Paul Dix Explains Nothing

Spending My Summer in SF and at Google

I'm spending my summer working for Google in the Mountain View office! I've decided to live in SF and take the shuttle in to work so I'll be able to enjoy the city on the weekends. I'm super excited and can't wait to meet other Googlers, entrepreneurs, Rubyists, bloggers, and everyone else. Here are a few of the tech/startup things in the bay area I can think of that I would like to do:

• Attend sf.rb meetings and meet all the SF rubyists
• Go to a TechCrunch BBQ
  
• Attend a blogger dinner with Dave Winer
  
• Meet Kevin Burton of Tailrank (just because I think what he's doing is cool)
• Meet the Powerset crew (hopefully this won't be a problem because of my affiliation with Google, but I'm curious what they're up to!)

What other tech/startup things should I be doing? I've been reading about the SF startup scene with envy from either NYC, Denver, Seattle, or Orange County for years. I'm hoping to meet as many interesting people as possible while I'm there. If you're in the area and want to hang out, talk shop, talk about nerdy stuff, or just get a drink, drop me a line!

I'll be in SF from May 20th to August 25th or so.

technorati tags:google, intern, sf, sanfrancisco

Updating My Online Presence and LinkedIn

I spent some time over the weekend and the last week in general updating my online presence.  After letting this site and my presence elsewhere stagnate for the last eight months, I've made a few slight changes and updates.  I switched to a FeedBurner feed (something I should have done a long time ago), set up google analytics, added links on the sidebar to contact me through email or IM, and a link to my LinkedIn profile.  So if anyone should want to get a hold of me, they'll have no reason not to do so.

I still have information and contacts that I need to fill in on my LinkedIn profile, but most of the important information is there.  Interestingly, filling in all my information on LinkedIn and updating my network caused a bunch of people I know to do the same.  About five people in my network went on an update frenzy immediately following mine.

Anyway, if you're bored, drop me a line. If you want to expand your network, connect with me on LinkedIn.

technorati tags:linkedin, personal

I'm back and BarcampNYC is coming!

Well it's been a long time since I've posted!  I had to take time off from both reading and writing blog entries so I could focus in on school.  I finished my first semester at Columbia and it turns out that I'm not as smart as I thought I was!  I actually ended up doing pretty well and now I'm ready to hack on some fun stuff for the next few weeks.

Speaking of fun hacking, BarcampNYC is less than two weeks away!  If you are or will be in the area you should join in on the fun!

technorati tags: barcamp, barcampnyc

In your face Paul Dix!!

I haven't checked in a while so I'm not sure when this happened, but I'm now the number one hit on Google for Paul Dix!  That spot was previously taken by a photographer living in Montana.  He's actually been haunting me for years.  When I was still in high school my brother showed me a photograph cut out of Skiing Magazine that was taken by the very same guy.  Well no more living in his shadow! (at least not as far as Google is concerned)

So, in your face Paul Dix!  Just kidding.  Paul, if you're reading this, I hope that the photography is treating you better than ever.

P.S.  I think I just got this site more Paul Dix cred since I've said it so many times in this post.  lol.

$51,718

That's it.

That's the number I've been focusing on.

It has nothing to do with my entrepreneur dreams.  Instead, it has to do with an even larger venture I'm taking this year.  It's the estimated cost of the next 9 months of school.  That's right, in addition to attempting to launch an ISV, I'm going back to school.  Here's the real kicker.  That figure isn't for the start of an MBA at Wharton or the first year of Harvard Law.  That's the figure for the first year of continuing my undergraduate program.  (If you're interested in my background story, I've posted my entrance essay here.)
To be fair, that figure includes living expenses in NYC and tuition for Columbia.  The estimated figure for tuition and books is around $35,000 per year.  That's still quite a chunk of change.  With all this talk of "Does College Matter?", you may be wondering why I'm doing this.  Is it because I've been laid off?  Actually, I am leaving a great job and with it a number of un-vested stock options which, based on the stock price as of this writing, have actual monetary value.

Yesterday was my last full day.

So does college really matter?  If I stay in the same field (which I plan on doing), an undergraduate degree won't really get me a better job than the one I'm leaving behind.  I'll have a better pedigree to be sure, but it may not matter much for me professionally.  Where college matters for me is personally.  Many people often talk about how much differently they'd do things if they could go back.  How much more they'd get out of the experience.  Well I plan to do those things and get that extra experience.  I don't plan on mimicking Rodney Dangerfield's crazy antics in Back to School.
College will also free me from actual work so I can focus my copious free time on starting up as Paul Graham talks about here.  I realize that my situation isn't exactly what Mr. Graham had in mind, but I can still use it to my advantage.  So while I write about my experiences as a wanna-be ISV there may be some of this life mixed in.

Back from Vacation!

I actually got back Monday/Tuesday but I've been inundated with stuff as I try to get back into the swing of things.  The Monday/Tuesday thing is due to a little travel problem that occurred which I should get around to posting about later this week.  In the meantime, I just wanted to mention how overwhelmed I feel.  I was almost entirely disconnected for the 11 days I was gone and now I find that there's a ton of reading I'm behind on.  My RSS reader is jam packed with interesting things I need to read, I have work to do, and I have a ton of little life maintenance things that require my attention.  Even though this is the longest I've been offline in a number of years, I can't help but think that this time I have exponentially more to catch up on than any time before.  I guess paying attention to the blogging community takes more time than I thought.

Vacation!

Today marks my first day of vacation!  I'm getting ready to hop a plane and spend some time hanging out in Portland, Seattle, and the Oregon coast.  I'll probably check out Haystack Rock while I'm on the coast (remember The Goonies?).  While I'm in Seattle I'm hoping to get a chance to go to Dixie's BBQ to get a dose of "The Man".  It's the hottest sauce I've ever tasted and now that my mouth has had five years to recover, I'm ready to have another go.

Posts will probably be slow or not at all for the next week and a half.  Have fun, I know I will!