What was your first job as a journalist?
I don't know i I consider myself a journalist, but the first writing I did were regular quick takes in BusinessWeek's Debate Room.
Have you ever used a typewriter?
When I was very little just to see what it was like.
How is social media changing news?
It's making news faster, shorter, and in many ways, reactive and stenographic, with trends and hashtags ruling coverage.
Who's your favorite fictional journalist?
Can't say I have one.
What does it mean to be a journalist?
I'll let you know when I figure it out.
What tools and software do you use to do your job?
Microsoft Word, Google Docs, WordPress, JetBrains Rider, Visual Studio, JetBrains Rider, Goland, MySQL, AWS, Redis, Kafka
What's your favorite social network?
That's like asking what one's favorite injury is.
Who do you wish followed you?
Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos. I have some space-related ideas to run past them.
Why did you become a journalist?
I'm not sure I am one, but if I were to be considered one, it was pure chance. I just started writing and people started reading.
Did you work for your high school newspaper? If so, what did you do there?
Nope. I did get to write a scathing op-ed in my high school newspaper once but that was it until well after college.
What story are you most proud of writing or working on?
My story on monetizing misery and frustration on social media. It received a lot of positive comments from psychologists.
What advice can you offer to aspiring journalists?
Have a backup. No, seriously.
When's the best time to pitch you?
When you have a cool science or tech story in mind.
What's the best pitch you ever got?
A scientist sent me his paper showing concrete proof that Bigfoot sightings may actually be bear encounters.
What's the worst pitch you ever got?
I've received more than my fair share of nonsense from cranks pitching only Cthulhu knows what snake oil and convoluted gibberish...
What's your favorite drink?
Depends on the time of day and the kind of day I've had...
When you're not at a computer, where are you most likely to be?
At another computer.
Aside from your own, what's your favorite publication to read?
Quanta, Ars Technica, Aeon, Eureka, Inverse, the list goes on. If it's nerdy, I'm probably reading it daily.
What's the most common misperception about your beat?
Popular science and tech writers don't get to do a lot of cool stuff. We just read a lot of papers and do a lot of our own research.
