I have mentioned it many times in the past, bug Google Reader flat out rocks. Mix Google Reader with Google Gears and I am impressed (almost) beyond words. We had a pretty crazy week in Dallas this, which led to very little feed time. A quick gears click before I left the office and I was able to cruise through my feeds at about 30,000 feet via my browser. I look forward to the day when Gears works with Gmail and the rest of Google Docs.
Speaking of the crazy week, we (Telligent) flew in about 15 remote folks. There was lots of fun things going on. My favorite was our first ever hack-a-thon. The event was centered around a new application called Graffiti we are planning on bringing to market in the fall. I have been spending a lot of my time on getting V1 out the door and this was the first time that most of the company has seen it. I gave a quick demo and then anyone who was interested had about 18 hours to do something interesting.
We have had a couple other coding contests over the years, which have resulted in some great ideas/code. But I have to say, I was just floored by the effort and creativeness (we actually had a group of folks work all night in the office on their submissions). The following morning there were about 15 or so demo's of what various people created. I am 100% certain all of them will in some way be incorporated in the first couple of Graffiti releases. Seriously, the effort was absolutely amazing.
I recently had my three year Telligent anniversary. I think back to when we started and what I thought at the time were lofty goals and I am continually impressed with what our teams are able to accomplish. It is cliche` but it is 100% about the people. I have worked at other places with great people, but I have never been at a place that was so focused on enabling others to be successful. This really stuck out to me in talking with our little intern army. Their excitement phenomenal. Part of this of course is related to them being about 21 and getting to hang out all day in a place that has more toys than your average Kb-toy store, but what I really think it comes from is the fact they are just as enabled to make a real and lasting contribution to Telligent as any other senior employee.
Finally, much to my wife's chagrin, my MacBook-Pro crush hit new peaks this week. Damn you Jason. :)
