actually i do yahoo, thanks for asking

so i’m sure some of you have heard the rumor by now, and yes it is true. i’ve accepted a position at Yahoo! in San Francisco. i’m stoked, even though it means moving even farther away from family and friends. :[ i’m shedding the corporate software yoke that i’ve been wearing ever since my first job, and now have the chance to make something that you might actually use!

the story behind my switch is pretty simple, really.  remember this post?  well less than a week after i wrote that, my consulting company was bought out by an even bigger consulting company.  Where our original focus was all about custom application development, the new boss is all about selling new buzzword-compliant solutions to companies.  that shift of focus caused me to question if i’d accept a job there if i was actively looking. (the answer was no)  and the whole acquisition process reminded me how unfulfilling making business software was.  kinda like the straw that broke the camel’s back, you know?  so i set out to search for not only a new job, but one that was centered around making software for people, not businesses.  since Houston is oil-and-gas headquarters (and a cool opportunity in Dallas didn’t pan out), i looked west.  and i liked what i saw. :]

now normally a job for the big Y would mean Sunnyvale, deep in Silicon Valley. but my position is actually based out of the city itself. i’m going to be joining the Advanced Products Team; we are responsible for designing and developing Yahoo!’s future products. (alongside Brickhouse, another internal Yahoo! innovation team) it is comparable to a startup within Yahoo!.  we come up with ideas for new applications, get them out there as quick as we can, and judge the response.  except in a startup if your product is a flop you go bankrupt; we’ll just learn and try something different.

i was worried that my interview would be torture, but it was quite pleasant actually. everybody i talked with was cool and so much smarter than me, it was actually comforting. it lasted about 5 hours though, and my throat was dry as a bone afterwards from talking all day. (keith, talk alot? never!) lots of discussion about my opinions on how and why software should be made, with a few rounds of technical drilling to make sure i had the chops for it. (i confess; i practiced reversing a string and binary searching in the flight over there just in case, but luckily the technical questions were more difficult than that :P) i just hope that i can meet the hype.  my official title will be “Technical Yahoo”, although i’m sure most people that know me would already use that phrase to describe me.

so the next month should prove to be pretty interesting. finishing up my current gig, moving to SF, and trying to find an apartment somewhere where we won’t have to worry about getting accosted by crazy people looking for change.  if you have any hookups that you could swing my way, including people you know who live there or an awesome apartment available for rent, let me know!  and somewhere in all that, terri and i will be in BR/NO from 5/13 - 5/22. i’ve heard rumors of a party that i may have to crash :]

and you know the best part? Yahoo!’s color scheme is purple and gold.  i think i’ll fit in no problem. :]

here are some snaps from when i was there for my interview.