Matt's Blog

A big concept in the software development world is eating your own dogfood — that is, using your own code as a customer would. (Places like 37signals will — justly — argue that this is of paramount importance.) A while ago we made an effort to use our own site for internal communication, and ended [...]

I was reading something about Array Networks and the load balancers with SSL offload that they offer. I followed a link to their main page, and the images slowly drew on the page. I’m on a cable modem, and thumbnail images generally load near-instantly. This is one of the images embedded on their main page. [...]

A recent Cracked.com article — yes, I’m citing it as a serious source — introduced me to the concept of Congo’s SAPE, from Société des ambianceurs et des personnes élégantes, which translates to the “Society for the Advancement of People of Elegance.” Adherents, known as sapeurs, dress in dapper, sometimes garish attire, despite living of [...]

The concept of microloans has intrigued me for a while. Loaning $500 might be all it takes for someone in the third world — or any non-superpower nation, really — to start a successful small business, or to get a college degree. The latter is the concept behind Vittana, which aims to allow microfinanciers — [...]