About Me
I build the infrastructure used by millions of developers around the world.
I’ve helped build Google Cloud Platform’s AI Platform Notebooks and Microsoft’s Azure App Platform, and nowadays I'm building Stripe. I even worked on Windows when I was a wee lad.
You can also find me on Twitter or co-hosting The Nonintuitive Bits podcast.
Why I Write
I read a lot. And I mean a LOT. Like, the-librarian-knows-me-by-name a lot. But the cool insights I'd learnt often trickled out of my brain by the next morning.
Then I discovered one trick which kept those ideas fresh: Writing them down
When I wrote them down, not only were the ideas easier to remember but I was also forced think about them more deeply: "I believe A because B is true....wait, am I sure B is actually true?"
As I wrote them down, it seemed a shame to keep 'em locked away to myself. So I decided to start a newsletter summarizing the best of what I learn.
But isn't everything already on the internet, you ask? There's a funny thing about information:
"Most secrets about how the world works aren’t secrets, they’re just knowledge unevenly distributed." --Patrick McKenzie
Here's to playing a tiny part in distributing knowledge a little more evenly.
What do I write about?
I love to read about software engineering, business, and psychology, and how they relate to each other. I send a weekly newsletter which highlights the most insightful material I read that week along with any essay I write.
More specifically, I'm passionate about:
Software Engineering
- Techniques for Engineering Effectively
- Practicing Rapid Experimentation
Personal Psychology
- Introspective Analysis
- Productivity Hacking
Business & Startups
- Business Strategy
- Seeing things from the customer’s point of view and solving their actual problems
Popular Essays
Sorted by popularity
- Interview advice that got me offers - Exactly what it says on the title
- The impostor's advantage - Turning impostor syndrome into a strength
- What's it like being a senior engineer? - It's no longer about the code
- I didn't want to abandon yet another side project - Cut scope & get more done
- Remembering what you read - The note-taking philosophy that worked best for me
- So you want to do deep work? - How to harness your motivation