CodeBenders

Posted by Taus July 06, 2010

As you can tell from the title, I’m not a huge fan of partnerships. I mean, I’ve been in love with my wife for more than 2 decades now. And I’m grateful to have Matt as my partner in crime at CodeBenders. But when it comes to traditional business partnerships, I just don’t think much of it.

Just look at AT&T and Apple (dropped call anyone?) if you want to see how the law of unintended consequences can mess up a perfectly good relationship. But with Engine Yard, it is the unintended consequences that make supporting the company so worthwhile. Yea, there are other solid hosting companies out there, including some damn good Rails hosts. But, Engine Yard (like no one else) supports the Rails community. I for one feel lucky that guys like Yehuda and many others have the opportunity to work in an environment that supports the community so voraciously. Just watch Yehuda’s keynote at RailsConf this year and you’ll know exactly what I mean. Equally important, it’s because of these contributors that Rails developers are able to provide such a compelling service to our clients.

That’s why I’m proud to say that CodeBenders is officially an Engine Yard partner. And, I’m proud to put the EY badge on our site.

Alright, enough with the fanboy talk… back to work.

Posted by Taus June 21, 2010

Well it must have been a slow news day in Bend, because the Bulletin came through on their threat and actually published a piece on CodeBenders. Thanks to David Holley for letting us rant about everything but technology and writing a nice piece that covers a lot of ground.

If you’re a subscriber, you can access the article here. If you’re not, we ripped a copy from their site and posted the complete article here.

Posted by Taus June 12, 2010

RailsConf was great this year. Got to meet a bunch of new people that I hope to keep in touch with.

After a crazy flight back to the west coast – 15 hours of flying, circling, diverting, waiting, unloading, loading, sitting, waiting for a pilot from Baltimore to Portland – these are the things that stick out in my mind the most…

As I previously tweeted, Yehuda‘s keynote speech was awesome. If you think Ken Kesey new how to mix up a tasty batch of Kool-Aid, you should taste Yehuda’s. Oh, man, was I inspired (and still am)! For all the bravado that is the Rails, Yehuda’s talk defined the moral center of this community. If there’s only one video to watch from the conference. This is it…

A good complement to Wy’s speech was Gary Vee‘s talk on the “Give a Fuck Economy”. Gary bring’s more emotion to his talks than a JV cheerleading squad, not to mention that he drops more f-bombs than Matt. During the Q&A, I got to ask Gary about his interest in social action. Although, I think he initially misunderstood that I was asking about charity, he did express some interest in the shifting world of non-profit, community action. When you combine Wy’s community participation ideology with Gary’s “mom and pop” grow a relationship with your constituents, I see a brighter future. And that future makes me even more optimistic about UniteNow’s mission.

Here’s Gary’s talk…

Lastly, although not a keynote, I really enjoyed Ian McFarland’s talk Agile the Pivotal Way. Whether you are a consultancy, a startup, a non-profit, a government agency or anything in between, these insights are invaluable. The slides and video have not been posted, yet. But I hope they will be uploaded here soon.