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Locking Down Facebook
It wasn’t until recently that Facebook has been embroiled in an existential threat about their collection of personal data, but there have been red flags for a long time. While those red flags have...
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The Top of Reddit
I’ve been checking Reddit daily for at least 4 years. Around the time that Justin registered r/chengdu was when I started using the site. It’s come to be one of my favorite websites – maybe my...
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Ordinary Lives in North Korea: “Nothing to Envy”
When you look up the best books about the actual situation inside of North Korea (one which we know very little about), one of the most oft-cited book is Nothing to Envy by Barbara Demick. Demick...
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The War of Art
The War of Art is about how creative professionals like artists and entrepreneurs overcome obstacles to complete meaningful work. It’s authored by Steven Pressfield, who also wrote another similar...
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Shovel Knight: Retro Charm in Spades
Shovel Knight is the ultimate NES game. It encapsulates everything that there is to love about the NES while cutting away all of the frustration of games from that era. There’s no question that games...
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Chengdu: Laid Back Tech Capital of China
At my previous job I hosted interviewers from around the world and talked at great length about why Chengdu is an attractive city in China for startups. Although to this day Chengdu still isn’t home to...
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Photos: Chongqing, June 2018
Last week I went on a weekend trip to Chongqing with Hika, Oliver and Austin to check out Instinct there. Instinct is a rave which takes place a few times a year in Chongqing, and it always happens in...
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China’s “Sabertooth” Street Tank
Saw this outside of the Chongqing railway station, parked among common police vehicles. It says “Sabertooth” on the side and is evidently a bullet proof APC (armored personnel carrier) built atop a...
View ArticleBeing “Ready to Go” When You Live in China
This morning two things happened which both brought me to the thought of how you must be “ready to go” when you are a Western expat living in China: I read news that Steven Balding, the U.S....
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Switching from iOS to Android
It’s been exactly ten years since I’ve been in the Apple ecosystem. And by that I mean, that was when I first got a 13″ MacBook Pro. Immediately I was struck both by how well made the device was from...
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Yangze Cruise Photos, Part 2
This is the second and final series of photos from a cruise on the Yangtze which concluded at the Three Gorges Dam. It was a beautiful five day trip through a part of China which I had never seen...
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Back in Vietnam in 2019
It’s been almost ten years, but I’m back in Vietnam. I’m surprised both by how long it took me to return to this country, and by how little it’s changed. When I was first here, I found Vietnam...
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The Cat, the Mouse, and Outline VPN
For any expat living in China, a VPN is basically a necessity. Without one, you can only access a heavily restricted form of the internet in China. And by heavily restricted I mean an internet which...
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Abandoned Basement Portraits
A few months ago a friend suggested that we explore an abandoned, subterranean shopping zone in one of the most developed parts of Chengdu. This sector of the city, a few blocks from the Ritz Carlton,...
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To Have a Sister
Throughout my life I’ve had my existence attributed to my sister countless times. Here’s how the story goes: as an eight year old child, my sister Anna (who I’ve called Cici my entire life) pestered...
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Superhot VR
One of my favorite games from the last few years is a first person shooter game called Superhot. It has a distinct and memorable minimal aesthetic, but what really separates it is a unique mechanic...
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Beer Breweries Along the US Mideastern Corridor
A few months ago when I took a trip back to the United States for six weeks, I arrive in Queens, NYC at JFK Airport. From there I went on a road trip for about five days, as far north as Boston,...
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Reddit’s Favorite Games
A year and a half ago I gave away a Steam key for The Witness, an independent puzzle game by Jonathan Blow, on the RandomActsofGaming subreddit and asked a question: “What’s your favorite game of all...
View ArticleMandarin Blueprint Podcast about Learning Chinese
Last week I was invited to join two friends who have a business teaching Chinese (Mandarin Blueprint) on their podcast to discuss life in China and learning the language. The conversation is just over...
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Thoughts on Playstation VR
After waiting for half a decade, VR has finally hit the mainstream. I remember first trying the pre-release HTC Vive at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco in March of 2013, and immediately...
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