Alan Lewis

Alan Lewis Has Joined Auctiva

I am happy to report that I have recently joined Auctiva as their Platform Manager. Auctiva has been in the business of providing software and services for eBay sellers for a decade, and I'll be leading their new effort to build a platform that powers new services for sellers off-eBay.

Why join Auctiva? Here are just a few of the many reasons:

• I have known many of the people who work here for many years, and I really respect what they have accomplished in building the company to where it is.
• Auctiva has a vision for online commerce that I can get behind. If I ever get back on the blogging horse in a serious way I will have much more to say about this vision, but in brief, Auctiva is building a powerful platform that will enable many new, uniques way to connect buyers and sellers.
• The people who work here are humble, and are willing to admit mistakes and reverse course quickly. Auctiva was recently forced by eBay policy changes to start charging for some services that were previously free. The original pricing that we came up with was a mistake -- too complicated, and too costly for many sellers. So we changed it, and every indication from our users is that this time we have got it right. Of course you hope to get things right the first time as often as you can, but any company will make mistakes, and what one of the things that makes a company great is how it acts to recognize and fix those mistakes.
• Auctiva has a very flat organizational structure. At Auctiva I am reporting directly to CEO Jeff Schlicht (and most other people in the company are also no more than 2 or 3 levels removed). This contrasts with a previous employer where the CEO was (no exaggeration) my boss's boss's boss's boss's boss's boss.

Although my new role is focused on Auctiva's off-eBay projects, I will be working on some eBay projects as well. I will be attending eBay's developer conference this week (which is literally being held down the street from Auctiva's new San Jose office) and I look forward to catching up with my eBay developer community colleagues who I have met over the years. I'll be sporting my new bright blue Auctiva shirt, so give me a holler if  you see me.

Its Spring! Time to Work Outside

It has been raining for what seems like months, and finally this week there was some nice weather. I took my laptop outside some of the time, and found that I was getting at least twice as much done. A nice environment leads to better work. I took this picture with my new cell phone (more on that later) -- I think I'm making this my new office:

I No Longer Have the Crappiest Car at eBay

My not-so-trusty 91' Ford Taurus, also known as the Crappiest Car at eBay South Campus, bit the dust on Friday after our North American Business Unit (NABU) all-hands meeting. Here is what it sort of looked like back when it was new (mine has really ugly peeling paint that is common to the model year on the hood and roof):

After the meeting I was filling up at a gas station, and after I started my car it made a god-awful grinding noise that continued even after I tried to turn the engine off. I managed to drive the car the few blocks to my mother-in-law's house, spewing smoke out of the engine as I drove down the street. Once I got there I managed to turn it off, and it wouldn't start again.

As luck would have it, I found out over the weekend that my parents are getting a new car, and they offered to give me their old Taurus (a 98'). So, as of next week, I'll be driving to work in a newer, different old Taurus that looks something like this:

I was thinking of taking up Bill Cobb's suggestion to all NABU employees that they buy a car on the site. However, it was hard to pass up something free.

Microsoft PDC Day 1

I'm at the Microsoft PDC Conference in LA today. This is my first trip as an evangelist, and I made the rookie mistake of booking the trip through the company travel portal instead of booking it myself, so I ended up stuck with a flight from San Jose to Orange County instead of to LAX which is much closer. The drive wasn't that bad, but having to drive extra in LA is never fun. LA used to look wildly different and weird to me, but now most of it looks the same as parts of the Bay Area to me.

I'm working in the eBay Developers Program booth today, Wednesday, and Thursday, so if you are at the conference stop by and say hi. I got to meet Sergey Dmitriev, CEO of JetBrains, who make my favorite piece of software -- the IntelliJ IDEA Java IDE.

