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[[Image:Nuvola apps important.png|25px|left]] 2/7/2013 IAP Personal Update
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[[Image:Nuvola apps important.png|25px|left]] 5/28/2013 MIT Retrospective
 
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=====CardSpring=====
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This is a special edition of the personal update containing a retrospective on my MIT experience.  I am still adding the other content (work, photos, etc) which I usually talk about in the update, so I am hoping to post a normal update in the next month or so.
[[IAP]] is about trying something different.  After a string of management internships, I felt I was losing touch with my Course 6 sideCould I still program?  Since I took a lot of course 6 classes this past semester, I had spent a lot of time benchmarking my course 6 skills.  Course 15 naturally left me with less time to hack on code.  I was lucky to be selected to extern at [[CardSpring]], a company that powers loyalty apps by letting them place webhooks on when a credit card is used at a business. It was a great opportunity to join a bunch of hard-core backend-programmers.  The [http://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffwinner CTO] ran cryptography at Netscape during the SSL days.  It was my first exposure to more modern tools like Git, Ruby, and Cassandra and working predominately on the backend (it's an API company).  I studied hard the week before the job to catch up on the latest tools.
+
----
 +
[[MIT]] was an awesome experience.  I was extremely fortunate to be able to attend.
  
As a programmer I built a complete set of integration tests using [http://rspec.info/ rspec].  The tests were designed to simulate the use of the API by publishers - both normal, expected uses and unexpected, error conditionsIt was a good way to learn the insides and outs of the APIThe team was really, really helpful to me and the other interns and helped us get up to speed with Ruby and the code base.
+
===Prequel===
 +
I didn't know that I wanted to go to MIT until I applied on a lark my [[12th Grade|senior year]].  Like everyone else who was actually admitted, I didn't think I had a good shot of getting in(Almost everyone at MIT, including our Chancellor, has felt the "imposter" syndrome, in which one feels that one was admitted by mistake.)  I come from a middle class family (65th percentile) in the USMy parents don't work in industries with MIT graduates.  This makes things more challenging, because, in general, students from prodigious backgrounds come to MIT better prepared and leave better off.  (Prodigious does not necessarily mean family name, or a specific income-level, but working in an area which MIT grads tend to go into.)
  
Continuing my benchmarking obsession from last semester I thought a lot about: How much are you expected to know going in? What are you expected to learn on the job? There are so many different subsets of programming that it is impossible to be an expert in all of themHow much should a new grad know about specific tools already?  And more generally, how can you measure and compare smartness/aptitude: how fast should you be able to figure something out? How many times do you need to be helped with something before you can do it on your own? How much should you try on your own, before asking for help?  Should you lean more towards asking if it is a risky operation?
+
When I was admitted, I was surprised, and I was unsure if I actually wanted to attend. "Too geeky" I wrote on my initial visit sheet. I spoke with my admissions officer for an hour where he said that he thinks I would "invent something great." Senior year of high school I had said that I wanted to study how computers and people interact. I was initially targeting an information science program. Even later on at MIT, I signed up for management first; I initially didn't sign up for computer science, till I took 6.01 and enjoyed it.  I initially thought computer science would be too difficult to mater.
  
In the end, I left with a positive reviewThe team was "sorry to see me go," "happy with my work product," and "thought I learned fast." This made me very, very happy - I was still able to code! I was able to catch up and learn up to their expectations as a MIT Course 6-er.   I think this helped restore some of my self confidence I talked about lacking from the past semester.
+
===Good Match===
 +
I think I was a perfect match for MIT.  At MIT, the focus is one science and technology, which is what I am interested inHowever, that also includes how technology effects people; for example, the program in [[Science, Technology, and Society]]MIT is not mired in tradition, and is always looking for ways to improve itself.  For example, [http://future.mit.edu future.mit.edu] is an idea board where members of the MIT community can submit ideas for the future of education at MIT.  MIT is also a place of limitless potential.  There are no internal limits - there are no limits to transfer into a major; classes are pretty much open to all students, especially if you can convince the professor you should be in; most classes don't have caps, if they are well-subscribed, the department tries to add grad students; there is only one organization, which is open to all - unlike Harvard where undergrads dare not step foot in the business school library. Once your in, you're in.  There is also an openness here.  A bit over 10 years ago, MIT looked around the online education space and decided to put everything online for free as "Open Course Ware".  While I was here, MIT decided to go a step further and launch [[EdX]], a non-profit dedicated to online education. I'm not sure to what extent this is at other top schools, but MIT students are also fairly involved in how the Institute is run.
  
