Cameesa - The Blog

Be forewarned that this is a reflection of my past 3 years working at Bank of America; sadly, all good things come to an end.

It all started on November 14, 2005. I was a young, inexperienced programmer finishing my Computer Science Master’s at The University of Chicago. Brien, Karen, and Zo gave me a chance to showcase my ultimate programming skillz. I had no idea what I was getting into, but I knew that there was something special about these people. In the end, my intuition was right, these people were awesome.

Brien and Karen taught me that it is possible to be close friends with your managers, and still maintain a healthy and professional relationship. This lesson was solidified when Karen, Brien, Suneet and I spent an entire day hanging out : watching the Cubs, eating at Tango Sur, chillin’ at Moe’s Cantina and laughing endlessly.

With laughter there always came business, and with business came Mr. Business Time, Taylor (aka T-Raack). Taylor, a Northwestern graduate, was my partner in crime…..programming crime that is. He actually taught me everything I needed to know about programming and, to this day, he is still the smartest and sharpest programmer that I have ever worked with. Sorry ladies…he’s not single any more

In the workplace, I met a UFC fighter, Tom, who happened to have a strange love for peanut butter, the Russian language, and monkeys. His attitude taught me to be happy no matter what life handed me. Next, there was Suneet and Lindsay who were both natural Providers, and had an endless caring for others. Lindsay was famously known for decorating people’s cubes on their birthdays, but when it came to her own birthday, she did not want to make it a big deal. Moreover, Suneet, organized Bank of America’s first basketball league, of which more than 100 employees participated, and then setup a volunteering program for the kids. Suneet also had a freakish memory by remembering significant names/events in everyone’s lives, not to mention a hilarious giggle. With giggles there was always wit…this is where sarcastic Scott came in, he was a witty individual that wrote depressing music, and was calm no matter which situation he was in. If you wanted to get back to a happy mood from Scott’s music, all you had to was call Darrin Tracy. “The Darrin” was famously known for his Slam Dunk video and for partying like it was 1999. Finally, there was Whitney who taught me a ton about Unix Systems, solving problems, and technology as a whole. And how could I forget Zo. Zo taught me that things are always comical, no matter what. If we weren’t talking about programming, then we were talking about something that no one in the world would think of…(ie. The Bristol Chart). Zo had a way to bring up questions and topics that no one could ever imagine.

“Jak sie masz? My name-a Borat. I like you. Do you like me?” was heard non-stop throughout our cubicles as Yury and I would fall back in our chairs. We met Borat from the Ali G show and spent half of our Christmas vacation watching it. Yury was a master negotiator who could sell a ketchup popsicle to a lady in white gloves. “Very nice, I like.”

My business partners were in North Carolina, and I wish I could have seen them more often. I will never forget my trip to Charlotte, where we spent majority of our lunches together, and then hung out after work……EVERY DAY. They were thoughtful and gave me recognition for everything I did, sometimes even for work that I didn’t do. Allison, Alison, James and Sara, thank you for being open and honest communicators. Sara, thanks for making fun of James and James, thanks for always ripping on Sara.

Believe it or not, I actually learned a lot at work. Magenta Magenta helped me find myself, and my true strengths. Wyatt Sutherland taught me about Agile Programming, and Michael Menary taught me to always give people their space.

As we have all know, the people make your job interesting and fun. From Qarlympics, to building a cardboard castle around Yury’s desk, to Congratulating Suneet on his weddingto Darrin’s birthday party, to Bryan Chavez eating 30 butter packets for $30, to Fat Fridays…..we ALWAYS had fun.

These are the things that i will miss most. I will miss you all and I thank you for making my last three years so memorable.

As some may know, Ali Gowani will be taking over my job as the Lead of the Corporate Research Library. I foresee him to be more successful than me because he is smarter :). Ali is a great programmer with an eager thirst for knowledge. He asks great questions and is an extremely quick learner. Ali taught me that the best way to learn something is by teaching someone else.

So………August 29th, 2008, is my last day working at Bank of America. I will be joining Andrew Cronk on the Cameesa Full-Time Squad on September 2nd, 2008, and am extremely excited for what is about to come with Cameesa. We are going to work very closely to provide you with the best T shirt Crowdfunding Platform EVER. Feedback is always welcome.

Some interesting illustrations from Vasco Mourao.

Although the Democratic National Convention has made Denver a wild place the past few days, I am most excited for tomorrow night. Wednesday the 27th, Rage Against the Machine will be playing next door to the DNC. On one side of the street you have who could be the future President of the United States, and on the other, a powerful band willing to stand up to and question authority at all costs.

While I was ironing my new super fly Cameesa T and thinking about tomorrow I made an interesting connection: I think Rage would like Cameesa. Here are a few reasons:

1. No presence of “The Man.” Cameesa cuts out the buyer, who supposedly knows the tastes of the buyers, and replaces them with the actual market. Cameesa’s community decides what is printed and sold. There is no controlling authority.

2. Cameesa is run by its community, not a money-hungry CEO. By supporting a design, a community member is directing Cameesa’s activities. Cameesa prints what its community demands. Without Artists submitting high quality designs and the Community making them a reality, there is no Cameesa.

3. Fair revenue distribution. Before Cameesa makes a cent for its production efforts, the Artist and Supporters earn on every T-shirt sold.

