Chief Technology Officer at HiiDef, creators of Flavors.me and Goodsie.com
Internet | Greater Atlanta Area, US
Technology executive of consumer web company HiiDef, guiding the outstanding teams behind Flavors.me and
Goodsie.com.
Jan
2010 - Present
Chief Technology Officer / Hii Def Inc.
John's tenure at HiiDef has been defined by his ability to attract talented developers and execute the founders' vision of elegant tools for beautiful websites.
As CTO, John consolidated teams to leverage the skills of the diverse Flavors.me and Goodsie developers. He shaped development strategies, led company meetings, and established a unique hiring process for remote workers that brings candidates to real world problems.
John decentralized responsibilities, allowing developers to tackle issues that inspire them while maintaining core technology components. This led to a versatile organization, emphasizing individual accountability and professional balance. As of mid 2011 HiiDef reached fifteen employees spanning the East Coast, Midwest, Hawaii, and Northern Europe.
John introduced additional systems redundancy, emphasized unit tests and static analysis, accelerated deployments, and released many technologies into the public domain. While still an active code contributer, he spends much of his time working small groups through challenges, identifying bottlenecks, and defining pertinent milestones. His projects include growth drivers like internal funnel tracking, A/B testing frameworks, and social analytics tools.
In late 2010 he led a rebuild of the aging Goodsie codebase. The team redesigned nearly all components of the site and launched in April 2011, delivering an unmatched e-commerce experience in a matter of months.
Late 2011 will see a redefined Flavors.me on a new infrastructure. John developed fresh approaches to consolidate dozens of social services into a single social graph, providing a new perspective on our online activities.
Dec
2008 -
Jan
2010
Consultant / Hii Def Inc.
Initially hired as a supporting developer, John soon emerged as the leader of the Flavors.me development team.
Using proven Python and Javascript technologies, he built the lauded front end experience and high performance spidering infrastructure. He integrated dozens of third party APIs, updating content in real time for hundreds of thousands of enthusiastic users.
Flavors.me has experienced sustained growth of its paid subscriber base, spawned countless imitators and remains a core product in the HiiDef portfolio.
Mar
2009 -
Dec
2009
Consultant / Copay Solutions
Advised the company on general technology issues.
* Helped set up a development environment and automated deployment mechanisms
* Deployed multi-tiered file and database backups
* Reviewed legacy application code
* Guided static website design and development
* Advised on SEO strategy
Sept
2008 -
Dec
2009
Developer / Offbeat Guides
Developed a system to generate a customized travel guide in seconds. Guides are hundreds of pages long and incorporate dozens of data sources parsed in real-time. Decentralized and hosted on Amazon's Web Service stack, the cluster of machines is capable of producing tens of thousands of books per day at low cost.
* Twisted Python based web services that interface with dozens of data sources
* Highly redundant, AWS based cluster
* Parsing mechanisms for a broad variety of user-generated content
* Translation between several output formats
Aug
2006 -
Jul
2009
Founder / Who's Going, LLC
Who's Going helps you meet new people through events and activities.
* Seamlessly integrated geocoding and geolocation localize interaction
* Cutting edge social software features enable new methods of communication
* Analytical tools help consistently refine the site and push viral expansion
* Integration with a number of third party APIs help users post rich content
* Development and design best practices ensure a consistent, high-quality experience
Jul
2005 -
Jul
2009
Founder / Tagalag
Widely heralded web identity management tool allows user to "tag" each other by email address. Combined with geolocation data, Tagalag becomes a literal map of meta-information about people.
Jan
2009 -
Apr
2009
Consultant / EurekaHire
Advised the company on general technology issues and helped coordinate an international team of developers.
* Helped set up a development environment and automated deployment mechanisms
* Recommended designers and assisted in design reviews
* Evaluated candidates as they joined the development team
Implemented broad Memcached based caching of SOAP web services
* Debugged and improved established PHP codebase
Apr
2006 -
Jan
2009
Founder / Zip-code-boundaries.com
Developed and marketed a ZIP Code boundary database and related software for use with mapping applications.
2007 -
Dec
2008
Lead Developer / BoredAt, Inc.
Boredat is an anonymous real-time communication application targeted at students. Popular at dozens of universities and content rich with millions of posts. Developed the entire technology stack, including:
* Innovative low-latency comet architecture
* Automated controls over scalable Amazon EC2 hosting
* Spam and abuse prevention tools
* Analytical tools to reveal usage patterns
Apr
2006 -
Sept
2007
Consultant / MSHC Partners, Inc.