However, in the end I also found that I personally like product management more than development.  It is a completely different style of working - At Disney I lived in Outlook; here I didn't touch calendar invites once the whole trip.  But I think product management fits my aspirations more closely.  It's fun to read up on a system and then be able to understand it.  It's exciting to think critically about a problem and come up with a way to crack it! Often the reward cycle is much smaller, as you are making visible progress every day. However, you are still stuck to your desk, doing work assigned to you.  Ultimately, that type of work is not as fulfilling.
+
===Perfect Playground===
 +
MIT is one of those very special places where students are free to explore and learn as much as possible.  It's full sensory stimulation. Even for people who get bored easily, you won't get bored here! There are so many different things to master, combined with an almost infinite depth that if you're bored at MIT, you're not doing something right.
  
=====San Francisco=====
+
===Peers===
Living in [[San Francisco]] was super amazing.  I am super glad I am moving there after school.  So much of the field is in the Bay Area - so I have so many interesting friends in the area! Plus, the city is really nice.  There are lots of shops and restaurants all within walking distance. I think the public transit is actually pretty good, despite what the locals say.  I enjoyed exploring the different areas of the city; in part to look for housing: [http://www.flickr.com/photos/theplaz/sets/72157632665672855/ Sunset], [http://www.flickr.com/photos/theplaz/sets/72157632665679387/ the Presidio], [http://www.flickr.com/photos/theplaz/sets/72157632665684269/ Berkeley], [http://www.flickr.com/photos/theplaz/sets/72157632669827382/ SOMA], [http://www.flickr.com/photos/theplaz/sets/72157632669836078/ Pacific Heights and the Marina], and
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One of the best parts of MIT are the other students. With very few exceptions, people here are at the top of their game.   People go to top industries: consulting, banking, entrepreneurship, so you can learn about these "1%" jobs that one would have never heard about back home. You can learn from your peers and model their behavior to fit into these jobs.
[http://www.flickr.com/photos/theplaz/sets/72157632669841364/ South Beach]
+
  
=====Next Semester=====
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===Awesome Deal===
This semester, my last at MIT, I have 4 required classes left, plus a paperFor my management degree, I have to take [[15.053|15.053 Linear Programming/Optimization]], as well as [[15.075 Statistical Thinking and Data Analysis]].  For Course 6, I need to take one more AUS or CS Lab class; I taking [[6.170|6.170 Software Studio]] .  I also need to do an [[AUP]].  I am planning on working on something relating to [https://panopticlick.eff.org/ Penopticlick] with [http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/users/hal/hal.html Prof. Hal Abelson].  I also need to take one more HASS-D, [[4.605|4.605, the History of Architecture]].  I am also taking [[6.933|6.933 Founders Journey]] where entrepreneurs come in and talk about their startups.  For example, in the first class, Paul English, one of the cofounders of Kayak shared his story. I am also "shopping" a number of other interesting-looking classes. --[[User:ThePlaz|ThePlaz]] ([[User talk:ThePlaz|talk]]) 00:57, 7 February 2013 (EST)
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I also received a very good deal financially in order to attend.  My parents and I paid about $10,000 per year to attend, about 1/5 the billed cost and perhaps 1/8 of MIT's estimated total spending per student.  It would have cost me more to have gone to a lower ranked schools, where I would have had far fewer opportunities.  I do have some debt, but I could pay it off today, with my cash on hand, if I wanted.
 +
 +
===Economic Mobility===
 +
MIT is also one of those auto ladders to the upper class.  It won't necessarily get you in the top 1% (~$350,000/year household income) or at least not immediately, but it will at least get into the top 10% (once you control for household size) almost right from the start.  MIT and the other ivy league schools with generous financial aid policies are probably one of the 10 most important factors for social mobility in the world.  I'm making more than both of my parents made last year, combined, my first year out of school.
 +
 