4. American Apparel T-shirts. High quality Ts made in Los Angeles by insurance-holding, fairly-paid workers in healthy working conditions. Learn more about them here

I am not suggesting that Cameesa likes Rage (but we do), but these characteristics help define Cameesa. I believe that these principles can be respected by individuals around the world. Who knows, maybe Morello will be wearing “Take Me to Your Reader” at the Republican National Convention next week.

When studying successful entrepreneurs I always come across a recurring theme. I am probably very receptive to theme because I sincerely believe in it, therefore I may possess a bit of selective attention. The theme is create something you are passionate about. Randy Komisar, a venture capitalist at Kleiner Perkins, in his book “The Monk and The Riddle” puts it best:

“Passion pulls you to something you cannot resist. Drive pushes you toward something you feel compelled or obligated to do. If you know nothing about yourself, you can’t tell the difference. Once you gain a modicum of self-knowledge, you can express your passion”

The problem is people usually work on something for some end goal. Once the end goal is achieved then they’ll do what they want. Randy gives this problem a name, “The Deferred Life Plan”. I have to do something really unsatisfying first so I can make the money to do what I really want. If you’re going to put in all the hard work and time why not devote it to something you give a damn about? If things don’t go as planned at the very least the time will not have been wasted.

Andrew Lockhart of Thinking Interactive introduced me to Jessica Hagy’s blog Indexed. Jessica refers to Indexed as her project that let’s her make fun of things while making sense of others. As she puts it, “I use it to think a little more relationally without resorting to doing actual math.”

Anyhow, I always have a good laugh every time I see a new index card. One index card I especially liked was “This is what 2.0 means”.

I subscribe to Google Alerts for the terms crowdfund, crowdfunded, and crowdfunding, among other things. The other morning when I awoke I was alerted to an article on crowdfunding from the Sydney Morning Herald.

I checked it out, and noticed a few familiar names on the crowdfunding scene: Sellaband and MyFootballClub. But there were two other companies that I had never heard of: Catwalk Genius and BeerBankRoll. After poking around a bit, it appears that Catwalk Genius plans to use crowdfunding to sponsor fashion designers. A noble cause, but I didn’t learn much more since their website is not currently functional.

The other company, BeerBankRoll is much further developed, and aspires to be a crowdfunded brewery. They have received a fair amount of press around the web, and appear to be steadily signing up people who believe in the idea. As I lurked around the nether regions of the site, I noticed that they are actually located in a suburb of Chicago!

It’s rare to find crowdfunding companies, but even more rare to find one in your own back yard. It was encouraging for me to see that crowdfunding is starting to proliferate in the United States. Hopefully we can catch up to our UK/European brethren soon. I feel like the biggest challenge is education on the concept. Once people grasp the premise they start to feel comfortable with participating.

You ever curious who is blogging about you, or your company? Well, here is Gooooogle Alerts. In Google’s words, “Google Alerts are email updates of the latest relevant Google results.”

How have I used Google Alerts? Well, I told Google to e-mail me every time it comes across the word ‘cameesa.’ Get it? So, I get an e-mail every time Google indexes the word ‘cameesa’.

Check out Google Alerts here.

My friend Charles was browsing around the flashy new website for the Samsung Instinct phone when he stumbled upon this gem. Apparently Samsung forgot that QWERTY keyboards start with the letters Q, W, E, R, T, and Y.

They spent all this money to get the crazy flash interface and overlooked the basics. How could something like this have slipped through the cracks?

To see for yourself:

• Go to http://samsunginstinct.com
• Skip the Intro, and click on Touch at the botto
• Click on Explore Touch next to the phone

I would just give you a direct link, but they chose to develop an all flash site, making it impossible. Let’s hope that we never do something like this with Cameesa. If we do, you have my permission to flame me for it.

Congratulations goes out to Jon Turner aka vonmonkey for being the first Cameesa Artist to become 100% Supported by the community. I’m glad it made it through because I really want to wear it. A big thanks also goes out to all the Supporters.

It was popular and caused waves in the community when initially uploaded. This weekend it heated up, quickly reaching the 100% mark.

I like Jon’s background on the piece:

From The Times, July 14th 1892: “Oxford: The academic community remains abuzz with gossip after the disappearance of young Jeremiah Mugglestone, MA (Oxon.), lexicographer, last seen on Saturday morning. Mr. Mugglestone, the youngest fellow of Balliol, whom Jowett described as being possessed of ‘the finest mind in the Empire’, had reportedly been in a disturbed state for several days.
“Colleagues state that he had become obsessed with the notion of ‘beings from another world’, and claimed to have discovered an ‘alien’ code hidden within the text of a pocket edition of Dr. Johnson’s Dictionary. A close friend, Dr. Cadmus Bodway, puts Mugglestone’s behaviour down to ‘a suspected case of library fever’; nevertheless there have been no sightings of the scholar, while his distinctive bowler hat and personal copy of the aforementioned dictionary have been found abandoned amid a scorched patch of grass in the South Parks. A mystery indeed”

I wrote a blog post a while back on Si Scott. I love his work and wondered what it would look like on a T-Shirt. Now I know as a Threadless select shirt is available, True Love Will Find You In The End.