Media Appearances
Internet History Podcast (June 8, 2015)
Host: Brian McCullough Link: YouTube Duration: ~90 minutes Transcript: raw/internet-history-podcast-2015.txt
A comprehensive career interview that Brian McCullough called "absolutely an essential listen for any young people starting out in the tech industry today." The podcast host noted Ted's career was "so interesting and varied" that they explored well beyond When.com.
Topics Covered
Childhood and Education: - Atari 800, making games in assembler, Commodore PET in a mall - Cornell → Michigan transfer "in pursuit of a girlfriend" - IBM Product Center summer job — hired as tech support, ended up selling computers - McKinsey as "an experiment" — first non-Ivy, non-econ hire - HBS summer internship at Apple (HyperCard stacks for K-12 sales) - Bill Gates calling Ted's dorm room to recruit for Windows (Ted declined)
Apple (1989–92): - Sculley era — felt like the underdog vs. Microsoft - Mac IIfx ($9,000, 40MHz, ran QuickTime), Mac LC, LCII, Mac Classic - Low-cost Mac initiative was engineer-driven (Paul Baker), not top-down - Newton starting in skunk works — friends on the project later joined When.com
EO and Pen Computing: - Head of product management for hardware - EO 440: ~$2,500, snap-on CDMA radio, fax and email, designed by frog design - Pitched to Gartner Group — "they made me feel like an idiot" - Handwriting recognition ~92% per letter — errors in every paragraph - Palm Pilot vindicated the category with pragmatic Graffiti approach - Jerry Kaplan's book Startup recommended
PF.Magic (1993–96): - John Skulski co-founded (from Apple) - Took a downward move — director to assistant producer - Balls (3D fighting game), Dogs and Cats (Petz), Ubisoft licensing - Joel Dubner showed Ted the internet — changed everything - Left when Olivia was born, management dysfunction
ActiveSite (~1996–97): - Consulting firm as startup incubator with James Joaquin, Tony Espinosa, Joe Beninato - "Your website needs a product manager" - Clients: Bank of America, Microsoft - Explored: Radar Software, property management, calendar (winner)
When.com (deep dive): - Visual Basic calendar prototype ~1995–96 - Javier Rojas at Broadview Associates encouraged the calendar idea - Jim Brock at Venture Law (Yahoo's founding attorney) as lawyer - Emil Waintraub / 21st Century Internet Venture Partners: $1.5M at $3M pre-money - Benchmark Capital: ~$6M at ~$14M pre-money, Kevin Harvey on board - All C++ custom stack, Oracle, own hardware at Global Center - ~200K users on own → Netscape/Net Center deal → 1.5M users in two weeks - Competitors: WebCal (Yahoo), Jump (Microsoft) - AOL acquisition: ~$150M stock (grew to ~$225M). Barry Schuler initiated, David Coburn negotiated - 17 million users within ~6 months on AOL - AOL culture: "soul-crushing," "like Office Space"
*Ofoto* and Kodak: - James Joaquin called Ted "out of retirement" - Ted's father had worked at Kodak in Rochester - Kodak knew digital was coming but thought they had more time - Transition happened faster than expected
Byliner.com: - John Tayman was founder; Ted was COO (not founder) - Kindle singles at $1.99; authors included Jon Krakauer, Amy Tan, Christopher Hitchens - Built subscription service — "follow the writer" concept - Acquired by Vook; another "too early" venture
TimeWalk (current project at time of recording): - Building a pilot in Unity — "a 3D Wikipedia called TimeWalk" - Mill Valley 1915, San Francisco 1906 as pilot locations - "Movies are going to be these experiences you walk into" - Also experimenting with quantified self, VR, Arduino/Raspberry Pi
Key Quotes
- On McKinsey: "I was an experiment. They thought, let's get one of these computer engineers from the Midwest."
- On Bill Gates: "He called me in my dorm room and said you should join Microsoft, we're doing this thing called Windows. No way I would work on Windows."
- On EO/timing: "You could build a VCR in 1955 technically. But it would cost thirty thousand dollars. Just because you can picture it doesn't mean it's time to do it yet."
- On Silicon Valley: "It really is a meritocracy. Don't worry about lateral moves and downward moves to get into something you're excited about."
- On When.com's exit: "I never felt like this is a racket. We were growing. We brought them more revenue and market cap than they spent on us."
- On career philosophy: "If I'm completely mercenary and just look for the biggest market opportunity, I'll be building some widget that ties onto Twitter. I need to care about it emotionally."
Open Questions
- Are there other podcast appearances, interviews, or articles?
- Any talks at conferences (AWE, etc. — referenced in Obsidian vault)?