Ted, who’s probably hacking something. And that’s Charlie looking intense in the back there.
Our software developer Ted is the third in a series of “who we are” interviews with the people who work at Abine. A company is only as good as the people behind it, and we don’t mean to brag, but we have some pretty great people here. We also tend to enjoy puppies and pancakes, perhaps more than the average group of people does.
Ted is one of those rare people who seems invincible when it comes to solving any problem and doing so effortlessly. He’s also a big A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones fan, so beware of spoilers below. And he has an unexpected choice for what his super power would be.
Thanks for reading and taking the time to get to know us!
Sarah: What do you do at Abine?
Ted: I’m a software engineer, which means that I mostly work with PHP, Javascript, MySQL, but I’ve been doing work on a lot of different things at Abine. I’ve worked on DNT+, which is our browser add-on that blocks tracking; I’ve worked on DeleteMe, which is our service that removes you from people-search websites; I’ve worked on our website and other little projects, like things for our company infrastructure. And I’ve only been here for 5 months, so it’s been pretty cool.
Sarah: What were you doing before you came to Abine?
Ted: I was in school getting a Masters degree in computer science last May. Then I moved to Boston and was working at Wellesley College in the IT department before I got this job.
Sarah: Where’d you go to school?
Ted: Wesleyan University in Connecticut.
Sarah: If you work here, privacy must matter to you. Why does it?
Ted: I think it’s something that a lot of people have strong feelings about. People want their privacy to be protected on the Internet, and they want the tools to do that. But it’s a complicated problem, and there are a lot of different ways that you can think about what it means to have privacy online, whether it’s just not letting people know certain information about you or being completely anonymous. It’s a complicated enough situation that it’s hard for people to understand how to get what they want.
Abine is trying to give people the information and they tools necessary to be able to actually have control over what information trails they leave online and what people can actually find out about them.
Sarah: Which A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones house would you belong to?
Ted: Spoiler alert. I’m going to go house Hightower, the rulers of Oldtown, which is a fine city of Westeros. It’s where all of the Maesters are trained. I suspect that we’ll be seeing some interesting political maneuvers from the Hightowers in the future. So I’m going to cast my lot with them.
Sarah: Do you have any unexpected or unusual talents?
Ted: I sing with the Boston choral ensemble. It’s not that unusual. I’m a bass 2.
Sarah: Name your top 3 movies in no particular order.
Ted: There are 4 of them, but I’m going to say the collaborations between John Carpenter and Kurt Russell, which are Escape from New York, Big Trouble in Little China, and The Thing. And you’ve got to throw Escape from LA in there, even though it’s not as good.
Sarah: Let’s say you’re on death row. Sorry. What would your last meal be?
Ted: Easy. Steamed crabs. Lots of Old Bay seasoning.
Sarah: If you could have any superpower, what would it be?
Ted: There are a lot of good choices here. I’m going to go with controlling the weather. I think that’d be pretty good.
Sarah: So you’d be like Storm?
Ted: I’m kind of thinking more like you could make it pleasant to be outside all the time.
Sarah, laughing: So your super power would be to make it pleasant outside all the time?
Ted: It’d be great.
Sarah: What is the non-work website you go to most often, aside from obvious things like Google?
Ted: I could say Westeros.org…I don’t know if that’s true, though. Allright, so I’ll just give a shoutout to this Game of Thrones tumblr, All Leather Must Be Boiled, that I like. That most frequently read in my Google Reader. Spoiler alert; be careful. He’s read all the books.
Ted chose Rickon.
Sarah: What is the best thing and worst thing about the Internet?
Ted: The best thing about the Internet is that you can connect with whoever you want and be a part of whatever you want in a way that no other thing let people do before. The worst part is that it’s a distraction from what you might want to actually accomplish in your life. As great as it is, it’s hard to escape from it entirely if you’re not careful. It can be a really deep rabbit hole.
Sarah: Let’s say we’re in the Harry Potter universe. What would your patronus be?
Ted: A dolphin.
Sarah: Why?
Ted: Dolphins are great.
Sarah: Do you have a tip or a system you use when you have to be super focused and productive?
Ted: Usually the most effective thing is taking a quick walk or taking a break to get a sandwich or a cup of coffee, and then putting myself in an environment where there are no distractions, so not listening to music, not sitting in a café, just quiet.
You can email Ted at Ted at Abine dot com, and check out our open jobs if you want to work here, too!