it: build a version of the world you want to live in? Then you get to live in it, regardless of whether anyone else is convinced it’s proper or makes sense.

Safari comes with everything you need installed, and the tools themselves are very stable. And they even look nice, which makes debugging less of a drama.

No doubt any programmer will recognize some of his own history in what lies below.

You must design something that people want (market research), in a way that they can understand (usability) and make sure they can find it (market communication and public relations).

Lack of discipline, big egos, being bad communicators, forgetting about the customer, and not prioritizing work properly.