A wholly biased account...
Under the heading of "Never let the truth get in the way of a good story", I'd like to let folks know that I just wrote a book chapter describing my memories of MP3.Com.
The chapter was for an O'Reilly book entitled "Beautiful Teams". The book contains interviews with and personal accounts from folks on hardware and software engineering teams across different industries. The goal of the book was to provide lessons learned stories - both in the positive and negative - about how different development teams worked.
None of the contributors were paid: Instead, royalties from the book were contributed to PlayPumps International, a truly wonderful charity that digs wells and installs pumps to deliver clean drinking water to rural schools and villages in sub-Saharan Africa.
If you're interested, the book is here: http://tinyurl.com/pp9bes
The process of writing this chapter was very interesting: doing the research was pretty phenomenal in that I got to reconnect with a lot of folks I hadn't talked to in a while, I got a greater perspective on how all of MP3.com came together/fell apart, and it gave me a sense of closure on that chapter of my life which I didn't have previously (leaving MP3.Com roughly coincided with me leaving San Diego, and I just kinda moved on without processing or transitioning that part of my life - dropping of the face of the Earth). Moreover, I wrote a chapter for a book and I'm now published in that sense. Very cool and a milestone. It was certainly a lot of work though.
All in all, I'm really happy about the book, and it was a great opportunity to reflect on a very transitional and wonderful part of my life, as well as to reconnect with some folks who are amazing and were a big part of my day-to-day.
The chapter was for an O'Reilly book entitled "Beautiful Teams". The book contains interviews with and personal accounts from folks on hardware and software engineering teams across different industries. The goal of the book was to provide lessons learned stories - both in the positive and negative - about how different development teams worked.
None of the contributors were paid: Instead, royalties from the book were contributed to PlayPumps International, a truly wonderful charity that digs wells and installs pumps to deliver clean drinking water to rural schools and villages in sub-Saharan Africa.
If you're interested, the book is here: http://tinyurl.com/pp9bes
The process of writing this chapter was very interesting: doing the research was pretty phenomenal in that I got to reconnect with a lot of folks I hadn't talked to in a while, I got a greater perspective on how all of MP3.com came together/fell apart, and it gave me a sense of closure on that chapter of my life which I didn't have previously (leaving MP3.Com roughly coincided with me leaving San Diego, and I just kinda moved on without processing or transitioning that part of my life - dropping of the face of the Earth). Moreover, I wrote a chapter for a book and I'm now published in that sense. Very cool and a milestone. It was certainly a lot of work though.
All in all, I'm really happy about the book, and it was a great opportunity to reflect on a very transitional and wonderful part of my life, as well as to reconnect with some folks who are amazing and were a big part of my day-to-day.