A Qik legacy

This was one of those fun but tricky things that I loved working on at Qik: Check out the new homepage, which features a brief but cute stop-animation video that I co-wrote with Min and Audrey. The real stars of this video, though, are Min and Audrey’s painstakingly created stop action animation and my super friend James’s great voiceover. See the kind of talent I got to work with every day? Those two pulled many all-nighters to produce this video. I mostly bossed James around and inserted vaguely insulting shout-outs to the likes of Lauren.

It’s cool to see stuff we labored over during my tenure go live – there’s more to come, and I think people are going to be very pleased as new creations and improvements appear. I’ll say no more for now…

Sheryl Gascoigne: It’s time to drop Gazza. For real.

Sheryl Gascoigne’s new book about being married to and abused by former England football star Paul Gascoigne, and the revelations she’s trotting out to sell it, leave me cold. I’m not someone who’s unsympathetic to those who have been abused – quite the contrary. But if you’re describing what a jerk someone is, and all of their bad qualities, you just look like a jerk for ever associating yourself with him. You have to detail any good qualities he may have had, even if you have to wrack your brain (“He told great jokes!”). You have to talk about which flaws of your own led to you being attracted to such an a-hole, and what lies you told yourself in order to stay with him for as long as you did. It does take two.

I don’t know if Sheryl’s book goes into any of this, but it is very dodgy that Gazza’s name is in the subtitle of her book. If you really want someone out of your life, you don’t take his phone calls or do TV shows about him or write books about him. You don’t want to be tied to him in people’s minds in any way, and you hope desperately that people forget you ever had anything to do with him. You don’t even talk about him to your friends, and if his name comes up, you change the subject or walk away. You simply erase him from your life and move on. Sheryl Gascoigne has gone in the opposite direction. She can tell herself that she’s doing this to help victims of abuse – and goodness knows I hope it does – but the impression I get is that she’s just as wrapped up in her sick relationship with Gazza as she ever was.

On forgiveness

This Guardian piece is worth reading (though the attempt to apply this thinking to nation states is really inappropriate). They took hundreds of words to say something I’ve heard time and time again from friends of mine:

Holding a grudge is like taking poison and waiting for the other guy to die.

You don’t have to like the person or ever speak to them again, but you hurt no one but yourself by holding on to old wrongs. Let it go and make room for goodness to flow into that space. (Another gem I’ve often overheard: Do you charge those bastards rent for all the room they take up in your life?)

Quote of the day

When you have a problem, if you tell the truth, the problem becomes part of your past. If you lie, it becomes part of your future.

-Rick Pitino, who should know

“We are entering Web 3.0. Here’s a hint: It’s regulated.”

That’s a quote from Dave Johnston, and I could not agree more. What scary times we live in. From Techdirt:

You shouldn’t have to confer with your lawyers to figure out how you mention any particular product, just because you got a freebie or a sample somewhere.

And, what’s really scary? It appears that even the FTC isn’t sure what the policy actually means, and hasn’t thought through any of the unintended consequences or fuzzy borders.

Do any of you feel safer because the government is pushing through laws about bloggers getting freebies?

Why don’t they run?

Alice Bachini-Smith on why victims of abuse often don’t run away:

Clearly, different people respond to abuse in different ways, and we don’t really know what makes that difference. But when the victim is broken, feels unable to get away, even when they have the mobility to be able to do so, I think maybe the term we need is something like “brainwashing”…It’s also something that often happens in the “normal” kind of abusive relationships between adults: the victim is gradually acclimatised to being attacked, in a way that undermines her sense of self, and her ability to act independently. She commits a kind of emotional suicide- more reversible than the physical kind, but a surrender to evil that destroys the sense of self in return for that survival.

Power is a complex thing. It’s nice to think we have it inside ourselves, like a kind of permanent spiritual wellspring, but how many of us really believe that? Lucky people grow up with a sense of themselves that is confident, cheerful and optimistic. The rest of us have to get out there and find it, somehow.

Beautifully put.

I’d also add: Sometimes, it is a calculated risk one takes to stay, especially for children. Kids can discount emotional abuse – they may know, deep down, that the way they are treated is not right, but they really can’t grasp the extent of the damage it is doing to them. Also, the traumatized child cannot conceive of the possibility that the ones who created them and are supposed to love them could do these bad things to them unless they had been provoked by the child. The parents often tell them this outright, and children do believe it on some level. Even if there are other adults in their life whom they could trust enough to tell what is happening, there is the sense that a) it’s not that bad (if you’re used to it, it becomes routine), b) if you wait it out, you’ll be away from them soon enough anyway, and c) if you cause a fuss in the meantime, everybody is going to be mad at you.

