Technology Strategy
I've worked in a diversity of areas related to technology strategy:
sofware architecture for web applications, data science as a tool
for product optimization from observed user behavior, product management,
and organizational problem-solving.
After a stint in data science strategy leading data science teams and organizations at large-scale consumer tech product companies (Apple Siri), (Facebook, Quora, and Uber), I'm back to working on technology strategy, this time focused on "agentic" Artificial Intelligence.
There is a paradigm shift underway in the design of AI systems, from the traditional NL-processing + algorithmic execution model, where natural language models are built and connected to logic-based execution frameworks, to an "agentic" model in which the AI system is a semi-autonomous agent, often in an assistant role relative to the user, and the process of developing the AI agent is, itself, agentic. The design process has quickly progressed from "prompting" to "tool use" to "vibe coding" (AI-assisted code generation). We are now entering an era where the the process of analysis and design is, itself, agentic: an advanced reasoning-oriented agentic system co-designs the construction of the productized AI system by semi-automating the workflows of the engineering process itself, including prompt and spec authoring. I'm back to research and building within this new paradigm as we all witness a plate tectonic shift in the very nature of software itself.
Previous projects have been in the areas of technology strategy consulting, computer vision, and product requirements specification, and software framework design.
I got my start at NeXT, a Steve Jobs company, a formative time of learning from the industry's leading software theorists. At NeXT, I developed object-oriented application database integration framework layer, plus a stint at Oracle before that.
In 2003, I founded Neosociety, a social networking software company and technology platform for facilitating involvement in membership associations and non-profit initiatives. Other recent projects include technology and product strategy for an enterprise software infrastructure company.
As my first entrepreneurial venture, I co-founded Infoscape with Richard Williamson (later led divisions at Apple). Infoscape was a venture-backed software company that developed enterprise software in Java. Infoscape grew to 25 employees and was recognized by Upside and Computer World magazines as one of the top 100 emerging technology companies for 1998.
Education: A.B. in Computer Science from Harvard University with a focus on cognitive psychology and neural networks.
Home: San Francisco, California.
Research Interests
I am interested in agentic AI and the path to AGI as well as theoretical models of the brain when viewed as a decentralized biological machine, and the patterns of effective decentralized social organization, and collaboration strategy. A common theme that connects all these interests together for me is self-organizing systems which solve classes of problems and achieve goals.
Projects and Organizations
Member (or former member) of:- Society for Neuroscience, the leading association of neuroscience research scientists.
- Vision Science Society, the leading association of neuroscience research scientists.
- IEEE, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers is the leading association of technology researchers.
- Harvard Club of San Francisco, Board Member and Technology Advisor.
Past Projects (non-profit):
- Planetwork, a non-profit group advocating the use of Internet technology to facilitate environmental and social change.
- Black Rock Arts Foundation, a non-profit supporting large-scale, interactive, and collaborative art projects.