Consulting the prominent political advertising group on e-commerce initiatives.
May
2006 -
Jun
2007
Developer / Mochi Media
Periodically assist the rapidly expanding casual gaming advertising network with a variety of technological and marketing concerns.
Nov
2004 -
Jun
2007
Developer / Mogopop/Talking Panda
Authored a Flash based iPod emulator for Talking Panda's iLingo translation products. Assisted with editing marketing materials. Maintained the company's online presence. Worked with Zondervan to port religious materials onto the iPod platform.
Jan
2006 -
Jan
2007
Member, Board of Advisors / TailRank
Assisted with the leading internet meme-tracker's information architecture and design.
Oct
2004 -
Jun
2006
Developer / Bobby McFerrin, Inc
Worked with the team at Bobby McFerrin, Inc to shift their Macromedia Flash based site to an open, community driven portal.
Mar
2004 -
Dec
2005
Editor / Avisian, Inc
Developed and maintained a highly customized, Movable Type based CMS for Contactless News, CR80 News, RFID News and Secure ID News, each a leading publication in the automatic identification industry. Developed advertising inventory management systems, user management systems, and paid subscription services. Oversaw a massive architecture overhaul that sparked a substantial growth in traffic, with over 250,000 unique visitors in January of 2006.
Jul
2003 -
Dec
2005
Founder and Editor / RFID News
Founded the leading RFID publication with more than 85,000 unique visitors in December of 2005. RFID News is an established thought-leader in the expanding and controversial industry. Affiliated with Avisian, Inc in March of 2004.
Sept
2005 -
Oct
2005
Developer / California Chamber of Commerce
Worked with Blue River Interactive Group to develop Calchamber.com content.
Aug
2005 -
Aug
2005
Developer / Apple, Inc.
Worked with Blue River Interactive Group to develop Apple's internal "Information Systems and Technology" website.
Nov
2004 -
Feb
2005
Developer / Pheedo
Conceptualized and developed a PEAR and Smarty based PHP based advertising and billing system for a leading RSS and weblog advertising system.
Oct
2004 -
Jan
2005
Developer / HomeValuesAndListings.com
Worked with Blue River Interactive Group to develop a PEAR and Smarty based PHP based real estate listing system linking prospective leads with agents. The system includes Authorize.net billing and authorization functionality.
Apr
2003 -
Dec
2004
Developer / Donna Karan / LVMH
Developed and maintained the Spring, Fall and Winter 2003 "New York Stories" dkny.com websites as well as the Spring and Fall 2003 donnakaran.com websites. Built a PHP/MySQL based sweepstakes management system and produced all Flash content.
Jul
2004 -
Jul
2004
Developer / Technorati
Developed online applications to assist in the manual and automated classification of weblogs. Created an aggregator that tracks linking patterns in political weblog communities.
Nov
2002 -
Feb
2004
Founder / Memeufacture.com
Developed and designed the widely cited, Python based multi-language weblog aggregator. Memeufacture uses a combination of editorial selection and bi-hourly spidering to monitor topics from distinct online communities:
* Conservative Politics
* Liberal Politics
* Law
* Apple Computers
* Design
* Top Weblogs
* Persian Language
May
2002 -
Aug
2003
Developer / Masters of Branding
Developed Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) applications in Python, Visual Studio and Macromedia Flash for Fortune 50 companies. Installed and demonstrated RFID systems at Wal-Mart headquarters, as well as being a member of the installation group for the first ever live RFID smart shelf. Represented Masters of Branding at the June 2003 RFID summit in Chicago, Illinois. Created media and applications for L'Oreal Brands (Maybelline, L'Oreal Professionnel, Garnier Fructise, Matrix) Revlon, P&G, Coty, Prada, and International Paper, while working with large retailers such as Wal-Mart and CVS. Conducted retail audits for Coty, DKNY, and Prada.
May
2001 -
Aug
2001
Developer / The Village Voice
Worked with a small web development team to produce the weekly Village Voice website, winner of the 2001 National Press Foundation's Excellence in Online Journalism Award.
May
2000 -
Aug
2000
Developer / Oven Digital UK
Lead programmer in London for Oven's 'presentation tool' multinational project, integrating an Oracle database, Macromedia Generator and XML communication protocol. Primary internal rich media developer.