Simon Willison's Weblog: technology

Work process vs technology

2017-03-01T05:25:00+00:00

My answer to Work process vs technology on Ask MetaFilter

Do you have a plan for what happens if you lose your hard drive, or someone steals it? I understand your need for offline access, but personally I'm terrified of losing my laptop to the point that I use cloud backup services (Dropbox, but I've used and liked Backblaze in the past) to make absolutely sure that I don't lose any data should my laptop get lost or stolen.

Tags: ask-metafilter, design, microsoft, technology, secure

What's an idea worth?

2013-07-29T14:02:00+00:00

My answer to What's an idea worth? on Quora

I like Derek Siver's model proposed here: http://sivers.org/multiply

To make a business, you need to multiply an idea by its execution. A really great idea is worth $20.

No execution is worth $1. So if your idea is truly great it's worth 20 x 1 = $20.

If you can pull off just a good execution ($100,000) then congratulations, you have a combination worth $2,000,000.

Tags: business, entrepreneurship, funding, ideas, startups, technology, quora

What tech conferences will be taking place in Seattle the summer of 2013?

2013-06-03T18:00:00+00:00

My answer to What tech conferences will be taking place in Seattle the summer of 2013? on Quora

We have a list of upcoming (mostly tech) professional events and conferences in Seattle here: Conferences in Seattle | Conferences & Events | Lanyrd

You can subscribe to iCal or RSS feeds of that page to stay up to date with new events.

Tags: conferences, events, software-engineering, technology, quora, conference

What should tech conferences, events and planners do to add diversity?

2013-06-01T10:17:00+00:00

My answer to What should tech conferences, events and planners do to add diversity? on Quora

JSConf did something very clever that helped them get 25% female speakers last year: Beating the Odds - How We got 25% Women Speakers for JSConf EU 2012

Their trick was to run an anonymous call for proposals, and then have a separate team go out and actively encourage people from under-represented groups to submit talks, and coach them to help them put together a great submission.

Read their article: it was a really successful strategy.

Tags: call-for-proposals, conferences, events, technology, quora, conference, diversity

Which web startup conferences are there nowadays?

2012-12-04T18:01:00+00:00

My answer to Which web startup conferences are there nowadays? on Quora

We have a pretty comprehensive list on Lanyrd - the site works like wikipedia, so if there are any we are missing you can sign in and add them to our Startups topic: Startup conferences and events

Tags: conferences, internet, technology, quora

What are some major tech conferences that offer student fellowships/discounts?

2012-10-14T14:12:00+00:00

My answer to What are some major tech conferences that offer student fellowships/discounts? on Quora

Many conferences will give you a %100 discount if you offer to help out on the day of the event - it's always worth asking, especially if you have built up a reputation as a reliable event volunteer.

Tags: conferences, technology, quora

Which are the big Tech and Social Media events coming up from September onward (USA & Europe)?

2012-09-19T11:52:00+00:00

My answer to Which are the big Tech and Social Media events coming up from September onward (USA & Europe)? on Quora

Our site http://lanyrd.com/ is a good bet for answering this type of question. We operate a wikipedia-style index of professional events and conferences, a large portion of which are tech/social media related.

In addition to the event details, we also list the speakers and any attendees who have told us they are going. If you sign in to the site with Twitter we'll look at who you are following and show you events those people are attending or speaking at.

You can browse the site by location, for example:

http://lanyrd.com/places/europe/ - events in Europe (1,100 upcoming events at the moment)
http://lanyrd.com/places/usa/ - 680 upcoming events in the USA
http://lanyrd.com/places/london/ - 305 upcoming events in London

Or you can browse by topic:

http://lanyrd.com/topics/social-... - 72 upcoming social media events
http://lanyrd.com/topics/mobile/ - 80 upcoming mobile conferences

Or you can combine the two...

http://lanyrd.com/topics/social-... - 33 upcoming social media events in the USA

If you're interested in a particular speaker, you can see all of the events they will be speaking at in the future (and see talks they've given in the past):

http://lanyrd.com/profile/scoble... - Robert Scoble's profile

Finally, you can sign in to the site and "track" individual topics - or topics restricted by area - to get email recommendations of new events when they are added to the site. We'll also email you new events that your Twitter contacts are attending.