As far as adult relationships go, often abuse masquerades as passion. Popular culture doesn’t help dampen such thinking. I have seen relationships where one of the partners is outrageously destructive and undermining, but does other things which the victim and perpetrator both believe offset the abuse. (For example, she may speak to you like you’re a dog, but she’s got supermodel good looks, cooks you wonderful meals, and always cheers you on at your basketball games in a way that makes your teammates wonder how you got so lucky. He may lie through his teeth and cheat on you, but he buys you expensive cars and jewelery that drive your friends crazy with envy.) The problem then in an adult abusive relationship is that it has to get bad enough for the victim to leave. Sadly, many people have a very high tolerance for pain.

Jeff Nolan: A rational voice in environmental policy

After every single conversation we have about the topic (and there have been a lot), I pester my friend Jeff Nolan to write more about clean tech and environmental policy. Jeff is someone who grows his own fruit and vegetables, sources meat and produce locally where it makes sense, and has put a lot into making his own home energy efficient. (Ask his wife about the time he raised chickens in their backyard.) He also knows environmental policy inside out – not just in the US, but on a global scale. He’s a free marketeer who understands all too well the unintended consequences of some of these policies, and how “sustainable” often isn’t. In his words:

While I am an enthusiastic supporter of renewable energy development, conservation technology, and energy storage, I just can’t get on the bandwagon with those advocating that we do this at any cost.
A sustainable energy proposal that bankrupts an economy is by definition itself unsustainable…We have already seen what happens when food crops are diverted to fuel crops and when government subsidies sustain and otherwise unsustainable approach, and this should cause us all pause as it relates to large scale energy investments. We simply cannot take the approach of “well this seems like a good idea so let’s do it”.

So I’m thrilled that Om Malik has nabbed Jeff to pen the Cleantech Counterpoint column for his Earth2Tech blog. What a win for the GigaOm network, and for people who want to know the realities of environmental policy. Jeff’s first contribution, on why Spain isn’t the role model for renewable energy that a lot of people think it is, is great stuff. Expect more where that came from.

Never say goodbye

Tonight the Qik team threw for me what I choose to call a farewell-but-not-goodbye dinner. After the best working experience of my life, with the greatest team with whom I may ever work, it’s time for me to move on to new adventures.

I have decided to relocate full-time to New York, which has been pulling me eastward for many months (well, more like 27+ years). Leaving Qik is difficult, as I truly consider the team better than family. More than that, the product is so groundbreaking and fun that my work was a blast. It wasn’t a job, though – it was a mission: one I lived and breathed with immense joy, total enthusiasm, and a hell of a lot of Diet Coke.

Bhaskar, Rishi, and the rest of the gang made 2008 and 2009 the most amazing time of growth and learning for me. I’ll always be Qik’s most avid cheerleader, and will be watching closely as the team continues to innovate and thrive.

Guys, I can’t thank you enough for the memories and knowledge I’m taking with me to the east coast. Please remember to SLEEP and eat more than a few handfuls of trail mix between meetings. And not to worry: I promise to downplay your shocking tequila consumption in my book. [insert wink smiley here]

Becoming

This is a theme that has always fascinated me, and probably always will. Hugh MacLeod wrote recently of becoming the person he was born to be. Today, on the closure of Gourmet magazine, my friend Nancy Rommelmann writes on becoming the person she dreamed of being:

I started subscribing to the magazine at age 12, thinking it so beautiful, so sophisticated; all these articles and beautiful photos from places like Gstaad and Vienna. It wasn’t that I dreamed of going to these places, but of being the sort of person who went to these places. In the meantime, I baked from the magazine’s recipes. Yes, at age 12, I was making a 12-layer Dobosh Torte.

I kept my subscription for 20 years, keeping years worth of the magazines shelved in the guest bathroom of the very first home my daughter and I lived in alone. I thought it a beautiful touch. A year later, I was contacted by Bon Appetit, to begin writing for them. They sent me on ski trips and cruises; I ate in cities all over, swam in three seas, for articles with beautiful photos. I had become that person I dreamed of, which astounded me.

I could add a lot to this, but I like what Nancy has written, so will refrain for now. (I would just add that the person she is, well, I love her.)

Stella McCartney: This is not a parody

Lunchtime in a fashionable cafe in west London, and a sleek young woman in an expensive ivory silk blouse and deftly cut black jacket smiles and asks the waitress what the soup of the day is. “Pea and ham,” comes the reply. The customer’s smile fades. Stella McCartney leans her head to one side and narrows her wide, grey-green eyes. “Why do you have to put the ham in it?” she demands, her voice cool and low but fractionally louder than it was a moment ago. The waitress, landed with the thankless task of defending pea and ham soup to one of Britain’s most outspoken vegetarians, can only shrug and look mortified.

The journalist notes how many times during the interview that McCartney proclaims “I’m not perfect.” In my experience, people who often use the phrase “I’m not perfect” actually feel they’re quite close to it. (Related annoyance: People who say, “I wasn’t the best [spouse/friend/parent/employee/employer]” instead of saying the truth, which is that they were rather terrible. It’s not repentance if you don’t think you’ve anything to be sorry for.)