About Me

I grew up in a corner of rural Ontario that is still home to horses and buggies, and roadside maple syrup stands. Despite this, or because of it, I developed a keen interest in media, especially how communities form around media.

Naturally, I was nearly thrown out of high school for publishing an independent student newspaper. A couple of years later, at the Ontario College of Art and Design, I did the same thing and got extra credit. The OCAD paper was called Fishwrap.

My growing preoccupation with media and technology led to partnering with a couple of my Fishwrap collaborators to form one of Canada’s first digital design companies. We called it Mackerel. (The fish thing was kind of a theme for us).

Read Cory Doctorow’s wonderful telling of the Mackerel Story. Photo credit: Patti Gower

In the years since, I’ve devoted more than 50,000 hours of my life to this industry, leading hundreds of UX design projects. During the dot com boom, I created a streaming video community called Talkback TV, years before YouTube. I made mobile apps for a national news network when Blackberry was the leading smartphone; then I had my mind blown by the first iPhone, and adapted. I have designed language learning products for Rosetta Stone, and professional financial products for S&P Global.

Our industry has always evolved rapidly, and part of the thrill is knowing that much will be different in 5 years. That seems to be average the lifespan of “best practices.” Then there are days when you have to forget about technology, and just think about the foundational principles of design and storytelling — voice, ink on paper, humans connecting with humans. From there you can make your own best practices.

I am truly eager to hear about your ideas, and to find out how we can work together to build great things.