For Free (Ode to Open Source)

I don't know why I'm so tempted to write stuff like this. Apologies to Joni Mitchell.

I slept last night in Los Altos Hills
I went shopping today for Treos
The GIFs brightly beamed on my hand-held's screen
While I checked in upon my Keoghs
I was sitting in a quiet corner
Sniffing at my latte steam
In the Starbucks he sat
And coded like that
On his own laptop for free

Now me I hack for options
And that fancy in-house lunch
I've got a new M5
And a company masseuse
To work-out my shoulder's hunch
I hack if you have the money
Or if you're a top VC
But that unkempt guy
Didn't sell, didn't buy
He was coding real good for free

Nobody stopped to watch him
Though he coded clean and tight
They knew he would never make
Stuff for their PC
So they ignored his download site
I meant to go over and sell him some tools
Maybe make him my licensee
I watched, feeling foolish
As my venti got coolish
He was coding real good for free

Zork on my cellphone

(Don't) Hear the music

Long drive today, the traffic made terrible by the spring rains and the end of spring break. Stopped into Starbucks to get caffeine, and surprised myself by buying a Joni Mitchell CD; her so young and winsome on the cover. How did I forget how much I liked her lyrics? It made me think of my commuter marriage:

Oh you are in my blood like holy wine
And you taste so bitter but you taste so sweet
Oh I could drink a case of you
I could drink a case of you darling
Still I'd be on my feet
I'd still be on my feet

And it made me think of the life I've just given away for an interesting job:

I was a free man in Paris
I felt unfettered and alive
There was nobody calling me up for favors
And no one's future to decide
You know I'd go back there tomorrow
But for the work I've taken on
Stoking the star maker machinery
Behind the popular song

On second thought, I probably should have listened to George Thorogood & The Destroyers — better to be bad to the bone than maudlin.

VC-funded Startups (a song written by me)

OK, I haven't posted in a while. OK, for a month. But I've been busy. Came out of retirement to a job (and maybe to a PhD program). More on those topics later, maybe.

On the job I've been meeting with all sorts of entrepreneurial types; people who have started companies, people who want to start companies, people who want to know people who want to start companies. [They're the luckiest people in the world.] When I'm with the old hands we reminisce about the startups, good and bad, that we've been in. Talking about the bad ones makes for way better war stories.

All this talk about bad companies reminded me that I've had a song working it's way out of my subconscious for many years now. To be sung to the tune of Tom Lehrer's National Brotherhood Week:

Oh, developers hate the testers
And the testers hate developers
To hate all your coworkers
Is a standard management tool

But in a VC-funded startup
VC-funded startup
PhDs and MBAs
Don't cross each other up
It's fun to use the guys
Who do stuff you despise
As long as you are sure you got more stock

Oh, the ops guys hate the apps guys
And the apps guys hate the ops guys
The new CEO hates the wise guy
Who happens to be the founder

But in a VC-funded startup
VC-funded startup
Everyone can get along if
We don't f**k it up
Who cares which products won't
As long investors don't
Howjya think the tall blond made his mint

Oh, the customers hate the sales force
And the sales force hates the customers
And the management hates the chairman
And everybody hates marketing

But in a VC-funded startup
VC-funded startup
Get big or go home, that the way
No prize for runner-up
Why should you get along,
With people who are wrong?
Who cares your stupid job is getting old --
You only have to wait until we're sold!

They have a word for it

Recondite readers will find it useful to know that Department of Homeland Security renders to German as Ministeriums für Heimatsicherheit.

Sounds so much better.