 +
==What I learned==
 +
===Focus and Intensity===
 +
MIT is like bootcamp for your brain.  Everyday is not fun.  I've had days where I was so tired I couldn't wait to get to sleep, but I still had work to do.  There were days where I didn't think I could manage everything I had to do, or days when I thought I was going to fail a test.  However, in the end, just like real bootcamp, in that it is an intense experience that is worth it in the end.
 +
 
 +
The unofficial motto of MIT is IHTFP.  This can either mean "I have truly found paradise" or "I hate this fucking place" depending on your mood that day.  Another benefit is that everyone is in the same boat.  One of the ways you can help deal with the stress is to commiserate with other students.  Since we don't have honors on degrees, the competition is not strictly against each other, but against the work and the challenge.  There is also competition with students at other schools for the best jobs.  I think MIT would be fairly easy if you just tried to get through doing only the minimum amount of work possible.  There are a number of difficult GIRs, but they are hard to fail completelyInstead the difficulty is that most people here feel a need to do high quality work. 
 +
 
 +
One of the best parts is that everyone is all in when at MIT.  When you here you are singularly focused on education.  There aren't many distractions.  People, even those that live nearby, don't go home on the weekends.  This is a significant difference from what I've heard from my friends happens at other schools, where people have other commitments and go home.    This helps contribute to productivity.  I've found I am more productive when I am busier - as it forces me to focus.  Even though I get started early and force myself to work on stuff, I get stuff done faster under pressure.  In addition, when I go home for breaks I find that I am also much less productive at home.  I can't watch commercial television anymore, there is just too much redundancy and simplification.
 +
 
 +
When you look back, you remember the good parts, and forget the bad parts.  Plus, I've been told by MIT grads that after MIT, everything else after this is easy. 
 +
 
 +
===Analytical Ability===
 +
I think I am able to look at situations much more clearly now.  In part this is due to greater specific, content knowledge, but I think it's mostly because I think my analytic abilities have improved.  When I see something, I being to decompose the problem into multiple, independent sub-problems.  This process, which is the hallmark of management consultants, makes it easier to think about big problems.
 +
 
 +
Things in the world no longer seem random.  Instead things seem to fit into some sort of pattern or framework.  MIT also give you plenty of examples - over and over again in different situations.  For example, in high school, I didn't understand how the school board or township board of commissioners operated to approve a project.  I now understand this much better, not only so I can interact with, but so I can analyze and compare the process.
 +
 
 +
===Management Ability===
 +
I see a huge difference in how I interacted at my [[Disney]] internship after junior year and how I interacted at my [[Deutsche Bahn]] internship. At DB, I broke every rule in the MBA playbook, since I was not aware of them at the time. On the other hand, at Disney, I was much more aware of the rules and I worked much more in concert with the organization. 
 +
 
 +
Although it seemed like I had a greater impact at the Deutsche Bahn project (designing the UI of the [[Touch&Travel]] app), I think this is because I got very lucky with the Deutsche Bahn project - I was in the right place at the right time, and I augmented a skill-set that they lacked.  Disney was much more on top of it, but I also tried to not reach too far beyond my own role, which is probably the best long-term  strategy for a manager in a big firm.
 +
 
 +
==What I did==
 +
===Academic===
 +
It also took me a while to adjust to MIT.  I came in fairly not well prepared.  However, I did better than I did the previous term 6 of the 7 terms.  I ended up with a 4.4 GPA, which is respectable, but not on the high end.
 +
[[File:MIT GPA.png]]
 +
 
 +
I sampled a lot of fields at MIT.  I was a double major of [[Management]] and [[Computer Science]].  I also took about a class or two which were not strictly required for either of my majors many terms.  I took 7 classes a term three of my terms here.  This amounts to almost double the average of 48 units a term.
 +
 
 +
I did fairly poorly my first few years.  I came into MIT not really being prepared.  I even took the "easy"-version of [[Calculus]] in high school.  Other MIT students did math competitions in high school, which I wasn't even aware of, and if I was, I would have never considered joining, as I didn't have the drive to improve my skills back then, as I do now.
 +
 
 +
In addition, as with many MIT students, I never really had to study in high school.  My first semester was a shock to me, as I wrote about in [[Learning to Learn]].  Since then, I used those techniques all of the time, and greatly improved my ability to learn stuff.  I wish I have known that in high school, so I would be better prepared for MIT-level work.  I think I would do far better if I was able to retake those classes.
 +
 
