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I did the Quantic EMBA program, here’s what happened

Many of my best life decisions were made by saying, “Let’s see where this goes!” When my husband and I started dating, for instance, I thought, “This will be fun for the summer until we break up; we’ll go off to college in different cities and never see each other again.” And then that never happened: we were both in New York and the rest is history.

I can say something similar happened when I decided to apply for the Smartly Quantic program. I had just finished paying off 27K of student loan debt and the prospect of going back to school (read: more debt) was not exactly tempting. And the truth is age is a major factor; going back to school in my 30’s was going to put a major cramp in my life goals of owning a home and having a child.

I saw ads for what was then marketed as “Smartly” on the train (specifically their fee-free MBA program) and figured it was worth at least throwing my hat in the ring. What happened next was unexpected; I was admitted to their Executive MBA track given my work experience. This track normally comes with a fee and I was offered a full scholarship to cover the one year program.

I honestly didn’t think I would be accepted so now that I was, at no cost to me, I had to make a decision — should I do it?
Continue reading “I did the Quantic EMBA program, here’s what happened”

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An Exercise in Frustration Online

When I’m not writing this blog, I spend a lot of my time at work. For a living, I manage digital products, specifically web applications, for a well-known and respected brand. And, if I’m being honest, I’ve been using and making for the web for the better part of half of my existence on this earth! All of this is to say, I know a thing or two when it comes to what works, and what doesn’t.

I’d like to share a story about an experience that didn’t work so well for me and how I’d recommend fixing it.

Ever since I moved, I’ve been thinking about switching up my gym routine. The other day, I was scrolling through Instagram (as one does) and saw something about Rise By We. Based on the post, it looked like they had a boxing or kickboxing program which I’d be really into since I’ve been doing Muay Thai for years now. Intrigued and because they mentioned something about a free intro class, I clicked on the link from my phone to arrive at RiseByWe.com.

The homepage set an odd tone. The “Refer a Friend” button is more prominent than I’d expect — it blocks the marketing copy that someone went to great efforts to write. Meanwhile, that copy is changing at an interval (in the screenshot below, the blue words are constantly changing so as I’m trying to make sense of what’s behind that button, it goes away.

Refer a Friend? But I don't even know if I actually like you yet!
Refer a Friend? But I don’t even know if I actually like you yet!

I can get around this, it’s just some marketing, but I’m curious — where is this place? In essence, realistically, does this gym work with my getting to work/home routines? I decide to check out the navigation menu (the delectably named “hamburger” menu for all you insiders) to see where it’s located. Continue reading “An Exercise in Frustration Online”

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Review: Nest Hello

With stars in our eyes as we admired a little red house that was in our budget — and in a safe, walkable neighborhood near public transit — we overlooked a lot of little issues and placed an offer.

Fast forward to living in the house and we noticed a small, nagging issue (one of those we overlooked): no doorbell.

I figured we’d just go to Home Depot and buy a regular shmegular doorbell but my husband declined this option. He’s not a technophile or super into keeping with the Joneses or anything like that. In fact, as a woman working in technology teams, I’ve always been the tech nerd of this couple. However, when it came to the doorbell, he insisted we get a video doorbell. Essentially, with the blank slate of nothing existing to replace, let’s go big or go home!

Continue reading “Review: Nest Hello”
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Houzz: Mobile isn’t always Better

Now that we have a house, I feel like I can finally utilize all the core competencies I’ve been building watching approximately a bajillion hours of HGTV. Of course, on TV every contractor is lithe, attractive and looking out for your best interest. In reality, it’s more like you are lucky if they aren’t weird and/or shafting you.

