Life & Research Notes

Taco Lab is a design and prototyping firm that I am co-founding with my friend and fellow Media Lab grad Jeevan Kalanithi. Our clients so far have included Hallmark, Panasonic, HandsOnToys, and Qixen-P. This week we’re settling into some studio space with our friends at Electric Works, and soon we’ll have a real portfolio up online, plus maybe even an occasional Taco fanclub newsletter.

I’m also happy to watch Swivel continue to make real progress after I change my relationship with them. With Swivel Business now in a public beta with real customers, plus a strategic redesign of certain key interactions in the works, Swivel’s future looks really bright. Plus the transition is happening on good terms for everyone, so I know we’ll all stay in touch and probably even continue working together.

Thanks to all you friends who bother to read this and who have supported me in this big change! You have an open invitation to come design, code, build, and dork around with Jeevan and me in our new TL office v1beta (which I promise will be way better than alpha), coming very soon.

Tomorrow afternoon Sara and I are heading to Sacramento for the InfoVis conference, where I’m participating in a panel on The Impact of Social Data Visualization alongside Martin Wattenberg, Fernanda Viega, and Ola Rosling. I’ll be representing Swivel, in particular our market driven approach to data sharing, collaboration and visualization, and emerging topics of data ownership and provenance, privacy, and so on.

This is going to sound shallow and simplistic, but I think things changed for the better a few weeks ago when I got a new car. Like, new as in new, a 2007 Honda Element (EX / 4WD / manual / silver). Somewhere around here I’ve got some photos, and once I dig em up I’ll post them. OK, it’s dorky, but I like pictures of people with their cars. And it’s a nice car, very friendly looking, definitely a little yuppie, but hopefully forgivably so. The car was a key step because it meant I didn’t have to keep taking the bus to and from work, which was a huge time sink. And it also meant I could once again listen to music while driving, which generally increases happiness.

And then only a few days ago I moved into a new home. I’m living in the city finally, in Bernal Heights, a couple blocks from a lot of good stuff, near my favorite record store and taquerias, yet peaceful and quiet up a (very) steep hill, with a great back yard and a garage. I’ve got an excellent housemate, and a comfy room, although at the moment I’m sleeping on some borrowed twin mattress pads. The hill is a killer, but it gets my blood flowing, and I’d much prefer to be more up and away from things than smack in the middle. We can see both Sutro tower and the bay, and it all feels very SF. My first day involved getting slicks and flat pedals for my bike, cruising around, getting lunch at revolution cafe, and hanging out in Dolores park with my sister. Very pleasant.

So it’s funny how things both fall apart and come together in waves. A few months ago I was totally discombobulated, taking things one step at a time. And I’m still in transition, but now on an upswing instead of a down. At the same time some of my great friends have been going through all sorts of interesting life events, with babies, weddings, engagements, sabbaticals and trips. So with some patience and some effort, things do come back together.

But there’s been a lot going on. From bus commutes to the housing search to catching up with old friends and making new ones, it’s been a busy few weeks. As my post two weeks ago mentioned, last week I started at Swivel, which has been fast paced with a lot to learn. We’ve got some cool stuff in the works there. Then that Thursday was an interesting meeting with some guys from Metaweb, after which I headed eight blocks down to a most excellent show at Electric Works featuring their collaboration with Paul Madonna. There’s been a lot more too, including some super long hikes on and around Mt. Tam. It’s great to be back in the bay area. So I’ve been a little bad about writing lately, but there’ll be more on this blog soon, and right now I’m happy to be so outwardly occupied.

This Monday I’ll join up full-time with Swivel, a social data aggregation, analysis and publishing platform. They are a startup in downtown SF, and I’ll be acting in a dual role as both designer and engineer, collaborating with some very talented developers to push the app to the next phase.

I actually learned about these guys quite a while back, as data aggregation and visualization was an area of interest for me when I applied to the lab, and when they got their first round of press I definitely noticed them. It’ll be fun to pick back up on this trail, well armed with my PLW and ML experiences. Eventually Swivel aims to act as an open bazaar of data, not only of static sets as it is now, but also live, dynamic feeds via the upcoming API. On top of the core services, they are also working on publishing tools for people to weave the data into consumable narratives.

No doubt the web industry is hot again, and I’ve seen a lot of interesting opportunities. Yet since I first contacted them, Swivel has solidly stood out from the crowd with an original and powerful underlying idea, combined with a fun, fast, smart, hard-working, and cohesive team. Needless to say I’m excited to dive in to the tasty data goodness.

Update: Swivel is also in the news today with pieces on TechCrunch and O’Reilly Radar about their recent success at the OECD World Forum.

Things are a little rocky right now. Work prospects are great, and the bay area is treating me well with some beautiful weather. But ten days ago I was blindsided by some unexpected personal issues. After three years of what I thought was a solid, special relationship, I’m single once again, by a unilateral decision not my own.

There’s not much to do about it right now, just cope, and look for strategies for moving forward. I didn’t intend this blog to be a repository of emotional baggage. I’d rather keep it outward facing and optimistic. But at the moment it’s difficult to find that voice.

I realized today that I’ve been subscribed to a false belief that great creativity often comes out of intense, painful life experience. With this thick sadness clouding my vision, creativity is on hold, and I’m just concentrating on keeping one foot in front of the other, and navigating all the other parts of life that suddenly seem a lot harder. My most creative moments have happened in my happiest periods, times of intense confidence and feelings of endless possibility. Sadness doesn’t make me create. It numbs.

So for the few people who actually read this thing, thanks for sticking by me, and apologies for the naval gazing introspective stuff here, but my past few weeks have warranted it. This is my material now. This is my life. So I’m going to learn from it, the same way I learned from the lab. These changes are forcing me to go back to basics, making lists of what I need or want to achieve, and trying to make some plans about how to get there. These aren’t ambitious by most standards, but they are a starting point. I’m training at altitude here, where it is harder to breathe and think straight. If I can nail this, if I can keep moving and even grow now, when I come back down to sea level I’m going to be in good shape. That’s when I’ll really make things happen.

Phew, just arrived back in the bay area late last night. I’m in Mill Valley at my parents’ house for the time being, and it is such a gorgeous day. The weather here is a very immediate confirmation that I made a good decision to come back out. I’ll be in the city tomorrow for some meetings, then hopefully some time to wander around a little.