 +
===Management Experience===
 +
On the management side, I think I cracked the code about how to get stuff done at MIT.  In my 4 years, I've made connections with people at every level from the line staff to President Reif.  I remember reading every page on the MIT First Year website super carefully in the summer before MIT.  Once I got here, I learned more about the inside working of those policies and the politics behind them; I even helped shape some of the policies.
 +
 
 +
I think every MIT focuses on something.  I just happened to focus a lot on Institute management and politics.  I learned a great deal from this arrangement.  From my position on various [[Institute committees]] on both the student life and academic sides, I got to know the Institute's leadership. I got to work with a real-life $2 billion dollar organization and understand how its leaders operate and how it makes decisions at every level.  I developed my ability to inflence and persuade, writing up what I learned in a [[:File:Unrelenting_Advocacy.pdf|white paper for future student advocates]].
 +
 
 +
With [[Baker Exec]], I got the opportunity to run an organization with about 20 volunteers and a $50,000 budgetIt had its ups and downs, but I got to [[Baker President|learn a lot]] from how much autonomy to give subordinates to how to motivation volunteers to setting high-level strategy.
 +
 
 +
It also got me thinking about policy design with the [[Baker Rooming Policy]], [[Baker Security Plan]], and the [[Framework for Student Engagement]].  Policy design is a lot like programming, you have to anticipate every edge case.
 +
 
 +
I started to do this at [[Disney]], and now I need to do it at [[Oracle]].  I must learn the new players in the game and adapt to that situation.
 +
 
 +
===MOOCs: MITx and edX===
 +
I was also very fortunate to being in the right place at the right time with the roll out of [[EdX]].   Since early high school, I've wanted to improve the world's access to educational materials. I started scanning and putting all of my notes available online in 8th grade.  When I started this, I remember being influenced by MIT's OCW program.  Because of this, I ran for the undergraduate spot on [[MITCET]], the MIT Committee on Educational Technology.  While I was on the committee, it came to light that then-Provost Rafael Reif wanted to counter Stanford's AI class with an Institute-wide initiative of our own. I was involved in the initial discussions with MITCET and then-Provost Reif on how the new group should be organized with respect to MIT. In that memo, I proposed a platform which I called "EDUx" as a software platform which would help both MOOCs and traditional classes. This was about 6 months before MIT and Harvard announced "edX".
 +
 
 +
==Looking Back==
 +
I would certainly come to MIT again. The quality of the exits and the experience that one can have here is almost unparalleled (save perhaps Harvard and Stanford, but they have slightly different twists but are otherwise on-par).
 +
 
 +
I sought a non-traditional exit from MIT by going to the management track of a large company.  I think many MIT students try to either start their own firm or go into engineering at large tech firms like Facebook or Dropbox.  That never particularly appealed to me, so I didn't prepare enough for those roles.
 +
 
 +
I'm sad to leave.  There are a number of things that I know I will never be able to replicate.  Living in Baker was amazing.  Not only is it a architectural landmark with million-dollar views and handmade, hardwood furniture but it had my friends living right next door.  I had plenty of amazing conversations at 2am when friends just stopped by my open door.  In work, especially at the entry level, you focus on one or two things at once.  Only once you rise through the ranks, must you balance multiple challenges again, but you still generally have a small set of goals. 
 +
 
 +
===What would I do differently?===
 +
As I said before, I wish I would have prepared more in [[HHS|high school]].  I should have been less reliant on sites like HotMath and studied more intensely to master the material.  I just didn't have the interest, focus, or role models at the time.
 +
 
 +
At the end of [[MIT Freshman|freshman year]], I said that I wanted to focus on classes while at MIT, because I felt like that was an experience that I wanted to maximize while I had access to those resources (ie. was paying tuition).  I've since learned that there are many other resources which are only available to one while they are at MIT, such as close contact to the many very smart people here.  Perhaps I could have focused more on those; but on the other hand, I don't know which classes I would have skipped instead - besides the ones I had to take, but I didn't enjoy.
 +
 
