My nerd crush on Marc Andreessen
If you have a technology job, especially one related to web development, and you don't know who Marc Andreessen is, you should be shot.
OK, maybe not literally.
Tim Berners-Lee may have invented the web, but Marc and Eric Bina made it easy to use when they created the first widely used Internet browser, Mosaic. Oh how I miss that funky S with a globe in the middle of it running on the HPUX version of X-windows.
Marc happens to be a year younger than I am and I was in my first year at HP when he changed the world as we know it. Jealous? Absolutely. But I had to admire what he did and the way he did it. Before we used terms like "iterative programming models", those two guys lived it and made Mosaic better by the day as they aggressively solicited feedback from anybody who gave it to them. Because I started in the wave of web development that followed his early successes, I sort of celebrated his victories vicariously over the years. He did good work and got rich off it, good for him.
This month, Marc launched a blog:
http://blog.pmarca.com/
It's about a lot of different things, but the most fascinating posts are about his experiences with entrepreneurship and start ups. If you ever had a passing thought at having your own business, you should read his post from yesterday:
The Pmarca Guide to Startups, part 1: Why not do a startup
It discusses the ups and downs of starting a new endeavor in a unique way by a guy who has been around the block a few times over the last 14 years. Take a look at what he has to say and follow this current series of his. I'm sure everybody with a business can learn something from him on this topic.
Part 2 of Running Diary: Preparing for my performance evaluation will run later in the week.
OK, maybe not literally.
Tim Berners-Lee may have invented the web, but Marc and Eric Bina made it easy to use when they created the first widely used Internet browser, Mosaic. Oh how I miss that funky S with a globe in the middle of it running on the HPUX version of X-windows.
Marc happens to be a year younger than I am and I was in my first year at HP when he changed the world as we know it. Jealous? Absolutely. But I had to admire what he did and the way he did it. Before we used terms like "iterative programming models", those two guys lived it and made Mosaic better by the day as they aggressively solicited feedback from anybody who gave it to them. Because I started in the wave of web development that followed his early successes, I sort of celebrated his victories vicariously over the years. He did good work and got rich off it, good for him.
This month, Marc launched a blog:
http://blog.pmarca.com/
It's about a lot of different things, but the most fascinating posts are about his experiences with entrepreneurship and start ups. If you ever had a passing thought at having your own business, you should read his post from yesterday:
The Pmarca Guide to Startups, part 1: Why not do a startup
It discusses the ups and downs of starting a new endeavor in a unique way by a guy who has been around the block a few times over the last 14 years. Take a look at what he has to say and follow this current series of his. I'm sure everybody with a business can learn something from him on this topic.
Part 2 of Running Diary: Preparing for my performance evaluation will run later in the week.
Labels: Nerd crush
2 Comments:
Cute post. I hadn't heard of Marc's blog but I am going to check it out right now!
liz
Thanks, Liz.
While he was changing the world, I was, well, changing backup tapes in the data center our computer lab managed. At least it got better from there for me 8).
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