Hello World.

I’ve worked in digital media, specifically in the area of rich user experience development, for over 12 years.  In that time I have worked with some of the best designers, developers, technical architects, project managers etc in the industry, for the biggest agencies in the industry.  I’ve lead teams developing for biggest clients in the world, using every technology under the sun to do it, from Director (RIP) to Silverlight via Flash, Ajax, HTML and Java applets.  I’ve worked with Adobe, Apple, Microsoft and Google in amongst all of this.  I’ve never kept a blog for my opinions.  To do so would inevitably compromise clients, strategic partners or colleagues at some point.

Lets face it tho, the internet right now is a mess.  Corporations are deploying technologies on their sites merely for strategic purposes, regardless of the impact on their users.  Paranoid developers on all sides look suspiciously at what ‘the enemy’ is doing, and seek to unsettle and defame it at every opportunity.  Debate is rarely balanced and constructive, and is more often biased and ill-informed.  Reaction over consideration, suspicion over enthusiasm, protection over collaboration.

So why am I here all of a sudden?  Well, I’ve found this abundance of misinformed rhetoric now affects the everyday conversations I have with colleagues, bosses and clients.  Quite frankly, it’s deeply irritating.  So I have created Confabulor as a platform for me to try to provide a balanced & informed opinion, (it is, after all, just my opinion), of where we are, where we ought to be, and what is going to emerge.

On the blogroll you will see people representing different positions and points of view, different technologies and approaches.   I don’t always agree with them and they don’t always represent my views, but I follow them anyway.  Alongside them are people I just like to follow because I like the stuff they dig up and they seem like good people.

So, am I a shining light in the darkness?  A voice for reason in the madness?  An area of calm in the eye of the storm?  Er.. no.  Just a guy in the UX trade, trying to create an anonymous space I can point people at and say “I don’t know who that guy is, but I agree with him”.

Confabulor.

ps.  I am not quite the pompous ass this post makes me out to be.