 +
If I was targeting an engineering role, I should have focused more on quality and engineering classes.  I could have just focused on engineering, worked as an engineer for two years, and then have gone to business school.  However, as I confirmed when I was at [[CardSpring]] last [[IAP]], I don't think I would have found concentrating as an engineer to be very fun.
 +
 
 +
I wish I would have spent more time with my peers. I think I made a good number of close friends, but I always think I should have done more.  I never really spent much time on the [[Sloan]] side because I never really paid attention to Sloan events or classmates.
 +
 
 +
I wish I had taken on more leadership roles.  At first, I thought that I liked to be in the background, but being [[Baker President|President of Baker]] helped me see that I like being in the spotlight as well.  I was also cautious with my time.  I could have been more directly involved in the [[UA]]. Looking back, I actually held less formal positions than my title suggested.
 +
 
 +
I wish I did more to learn more advanced [[Computer Science]] topics.  I can learn more in the future, but I might not be around the smart peers.  Compilers are still magic to me.  I still don't know the internals of JavaScript and advanced topics like closures.  Design patterns are still a bit cloudy.  I've come a long way since high school, but I still have a lot to learn.
 +
 
 +
I think part of the problem was is that I didn't know where I wanted to end up.  I still really don’t.  I wrote a [[What Drives Me and What I Want to Do|vision document]] my last week of summer before [[MIT Senior|senior year]].  It was two pages or so, but it wasn't helpful.  There were many possible paths to implementation which I was unsure between.  Still I am fairly happy with where I ended up.
 +
 
 +
I threw away some opportunities as well.  For example, I was well positioned to work in the MOOC space.  However, I was just not interested in it.  Instead, I took a position for which I didn't have an inside connection on.  Do I just get too bored too quick?
 +
 
 +
I think MIT misses some things from not being a larger school like Harvard or Stanford.  For example, there is no law school nearby, so people don't really think about those things.  MIT is also more centralized, than entrepreneurial.  I think I would have been slightly more entrepreneurial than management oriented at Stanford.
 +
 
 +
For that matter, I did very little to reach out to the outside community. For example, despite knowing about it in high school and being on their mailing list I only went to one [http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/ Harvard Berkman Center] event.  I just never got to opening up their emails and adding them to my calendar.  I probably also would have been too busy to make the ~20-30 min trip up to Harvard.
 +
--[[User:ThePlaz|ThePlaz]] ([[User talk:ThePlaz|talk]]) 00:57, 7 February 2013 (EST)
 
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Resume

Welcome to ThePlaz.com

the site for all things Michael Plasmeier (ThePlaz)

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MIT Senior edit

Fall
  • Schedule
  • 7.012 Intro to Biology
  • 6.046 Advanced Algorithms
  • 6.858 Computer and Network Security
  • 14.72 Capitalism and its Critics
  • STS.085 Ethics and the Law on the Electronic Frontier
  • 2.009 Product Design Process (Listener)
  • 15.062 Data Mining (Listener)
Spring

MIT Junior edit

Fall
  • 6.004 Computation Structures
  • 6.005 Elements of Software Construction
  • 6.034 Artificial Intelligence
  • STS.011 Ethics and Politics in Science and Technology
  • 15.387 Technology Sales and Sales Management
  • 15.665 Power and Negotiation
  • 18.03 Differential Equations
  • Working out a System - How I take 7 classes at MIT and thrive
Spring
  • Spring Schedule
  • 6.033 Computer System Engineering
  • 6.813 User Interface Design and Implementation
  • 6.006 Introduction to Algorithms
  • 15.571 Business Strategy and the Role of IT
  • 15.565 Digital Evolution: Managing Web 3.0
  • 15.301 Managerial Psychology Laboratory
  • 18.06 Linear Algebra

MIT Sophomore edit

Fall
  • 6.01 Intro to EECS (Potpourri Introduction)
  • 6.041 Probabilistic Systems Analysis
  • 14.01 Principles of Microeconomics
  • 15.501 Corporate Financial Accounting
  • 15.567 Econ of Information
  • 16.71 Airline Industry
Spring
  • 4.211 The Present and Future City
  • 6.02 Intro to EECS 2 (Communications)
  • 6.042 Math for Computer Science (Potpourri Introduction)
  • 14.02 Microeconomics
  • 15.279 Intro to Managerial Communications
  • 15.401 Intro to Finance
  • 15.761 Operations Research
  • ESD.051 Engineering, Innovation, and Design (Listener)
Politics