Hope this is helpful!

Tags: social-media, technology, quora

What are good 2012 Technology Conferences in US for Programmers?

2011-12-08T11:34:00+00:00

My answer to What are good 2012 Technology Conferences in US for Programmers? on Quora

It would help if you were more specific about the kind of programmer you are - there's a big difference between C++ game developer conferences, Ruby on Rails events, Agile methodology conventions etc. Each developer ecosystem has its own flagship events (for Microsoft developers it's the BUILD conference, which hasn't been announced for 2012 yet - for iPhone/Mac developers it's Apple's WWDC, Oracle have Oracle OpenWorld, the Rails community has RailsConf, for Django people it's DjangoCon US and EU, etc).

Our site Lanyrd is an attempt to catalog all of the conferences and events happening around the world. If you sign in with Twitter we'll show you events your Twitter contacts are attending or speaking at, but you can also browse the site by topic. Here are a few pages that you may find relevant, depending on the kind of programming you do:

Mobile: http://lanyrd.com/topics/mobile/
HTML5: http://lanyrd.com/topics/html5-1/
Agile: http://lanyrd.com/topics/agile/
Open Source: http://lanyrd.com/topics/open-so...
Java: http://lanyrd.com/topics/java/
Ruby: http://lanyrd.com/topics/ruby/
PHP: http://lanyrd.com/topics/php/
Python: http://lanyrd.com/topics/python/
Web Development: http://lanyrd.com/topics/web-dev...

I hope that's useful. Let me know if there are any more specific categories of events you'd like tips on.

Tags: conferences, programmers, programming, technology, quora

What tech conferences are upcoming in San Francisco?

2011-06-27T16:28:00+00:00

My answer to What tech conferences are upcoming in San Francisco? on Quora

We have a pretty good list here: http://lanyrd.com/places/san-fra...

Tags: conferences, san-francisco, technology, quora

Are any major tech conferences held in San Francisco in August or early September?

2011-06-19T18:16:00+00:00

My answer to Are any major tech conferences held in San Francisco in August or early September? on Quora

Dreamforce (the Salesforce/Cloud computing conference) is pretty huge - 30th August to 2nd September: http://www.salesforce.com/dreamf...

We have a full list of (mostly tech) events here: http://lanyrd.com/places/san-fra...

Tags: conferences, san-francisco, technology, quora, sanfranciscobayarea

What are the underlying, unspoken values of TED?

2010-12-07T16:50:00+00:00

My answer to What are the underlying, unspoken values of TED? on Quora

Not unspoken, but the ten commandments they send out to their speakers are pretty interesting: http://www.ted.com/pages/360

Tags: design, ideas, technology, quora, ted

What company had the first API?

2010-10-11T15:27:00+00:00

My answer to What company had the first API? on Quora

They weren't the first to have an API, but Flickr were the first consumer web site that really pushed the concept in my opinion. They originally promoted it as "you can always get your data back if you want to", but they then greatly benefited from the ecosystem that grew up around it.

Tags: apis, flickr, programming, technology, quora, computers

Aside from Disrupt, what other tech conferences do you track?

2010-10-02T13:25:00+00:00

My answer to Aside from Disrupt, what other tech conferences do you track? on Quora

Self promoting here (not sure if that's OK by Quora community standards or not), but the site we just launched, Lanyrd.com, answers this question. It lets you sign in with Twitter and see what events your Twitter friends are tracking, attending or speaking at. It also lets you create a conference profile page - here's mine, which shows the upcoming conferences I am tracking at the moment: http://lanyrd.com/people/simonw/

Tags: conferences, technology, quora

Perl on Rails - Why the BBC Fails at the Internet

2007-12-03T09:43:36+00:00

Perl on Rails - Why the BBC Fails at the Internet

Depressing explanation of how the BBC’s decision to outsource its technical infrastructure to Siemens has resulted in severe technology limitations, including the need for everything to run on Perl 5.6 (5.8 came out in 2002).

Tags: bbc, perl, siemens, technology