I'm not sure what my "claim to fame" is, but I'm the Chief Technologist
and cofounder of an Austin, Texas-based software company called
Activerse Inc. We make a Java-based application called Ding! that can
best be described as a corporate buddy list, or alternatively a
"presence platform." I'm a big proponent of standards, and we're
working to standardize the buddy list category and move towards
interoperability. Activerse is actually the evolution of a previous
company I cofounded, Active Paper. Active Paper developed a web browser
and e-mail client for General Magic's Magic Cap platform. We sold the
technology to Magic back in '96, aquired another little startup, and
became Activerse. Before starting Active Paper, I worked at Sun for
about three years (out in sunny CA), at a modeling and CASE tool company
called Scientific and Engineering Software, at Dell, and at a data
migration tools vendor called Evolutionary Technologies, all here in
Austin.
The inspiration for Ding! and our related "presence" and
"realtime-interaction" products came from a long-time interest and
participation in MUDs and MUD technology development. I was "Lucifer"
on TinyMUD and TinyHELL, first MUDs to come up way back in '89, and
spent several years developing MUD stuff around that time. In '90 I
wrote the first GUI MUD client, "mudtool," and in '91 wrote a
Scheme-based, distributed (via object migration) MUD called "VERSE." (I
actually did a lot of this work on Sun's dime, while simultaneously
working on big distributed-database middleware and downloadable code
projects at Sun. My MUD stuff was always a "testbed" for my "real
work." :-)
My interests are pretty all over the map. My work interests are in
parallel and distributed systems, mobile code, dynamic object-oriented
languages, scripting, online communication and collaboration, and
special-purpose computing devices. I'm a big UNIX proponent... I'm
also into physics (I have this hypothesis that matter is basically
nothing more than relativistically folded-up space and I'm struggling
through the math on it in my copious spare time; if I ever end up
working towards a graduate degree, it'll be in physics and related to
this topic,) "strange" math, radio astronomy, nanosystems, and the
wet-science issues around extending human life span. I love to cook,
and am a confirmed omnivore. I like off-beat movies. I like grubbing
around in small, central Texas towns on sunny Fall weekends. I write a
lot of (perhaps mediocre) poetry, and occasionally do a poetry slam or
open mike night. I'm hooked on NTN trivia, and am usually a contender
for first place on Trivial Pursuit Interactive in our local bar. I also
love to dance (primarily late 80's/early 90's, goth/industrial and EBM)
--- spent *way* too many hours in dance clubs over the last ten
years... My musical interests range from old "lounge" stuff to jazz
fusion to Combustible Edison to NIN to Throbbing Gristle. I have a
little side business here in town that is essentially a nightclub
marketing / promotions / DJ / management type of deal. I have two cats
(Arsenic and Boo) and (only ;-) one girlfriend at this time, which seems
to suit me (and them) just fine.
If you haven't guessed it by now, I kinda tend to ramble... apologies
up front. I dunno what else there is to say right now...
Glad to be here!
Jeff Bone