MIT Freshman edit

Fall

  • 8.01 Physics: Mechanics - Prof. Greytak
  • 3.091 Intro to Solid State Chemistry - Prof. Sadoway
  • 18.01 Single Variable Calculus - Prof. Brubaker
  • MAS.110 Fundamentals of Computational Media Design - Prof. Bove
  • 6.A53 Entrepreneurship and China Advising Seminar - Dr. Eng
  • SocialSaver UROP at the MIT Media Lab
  • Learning to Learn at MIT - My "near fail" experience that caused me to pull it together

Spring

Other Stuff

Nuvola apps kpovmodeler.png AP Physics (Science)

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Outlines

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Essays and Reports

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Latin 3

Projects
Notes
Journals

Double Entry Journals have 2 components: What I Learned (a summery), and Personal Response (a reflection)

Latin 2

Projects
  1. Roman Travel Project
  2. Sejanus
  3. Echo and Narcissus Myth
  4. The Journey of the Hero
Journals

Latin 1

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Nuvola filesystems folder blue open.png 8th Grade

Nuvola filesystems folder blue open.png 7th Grade

Nuvola apps kuser.png About Me edit

Michael Plasmeier Spring 2009 Narrow.JPG
Michael Plasmeier
"ThePlaz"
Yahoo APM: Membership and Geo Platforms

My name is Michael Plasmeier, but almost everyone calls me Plaz. I am a Associate Product Manager at Yahoo - working on the Membership and Geo-related platforms teams. I graduated from MIT in 2013 in Computer Science and Management. I am halfway between the tech and the business world, doing both web development and product development. My interest in doing both started while I was working on GridView, an app I built after 10th Grade that reached 1.3 million users on Facebook.

Internships

Last IAP, I was a Software Development Extern doing testing in Ruby on the back end at CardSpring. Last summer, I was Product Manager at Disney Parks and Resorts Online where I worked on a project for Disney Cruise Line. Last January, I worked in management/strategy consulting at Altman Vilandrie & Company. The previous summer, I was a web developer at NextJump, an online affiliate advertising firm in New York. Prior to that, I was an extern in the Office of the Chief Scientist at State Street. My freshman summer I worked at Deutsche Bahn, the German national railroad, where I designed the smartphone version Touch&Travel, an app that lets you pay for the train with your phone.

MIT

At MIT I was heavily involved in classes, usually taking 7 classes a term, while being involved in student government. (I wrote about how I do it in Working out a System.) senior was dedicated to wrapping up requirements. Junior year at MIT I focused on EECS classes, as well as being elected president of Baker House. My second year at MIT focused on management classes. I was also involved in the vendor selection and implementation of the new dining plan. Freshman year, I took core classes and served on the Athena and Printing Committee. (I wrote about just hanging on freshmen year in Learning to Learn.)

Websites

I built a lot of web projects in high school. My most popular project, was GridView [1], an app for Facebook which lets you add the profile pics of all of you're friends to your Facebook profile. GridView had over 1.3 million users and made me some money.

I hosted and produced the video podcast Tecker 911 [2] along with some of my friends. Tecker 911 was a series of 100 5-15 minute shows each which covers a technology topic in a way which is relevant for ordinary people, with a focus towards students and our community. Tecker 911 was also shown on our local public access channel Channel 11.

I started SeniorQuoter, [3] an open-source web application for senior quotes collections for high school yearbooks. In 11th Grade, I lead a Dynamic Website Building Instruction and Practical Experience Group Study at my high school. I helped 4 other students learn PHP and MySQL and then I project managed version 2 of SeniorQuoter, the administration interface.

Tecker and Conflicter were question and answer services I built in 10th Grade. They never really caught on, but they were the perfect way to learn PHP. Dictionary Robot is something I tarted last year, but abandoned later. In 10th Grade, I was a member of Team 484 and in 11th Grade I was their webmaster.

In 8th and 9th Grades I wrote bunch of programs for the TI-83+.

Tech

My first two years at MIT, I was a regular on The Weekly Spin, a weekly take on tech stories and tech policy.

