Things I’ve written
Sometimes I write things, very slowly. I think everyone could write more, even if like me, they don’t see themselves as a writer.
Keep Up
I will eventually spin up a mailing list here.
Latest piece: ./ROI: Balance is more than numbers
Play
I talk a lot about game design, occasionally about other things game-related.
In the modern era, gamers demand their Game Is Balanced. The biggest taboo a popular game can make is when one “tool” or combination turns out to be significantly more potent than others.
Operation Dicestorm is a 1 versus 1 tactical strategy board game we’ve been working on for a while. The armies of completely asymmetric factions duke it out till only one has units standing.
A note: If you happened to stumble upon this piece but aren’t particularly interested in game design, know that this framework is also useful beyond just game design, as I outline towards the end.
One of my big projects is our one-on-one versus board game, dubbed Operation Dicestorm. While it’s my first focused attempt designing a board game, a lot of lessons I learned analyzing video game design is directly applicable.
Learning
How we learn being the foundation of how we do anything else, I circle back to this topic regularly. Surprisingly often I’m torn between placing a post here or above in Play, because I talk about games + education a lot.
There was this Naruto episode I watched, about 6 months before I started college, that got me thinking about what lessons are worth being taught in school. For those who don’t want to watch it, plot summary:
Gaming has gotten a lot of attention recently as a medium for teaching real lessons and training. The topic has developed so much that I cannot address everything in a single post.
Tech/startups/product
Product ideas, thoughts about running a business, technical nitty-gritty.
It’s happened. I’m officially one of those “good ol’ days” people, at the ripe old age of 35. Quicksand I hate how we exist online: a stream of isolated thought-bytes (and thot-bytes) taken out of context and embedded in an algorithmically knitted tapestry from across our acquaintances, crushes, IRL celebrities, tapestry-celebrities and “I-don’t-remember-why-I-started-following-them"s.
So I decided to rewrite my formerly jekyll-powered personal site with hugo. Why? I’ll say upfront that I believe one should use static sites for 99% of use cases Jekyll, for 99% of static sites I love how mature and true to its core Jekyll has remained.
ℹ️ 2023/12: Sadly, this article is outdated. I attempted to get this working again but abandoned the project for getting too invasive with the desktop OS as described in the text.
It’s a fairly common question near- and new-grads try to answer in the STEM field. Should I work at the small startup/start my own company, or join a big corporation?
Places and culture
I didn’t think I’d write about this much. However, being a nomad became a significant part of my identity and cities became my closest friends so I talk about it now – a lot.
In December 2013, I left San Francisco to begin my life as a digital nomad. For the next 2 years, I lived out of airbnb listings, mostly in Asia, while I continued to work remotely for my startup, BitGym.
The following is a little loaded and very personal, so if you do read it I am grateful for your time and letting me dampen your mood a little bit.
This question is a popular modern gripe among Asian Americans. Really this bothers the descendant of an immigrant of pretty much any ethnicity, in almost any country. I understand some of the motivations behind that question – a succinct question and answer to create a rough model of who I am based on their knowledge of the world.
In December 2013, I left San Francisco to begin my life as a digital nomad. For the next 2 years, I lived out of airbnb listings, mostly in Asia, while I continued to work remotely for my startup, BitGym.
In December 2013, I left San Francisco to begin my life as a digital nomad. For the next 2 years, I lived out of airbnb listings, mostly in Asia, while I continued to work remotely for my startup, BitGym.
In December 2013, I left San Francisco to begin my life as a digital nomad. For the next 2 years, I lived out of airbnb listings, mostly in Asia, while I continued to work remotely for my startup, BitGym.
Meta: writing, life, the world
My least incoherent thoughts about all other things.
Since 2012, building BitGym has been my full time job and I have spent a lot of time researching health and fitness products, services and, more generally, advice. What I’ve noticed is that a lot of what we’re told about tends to be unsubstantiated pseudo-science as often as not, with lots of contradictory advice and weak explanations.
This post is weird because it’s a retroactively written intro to my site after I’ve already drafted and completed a number of essays. But I feel better about writing this intro post this time than every other time I’ve intro’d my blog because I’ve finally developed into a somewhat consistent writer.