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Brendan on the web
Author Archives: brendansterne
JavaScript in the Data Center?
First I saw that PayPal was using Node.js for production services. Then Airbnb. What the hell is going on? Well, a pattern is emerging: A new product or service team starts operating in lean-startup-style. This means rapid-prototyping so you can … Continue reading
Goodbye Bazaarvoice, Hello Indeed
After 3 amazing years at Bazaarvoice, it’s time for me to move on. My last day was Oct 31st. See how R&D dressed up to say goodbye! … Bazaarvoice has been very good to me. For the past 3 years … Continue reading
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Seek contact with reality, early and often
There was an interesting question on Quora the other day: What are the early symptoms that a startup is going to fail? There were a variety of answers, some funny, some insightful, some both: William Pietri provided a superb answer that … Continue reading
Be Vulnerable
Shame on me. I haven’t watched Jack Dorsey present before (live or on video), and I had made certain assumptions about him because of his business success (co-founder of Twitter, founder and CEO of Square) and because he was (in)famous … Continue reading
Can I explore your API in a browser address bar?
I like this best practices guide to designing APIs by Vinay Sahni. In it he offers some excellent advice, but one particular design principle is worth heeding and has lots of implications, namely the API should be “explorable via a … Continue reading
Hire people you would be willing to work for
The Y Combinator Startup School 2013 videos are online! I started with Paul Graham’s interview with Zuckerberg. There’s not a ton of new info in that video IMHO, but there are a couple of gems, such as: “One of the … Continue reading
Do the right thing, Wait to get fired
I stumbled upon this bit of wisdom in Team Geek: A Software Developers Guide to Working Well with Others, and it resonated. It comes from Google engineer Chade-Meng Tan: Do the right thing, wait to get fired. New Google employees … Continue reading
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Fairness Matters
If you haven’t seen Frans De Waal’s TED talk on Moral behavior in animals you should. One of the best parts is the Capuchin monkey fairness experiment video, where we see that capuchin monkeys – like people – aren’t rational (in the … Continue reading
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Inside Facebook with Jocelyn Goldfein, FB Engineering Director
A friend pointed me to this frank and insightful talk by Jocelyn Goldfein, Engineering Director at Facebook. In this hour-long interview at Stanford she shares her perspective on engineering culture, and a few stories about how things are done at … Continue reading
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The Signal and the Noise
I recently finished Nate Silver’s The Signal and the Noise, and frankly I’m disappointed. There were surprisingly few insights to be found in the 450-odd pages; I only highlighted two passages – an all-time low – and remarkable as I … Continue reading
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Brendan Sterne 