I still love you all!

Wow, its been six months at FaceTwit. Boy I have had to learn so much and had so much to un-learn. I though Hank Commerce had prepared me for the next big internet adventure, but wow, dealing with the scalability issues at FaceTwit... blows my mind. And forget about the reliability and uptime. Phew. It makes my head hurt.

First of all I get to write Java. Lots of it. Then I get to re-write stuff I don't like. My manager says "Sure, go for it. Just make sure the regressions pass". And then I just do it. No HoMo's to get approval, so psycho Ops nazi's to push the code, just peer checked and then roll out with the next iteration. We have continuous deployment during the day, its automatically picks a small set of the farm to deploy to and then, BAM... your code is live and being used and making a difference. Its wonderful. Our customers love us, we don't need surveys, just the every growing user base.

I've bumped into a few old friends from Hank Commerce in Mission bars from time to time. They look older and grayer, as if Henry has leached the last of their life force from them. Those who have left, well, they are smiling, lost a lot of weight and stress and look ready to rock the world again. Its great to see them all re-juvinated. Constantine, Euro-Fool, Stan and the rest of the "ex" all survived. Rock on brothers and sisters.

Back at the mothership, Can-I-Have-A-Latte-Sir is still the old thug he always was so I'm told. Can't collaborate, does his own thing and then forces it on everybody else. Its a shame, nice guy, unemployable anywhere else in the valley according to some. Henry is managing to keep up his tan, which is great for him but lousy for the shareholders. Somehow Lonely-James has managed to grow his team just so that an irreverent link based on a tiny data set gets super high prominence on the landing page. I know that will swing the company valuation. What a waste of real estate. Stacy and the iPhone. Sure, its coming in the fall with bells on this time. Got to feel sorry for Franks-Mom, having to keep the pirate ship sailing, if she gets it sailing up and to the right then the true hero will emerge.

Apart from working, what have I been doing? Well, got this freaky phone call. Well it started with an email. I thought it was totally a hoax, but for sure its totally real. There's an agent in L.A., works with all the top names. Wants me to turn my blog into a screenplay. He says that it touches everything in the human condition, the personalities are so hyper vivid that he thinks it could be the first geek-buster movie that will make money. Everybody wants to laugh at geeks, this is going to be the one! He wants me to change a few things, but I'm totally up for the challenge. He wants to keep Can-I-Have-A-Latter-Sir "as is", thinks Ed Norton might be interested in an option, potentially Zooey Deschanel as Geek-Babe if she is available. If nothing else, I've hung out at some cool parties in L.A.

In the short term, I've been editing down the blog into a slim book. A friend asked me for a signed copy, so I put one together and it made me think that it could be a great parting gift for anybody else leaving the hallowed shored of Hank Commerce. I'll post a link when its ready.

This weeks food and drink
Beer : More of a wine man these days
Shots : I've cut down, really I have
Dinner : I cook at home with my girlfriend these days, its all organic and really heathy
Weight : 168 lbs ... lost 31 lbs

Copyright fiasco!

Only Hank Commerce could screw up like this. It now all makes sense why Stan, our VP of Products and the creative genius behind Hank Orange Soda (tm) has been on a leave of absence. Literally a whole battalion of lawyers pitched up this week and seized a pile of materials and numerous hard drives. Turns out that Hank Orange Soda (tm) is a carbon copy of some soda drink from of all places Scotland. The rumor is that Stand simply copied the whole color palette thinking that nobody is Scotland would be paying attention. But global brands have a global presence, including their lawyers.

Just thinking about that, we are going out there saying we are the next big internet story and BAM! We use somebody elses copyrighted color scheme... and Stan thought no one would notice. What a dumb ass!

The creative team have been working 24/7 and trying to get a proof signed off by Henry. He's in New York this week, he's engaging in multiple partner opportunities (aka trying to scrape up any sort of deal). He sent out an email blast to us all about the "9 - 5 culture". Sure, we just work those hours only, are you kidding? I guess he has to break from the hectic contract negotiations at 5pm to get to the nearest bar to get a "well deserved" Martini, while the rest of us get this thing done. What a jack ass. The creative team are pulling their 'fros out tweaking the PANTONE by slight increments, well that's what they tell Henry. The simply have three variations, which they give them to him in rotation, basically saying that they did as he asked and here's the new sample. They are too bust playing Ms. Pacman to really put in a days work.

Henry loves to email from his Blackberry. Its a bad state of affairs when your CEO is telling the staff to "ENGAGE" and that the company is "NOT A SPECTATOR SPORT". Dude, haul your ass of the beach, New York or where ever the f**k your normally are and get into the office and engage with your staff in your company! The CEO is not a Monday Morning quarter back position, is not a spectator sport like you seem to think it is. You have to really put in a days effort like the rest of us. Roll your sleeves up and ENGAGE!

This weeks food and drink
Beer : 0 (no more official drinking!)
Shots : 7 (no more official drinking!)
Dinner : 0 nights (no more official eating!)
Weight : 194 lbs

H Staff disappear!

Feels like there is some sort of Stalin like purge going on. Let me recap

• Tori quits. This was a few month back, but had a better offer from one of our Advisors so the whispers are saying
• CFO disappears. We think he was fired, but may have quit. Perhaps he just had a difference of opinion with Henry.
• Constantine definitely quit, but has lawyers chasing him, probably after his parking permit
• DJ quit, according to Henry to "find himself"
• Stan is "on leave". After the slam-dunk of the Hank Orange Soda (tm) color scheme, I'm not sure whats going on there, perhaps he needed to rest after that effort.
  
• Guy who ran support, nobody remembers his name, been here for ages, but has an accent, gone as well. Probably fired.

In terms of H-Staff that leaves

• Henry
• Arnold the VP of World Wide Sales

Henry should have just rolled in some NRA buddies, told them we were all "commie-pinkos" and had us all shot. The blood seems to be running down the corridors and I don't want to spoil my Nike Air Jordans in white that I won on eBay last week.

Just to break the monotony of the constant departures, Henry has been showing us on a weekly basis the latest customer acquisitions and transactions. Weirdly they were as red as the blood in the corridors and also remarkably never changing week after week. If I read the charts right green is good, red is bad. I'm not sure how you can stand up and talk for an hour on basically nothing. We do love Henry, but Henry does love the sound of his own voice. Time for a drink.

This weeks food and drink
Beer : 0 (no more official drinking!)
Shots : 13 (We just drink at our desk now, who cares, we still don't even have a VP)
Dinner : 0 nights (no more dinners!)
Weight : 192 lbs