Hearing about so many horror stories, I was really happy to discover apps that can help with sourcing and vetting vendors. One of those is Houzz, but their mobile app leaves a lot to be desired. In fact, I believe some features are buried and perhaps it’s because the organization is not ready to invest in their success. Continue reading “Houzz: Mobile isn’t always Better”

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Another Perspective on Stuff You Fill Out

I was scrolling through Twitter today when a Tweet by someone I don’t follow about a topic I’m privileged not to be intimately familiar with happened to catch my eye:

I say I’m privileged because, while I joke about being blind because I’ve been wearing glasses since 2nd grade, I’m not actually impaired. I’ve never had to experience this wild and wonderful thing we call the internet without the gift of sight. And, throughout my career as a web developer, accessibility was often an after-thought.

Continue reading “Another Perspective on Stuff You Fill Out”

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Dark Patterns

Sometimes things happen and they are just coincidence and sometimes things happen, especially on the internet, and someone explicitly went out of their way to make that happen. You may find this when you are casually browsing a retail site for a pair of shoes and then, through the magic of something called “retargeting,” you keep seeing advertisements for that same pair of shoes. At this point, we all see this coming so it doesn’t come as a surprise.

Everyone is tracking us everywhere — and sometimes we willingly let them track us by volunteering information about ourselves (i.e. what we all do on Facebook day in and day out). This is okay as long as everyone’s complicit; when the product you are using is free, YOU are the product (the selling of information about you to target selling you stuff, in essence).

What I find far more disturbing is a trend toward dark patterns that I’m seeing in the design of products. I define a dark pattern as a product that takes you somewhere that you as a user don’t want to go. It’s intentionally leading you to something you may not want — usually the end game is to lead you to something that is profitable for the product but not so great for the consumer.

Dark Bouquet by Jen Gallardo
Dark Bouquet by Jen Gallardo

Continue reading “Dark Patterns”

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In the Eye of a Hurricane

In case you’ve been living under a rock, there was a massive hurricane that impacted the Gulf Coast (Hurricane Harvey) and now another even bigger storm heading toward southern Florida (Hurricane Irma). I’ve now gotten to the point where I’ve typed the word hurricane too many times; so much so that I’m starting to doubt that I’m spelling it correctly.

I knew some people in Harvey’s path but most of my family could potentially be in Irma’s path so it’s more top of mind for me. I haven’t yet turned on the (cable) news because I have a feeling it’s going to be devastation porn so, in order to get a sense of where this storm is going, I’ve been looking at my Weather Underground app (which I love) that has a hurricane tracker and also googling a bit for pieces of information here and there.

And this is where technology gets a little weird. Continue reading “In the Eye of a Hurricane”

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Subways and Countdown Clocks

In a world where you might be stuck underground waiting for a subway train, a digital screen that can tell you when the next train is coming can be a godsend. If you live in a city with a modern train system, you are probably used to screens that announce train arrivals and don’t think anything of it. In New York, this is novel like a great white buffalo.

Well, it depends what train line you are on. And, for me, it’s not great. I take the A train and the train is often crowded or delayed; and when it is delayed, there’s usually not a “countdown” clock in sight.

Continue reading “Subways and Countdown Clocks”

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Why I Can’t Read the Googler’s Manifesto

I think you may have heard about one Googler’s manifesto, but I can’t bring myself to read it.

Segmentation Fault
Was I not the only one who wanted to throw her computer out the window after hearing about the manifesto?

Let me preface this by saying that I strongly believe in free-flowing discourse and dialogue. I believe that we should question our assumptions and seek solace in facts and figures. I also believe in seeking out patterns in our past behavior to help predict future actions, or break out of them. But first and foremost, I believe that we owe it to our fellow humans to empathize with their experiences on this earth.

And, from what I understand of this manifesto, the writer doesn’t seem to understand the shifts that women have seen in the last 30 years with regard to technology. The number of women graduating with Computer Science degrees is steadily decreasing; as Wired Magazine notes in their interview with Melinda Gates, 1 in 3 women in the 1980’s has decreased to less than 1 in 5 earning a Comp Sci degree. Continue reading “Why I Can’t Read the Googler’s Manifesto”