I saw this list of writers’ years in review and thought it would be interesting to do my own. I’m not sure if I got everything but this must be about 80–90% of it.
02/23 — Just Checking In (With Virginia Heffernan) Medium, The Message A joy to write and put into the world. One of the three things I (we!) wrote this year that will hold up, I think.
Reviewing this year, I have very little memory of writing most of these, except What Is Code. I’ve been trying to finish a book that explains the web and technology and it has gone terribly. If you’d’ve asked me at any point during the year how I was doing as a writer I would have said that I was blocked, incapable of writing, and miserable about it, in the midst of a huge crisis of confidence the whole damn year.
05/19 — A “No to” Poem Medium, The Message I tried to cover something I thought was weird and interesting; it sort of fell flat. It’s an impossible subject for someone like me to write about; I felt like I was just treading where no one wanted me and by the time it was written I regretted writing it.
05/20 — A piece for Elle about “breasts” that never went online Elle Kind of glad this one didn’t hit the Internet.
06/01 — What Is Code Bloomberg Businessweek, Special Issue This was ridiculous to pull off and I’m proud we pulled it off. Me and 40+ people cranking for weeks to create something novel and weird. All credit to Bloomberg for taking this risk. The paper copies are all sold out (I have about 100 left); the digital version got tons of traffic. Never had anything enter into pop culture at all, even smart-people pop culture, never expect to again. But it was interesting to see.
06/08 — The Last Museum Vice Media, Motherboard, Terraform Just a fun, weird piece. I love writing fiction even though I’m perpetually rusty. 2016 will include more fiction.
06/22 — Pax Google The New Republic, Big Data Not a bad piece. I like that TNR lets me figure stuff out as I go.
I was doing a lot of writing, but it’s hard to get people to pay writers for things on time. I was doing a bunch of consulting and programming work, started a company, my wife started a full-time job, and we raised our twins from 3.5 to 4.5 years of age. I’ll always write, but when it was my primary income it felt like I was hanging over a cliff. As much as I love-slash-hate the work, I’ll never feel safe relying on it.
July–September
07/18—Health as a Puzzle Chairs and Tables Wrote this for some nice Canadians.
07/23—Correspondence Medium, self-published I still haven’t answered these emails.
08/13 — The Final File The New Republic, Big Data Love this database.
09/01 — Saving For A Daughter But Not A Son: This Father Is Starting A Fund To Combat The Wage Gap Elle Once I had this idea I couldn’t leave it alone. It pissed off so many people from so many different backgrounds. The big TV morning shows wanted me to come on but I figured I didn’t really want death threats for me and my wife, the Internet comments calling her a whore were bad enough. I love that just by saying you’re going to save some money you can cause people on the left and right to completely lose their shit.
09/23 — Here is Postlight Postlight Posts (Corporate Blog) I co-founded a company to build web things. I couldn’t imagine being beholden to publishing any longer; it’s a dangerous industry in that it feeds your narcissism without paying you real money.
In 2016 I plan to work on some pieces about technology, and write two big pieces of science fiction that have been rattling around in my head for two or three years, and my book should come out (if I can just finish the last 15,000 words right now).