On my Tech page I have had a few pages about Devices I own and other small things that I have built. For example, I also made some improvements for MediaWiki, the software that runs ThePlaz.com and Wikipedia. I made a new skin for MediaWiki and a few MediaWiki extensions


Other Accounts

I also tag a lot of stories on Delicious. I also have over 70,000 photos on Flickr. I Tweet kinda regularly. I also post things to YouTube. And of course I have a Facebook. It all comes together on my FriendFeed.

Website Content

On my site you will find:

  • Updates on what I am involved in
  • Links to my other projects
  • My comments on the world
  • Photos and videos I have taken
  • School work and notes I have made
School Work

I hope that this knowledge will help people less-fortunate than me persevere and succeed. All of my work is under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 license, meaning that you may use it and re-post it anywhere as long as you post my name/nickname, provide a link back to my site, and don't make money off my work. Many people visit my site from overseas where the school system is not as good. See Site Mission Statement for more

    • For 9th Grade I have posted projects I did on the computer
    • For 10th Grade I have posted not only my work I made on a computer but laboriously scanned all of my handwritten notes and worksheets
    • For 11th Grade I am only posting my own notes (no worksheets) from very structured classes; I am scaling back
    • For 12th Grade I used a tablet PC, so I have posted my OneNote notebooks from the class
    • For MIT Freshman year, I used a tablet PC for the first semester; realized this was a bad idea; so I used paper which I scanned and released as large PDFs the second semester. Note MIT actually does the same thing I do with MIT OCW.
    • For MIT Sophomore I will continue to post large, comprehensive PDFs.
    • See also my Notes Key
Tech

Theweeklyspin.png The Weekly Spin

The Weekly Spin is a weekly rant about technology and tech policy with Michael Gdovin. We often cover the cell phone industry, the FCC, DRM, and Michael likes to throw in some Apple rumors.

Download the latest episodes: TheWeeklySpin.com Audio Podcast

Nuvola apps laptop pcmcia.png Student Tools edit

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ThePlaz in often mentioned or interviewed in the news

MIT
MIT Dining
MITx/EdX
Baker Piano Drop
Tecker 911
GridView
ThePlaz.com Praise
  • Sam's Praise about my site
  • Baron Harkonnen's Thanks
  • Thanks for uploading Flickr photos
  • Uses Many ThePlaz.com Wiki features
  • A Drexel professor told me on the first day of class that I take very good notes and I would graduate suma cum laude from Harvard due to the quality of my notes at Gov School
  • Hi I saw your page about that download for the ferris wheel unit for IMP4, I didn't download it but even the info you had on the page helped me out. I have no idea what I'm doing and just started this year- i really get stuck on my homework EVERY night. Right now im working on HW 2 "As the ferris wheel turns" and i have no idea what I'm doing. But i just wanted to say thanks cause I'm gonna download that once I'm farther into the unit!--A Facebook user (J. S.)
  • Just wanted to let you know: I stole your headline method of note taking from your website and it is completely saving my life in American Studies. -Rebecca C.
  • Hey, you do have one of the best designed websites I have seen lately. Good job. A little flashy, but still functional. --Email comment 8/18/2010
Videos

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Tecker 911 Logo.png Tecker 911

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Trips/Vacations
Universities
MIT
Haverford High School
Places/Events/Daytrips

(need to update)

Tech/Unboxing/Products
Pictures on the Wikimedia Commons

TI-83--rotated.png TI-83+ Stuff edit

Nuvola apps kcmprocessor.png Tech Stuff edit

I am a lot into technology. Here are links to some of my web sites as well as modifications and how-to articles about other software.

My Websites
Devices
MediaWiki Tweaks
Essays/Thoughts
Other

Nuvola apps gaim.png Miscellaneous edit

Nuvola apps remote.png Site Statistics edit

For up-to-date info see Special:Statistics

There are 6,499 total pages in the database, including 1,578 pages in the main namespace and 5,000 files uploaded. These counts do not include OneNote notebooks on minisites or SkyDrive, and count multi-page files (PDF and Word) as one page.

There have been a total of 5,163,449 page views, and 16,470 page edits since ThePlaz.com was setup. That comes to 2.53 average edits per page, and 313.51 views per edit.