Jolly Fund
I was about to graduate.
About to start a job building an app.
One of my professors asked,
“Gonna spend your life making buttons?”
I was about to graduate.
About to start a job building an app.
One of my professors asked,
“Gonna spend your life making buttons?”
Now that I’m free from the button factory,
What should I do in this world?
What am I interested in?
What am I good at?
What can I do to help?
Looking through old notebooks.
Reading things I wrote while drunk.
Essays about how money is silly.
Always in cursive for fun.
I wrote very confidently,
All people should get the basics.
Just give everybody money.
We should all be able to afford life.
Too much imbalance in this world.
We talk about universal basic income,
But people just argue about it.
Can we do something about it?
Should we?
One of the many problems,
Where’s the money?
Some people say taxes,
But that’s a steep hill.
What if we just donate it?
Tax-deductible donations.
Split amongst anyone who signs up.
Free money.
Provided by those who care.
If we’re generous, we benefit.
Can we just do that?
Is that legal?
Can we start a Jolly Fund?
AI Do Everything
AI is a paradigm shift, but at the moment it can’t do much.
Can we teach it to do more?
Here’s a little peak at a prototype.
Even the best apps are buggy.
They crash. They fail. They lose your data.
If they do too much, they’re confusing.
If they do too little, they’re useless.
Sometimes an app is almost perfect.
It almost does what you want, but not exactly.
So you move on.
You try another app.
And yet we keep making new apps.
Every bank has an app.
Every streaming service. Every restaurant.
Even your toaster has an app.
All these apps do the same thing.
They just use different colors.
They show you things.
They save things for later.
They let you press buttons.
They do stuff for you.
But maybe we don’t need all these apps.
Why not ask AI?
AI can show you things.
AI can save things for later.
AI can let you press buttons.
AI can do things for you.
For example, want to pay a friend?
Ask AI.
Want to be a better friend?
Ask AI.
But that’s a bit tedious.
You can’t be bothered to ask AI every time.
What if you just want a button?
Ask AI.
But what if you forget to press the button?
What if you’re too lazy?
You guessed it.
Ask AI.
But how can you trust the AI?
What if it doesn’t understand?
What if it’s not consistent?
What if you need more control?
Want to see the magic behind the curtain?
The AI isn’t special.
It’s just coding on your behalf.
What if you could code too?
What if you could access the world?
What would you do?
Joy Deficiency
Why can’t you just be more jolly?
It’s only the flip of a switch.
Turn off the view of the sadness inside,
And give us a smile, you lil’ bitch.
Why can’t you just be more jolly?
It’s only the flip of a switch.
Turn off the view of the sadness inside,
And give us a smile, you lil’ bitch.
You tell me you’re all about parties and fun,
Or that’s what your followers say.
But they only see a percent of your life,
And the rest is all boring and gray.
Not that my life is anything better,
You’re right, I’m a hypocrite.
But why do you need to prove that you’re happy
To people who don’t give a shit?
What do you want? Fame? Respect?
Sex, drugs, money, and power?
A like and a half won’t give any of that,
So just drain all those thoughts in the shower.
The singers, the leaders, the names in the stars,
They all live a meaningless life.
Just because they got a jawline and abs
Don’t mean you should go under the knife.
They look very happy, and maybe they are,
But that doesn’t mean less for you.
Their happiness doesn’t subtract from your own.
They can be red, and you blue.
You’re wonderfully perfect, you know that you are.
To change anything would be weird.
Just be yourself, the one that you love,
And ignore those who won’t give a cheer.
Life is hard enough for us now
Without you making a mess.
Just calm on down, erase that frown,
And let jolly take care of the rest.
After all, maybe you’ll never be rich,
You may never have muscles or cash.
And if that’s true, you can still be jolly,
Just don’t be a pain in the ass.
Farewell Ode to Apple
Ten years ago, I snuck in the back door at Apple.
Ten years ago, I snuck in the back door at Apple.
New grad on a product about to be cancelled.
My team was repurposed to work on Notes.
I was a lucky kid.
Notes manager asks, “Who wants to build sync?”
Having never synced a byte in my life, I raised my hand.
Whether due to trust or desperation, I got the job.
A billion sync bugs later, I still had it.
Eventually I managed the Notes team.
I wore button ups then, but they’re a pain to wash.
Things were going well, but my bucket list screamed at me.
Apparently, I had to live in London.
Joined the CloudKit team. Moved across the pond.
Five years and a pandemic later, a pet project became API.
But now, the bucket list screams again.
Apparently, I have to quit.
Not going to a competitor. No problems. No spicy drama.
I just want to experiment with pure freedom.
Not sure exactly what I’ll do, but I have some ideas.
No kids. No responsibilities. Now is the time to be dumb.
I’m sad to leave.
Sad to miss everyone.
Sad for any time I made you mad.
Sad for all the crappy code I leave behind.
But I’m happy to have been here.
Happy for all the opportunities.
Happy for the laughs.
Happy for all the funky log lines and comments.
Thank you, Apple, for helping me make a dent.
My last day will be Friday, December 15th.
I need to finish the liquor on my desk before then.
Come by if you’d like to help.
Career Radar Stats
Bugs Filed: 8,135
Bugs CC’d: 26,175
Bugs Modified: ~40,000
Bugs Resolved (Fixed): 2,488
Bugs “Resolved” (Other): 4,620*
*Likely thousands more, but there’s a bug with how Radar tracks resolutions. Don’t worry, I filed a Radar about it.