My New Job at eBay: Technical Evangelist

Today I signed the papers to transfer to a new job at eBay. I'll be working as a technical evangelist in the Developers Program, along with people like Adam Trachtenberg (my new manager) and Greg Isaacs (director of the program). I've been a technical writer for the last five years, and I want some new challenges. My first challenge will be to explain to my family what exactly is a technical evangelist. I'll be spreading the word about the Developers Program, and all of the cool APIs, tools, and programs that we offer developers. I also hope to evangelize blogging within eBay. I realized today when I signed that I'm now in the marketing department. I guess I'd better learn to talk really loud, and I should hone my Excel skillz. I'll be working in a different building: "Toys", the only one that has Diet Mountain Dew in the soda machines.

My first day in the new position is in two weeks, and I get to jump right in by attending the eBay Developers Conference. I'll be giving two presentations there: "Introduction to eBay Web Services" and "Migrating to eBay Web Services."

Strange Encounter at Frys Electronics

I was at the Frys on Hamilton in San Jose today, shopping for a new monitor. I hadn't been there in about a year, and every time I go it is worse and worse. The merchandise is in terrible shape, and it feels depressing in there. After a few minutes, I gave up looking and was heading out when I checked my cell phone to see what time it was. I looked up from my phone to see an employee looking at me. "You didn't just take a picture, did you?", he said, nervously. I said that I didn't have a camera phone, and that I hadn't taken a picture. He looked around, more nervous than before, and said, "There are people in here all the time taking pictures, I hope you didn't take a picture." I pulled out my phone and showed him that there was no camera on it. "Good," he said, "because I have private investigators after me trying to take my picture."

Ten, or even five years ago, Frys was the place to go to get deals on electronics and computers. The customer service was horrible, but you put up with it because it was the best bargain in town. Now, you can almost always get better deals online. I've been going there less and less over the last few years, and I keep swearing each time I go that I'll never go again. But if I don't ever go there, where will I meet such interesting people?

Another Review of the Lou Harrison Concert

I found another review of the San Jose Chamber Orchestra concert where my dad's new composition, "Elegy for Lou Harrison", was premiered. The review is by artssf.com, which apparently is "the independent, non-commercial observer-critic of the arts, your best source in the San Francisco Bay Area." The review is very complimentary:

The concert brought out [Lou Harrison's] percussion period, his Chinese phase and his relatively traditional Suite for Violin and String Orchestra. Its novel highlight, to these ears, was Kerry Lewis' new "Elegy for Lou Harrison,"  a marvelous exuberance  echoing many stylistic trends of LH's own music, coming from one of his former pupils.

Lou Harrison Concert Reviewed in Mercury News

The Mercury News has posted a positive review of the Lou Harrison concert where my dad's new composition was premiered. The reviewer enjoyed the concert (as did I), and he had this to say about my dad's work:

"Elegy'' felt powered by breast-beating grief, carried by dark melodies over harp arpeggios and ostinato bass. Later, it unfolded sweetly -- "resplendent'' with Harrison's Asian modalism. Lewis, who was in the audience, has written a piece his teacher would have enjoyed. The orchestra gave it a rich, emotional performance.

Kerry Lewis to Debut Composition This Sunday

My dad, Kerry Lewis, is an accomplished composer who has written a piece for a concert that will be given this Sunday, March 7th, 2005. When he was in graduate school at San Jose State, he studied with Lou Harrison, one of the great composers of the 20th Century. Lou died in 2003, and my dad has composed an elegy that is to be debuted by the San Jose Chamber Orchestra on Sunday. The concert will also feature two works by Lou, and is presented in collaboration with the New Music Works Ensemble. The music is sure to be good, and the orchestra plays in a beautiful theater in downtown San Jose, Le Petit Trianon.

On this memorial page to Lou Harrison, my dad contributed the following anecdote:

When I was studying with Lou he explained to me how one went about "preparing" a piano (a la John Cage). In all innocence, I asked, "What do you do if you are preparing a grand piano and a nut or bolt falls through the strings to the soundboard?" Without missing a beat, Lou replied, "You leave town as quickly as possible."