Subject: Technicalities Resent-From: nystaff@agency.com Date: Mon, 11 Oct 1999 22:54:53 -0400 From: Mitch Golden To: "Staff (New York)" , Fern Shlauter Technicalities Oct 11, 1999 *) Two Steps Forward, One Step Back Over the past few weeks, I have told you about all the great people that have recently joined the tech department team. This time, it is with great sadness that I announce that Jeff Dibartolomeo has taken another opportunity and decided to leave AGENCY.COM. Like any great tree, AGENCY.COM has roots that go in all sorts of directions. We have employees here who have been around way longer than I. There are those who have been with Quadris for over a decade. The branch I was on started in 1995 at a different company altogether, with a team of people some of whom are still here. I have been working with Jeff DiBartolomeo, Pascale Jouy, Fern Shlauter, and Pall Walton since the summer of 1995 - pretty much the very time New Media got going in earnest. After such a long time it is awful strange to see one of these folks go. Jeff has gotten an amazing opportunity: CTO of an HBO-funded startup called Volume. If I'm to believe what he's telling me - always a somewhat risky proposition with Jeff - he'll have a staff of 10 reporting to him, and (get this!) 8 weeks vacation. Amusingly, this winter the company will be moving to the 9th floor of 665 Broadway. He tells me he wants Aaron's office. When Jeff started in this business he was a sitebuilder. There are people (now employed at other companies) who worked with us both during that time who tell me they are looking to hire sitebuilders "like Jeff was". Pretty tall order: Jeff has gone from sitebuilder to CTO in just over 4 years. (Now please excuse me while I call my broker to short Time-Warner stock.) *) Tech-Know-Bowl As I write this I am just back from a night at the Bowlmor Lanes with some members of the tech department. This particular outing was arranged by Jamil and Eugenia, our two most recent additions. (Jamil figured that if he was surrounded by people who were of obvious legal drinking age, no one in the bowling alley would check his ID. Clever fellow - that's why I hired him.) When we got there, the alley put us in the end two lanes, and closed down the lane next to ours. Hey, we're used to it. WE'RE GEEKS AND WE'RE PROUD. Any VP can relate that going out to such an event with people who work for you is pretty stressful. If you display the full, awesome power of your game, you'll demoralize your team. On the other hand, you can't lose too badly, because then everyone will just lose respect for you. So you spend the evening fine-tuning your performace. Just under 100, that's a reasonable score. Throw a strike and a spare or two, so they know you can - yeah, that's the ticket. Chris Stetson displayed none of this judgement. He not only had the highest score both games, but he even defeated his wife, who deigned to spend an evening with us of pocket-protectordom. (Chris then proceeded to add insult to injury by comparing his marriage to a socker game in which the score was 0-0. Chris will be sleeping on the couch tonight.) At any rate, we had a good time and left by 10. Except for Jamil, who ran into some other, older, friends of his who will keep buying him beer.