Heath {103311.1246@compuserve.com}

Through my own determination, and help from a chick named Evie, I got a job with this amazing company called Modem Media. It's an interactive advertising agency. So now I design web sites for Delta Air Lines. It's very cool. I am constantly bombarded by new technology and I am in heaven. I love what I do cuz it's in a constant state of flux.

The people I work with are crazy, in a good way of course. Headphones are not a require- ment and the louder the music the better. It's the first place that I've worked where I actually enjoy hanging out with my co-workers. I wish you could see the big smile on my face.

peace & jah love,

mouse...

Melanie Ferguson {mferguson@modemmedia.com}

Once, I was. I was called back to fulfill the position of webmaster. I had been a victim of a layoff five months prior. At that time, I worked technical support just to say I did.

They gave me big money, they gave me big stock. I have five machines and a lax schedule. I can even telecommute.

It use to be fun - a rush. The more we focused on pushing the web site towards "a profitable model", the more it was stressful.

I visited Netscape one day. Toured the engineering building, in fact. That was a rush. Perhaps it was a high. Walking through those corridors, knowing what I know, I know I have to work there.

It continues.. Hopefully, my love affair with Netscape will pay off. I've painted a picture of myself, sitting quietly in a cubicle, lost in the infrastructure, enjoying a bliss I've always wanted. People think working in a children's software company is fun. It's not. People think the web is the end-all be-all of existence. It's not.

Call me a romantic, but it's just not fun.

I want to be stoked again.

Eric {eric@scenario.com}

I didn't really mean to write this um (poem?), but it happened. I am really starting to think that 90% of the people that work on computer are idiots.

Example #1: This guy came in to work today and asked me if I could come and work on his pc at home cause he was having problems. After pondering for a while, i said with a devious grin on my face, "Yes, yes I can.....but.....I charge 20 an hour." This did't seem to bother him at all. So, I get over there and I have to fix this and that on his computer. This is the point in the story where it starts to get interesting. He just had this computer in for a whole week in a computer shop to get it fixed and working properly. Well, that sure as hell didn't happen otherwise he wouldn't have needed me. So, after 4 hours I had everything that wasn't working, working, and everything he wanted installed, installed,set up working also. I had to set up his Sharp organizer to talk to his computer and vise versa. This was one of the things that the guy at the computer store couldn't get working. I took me 15 minutes. Strange, sometimes I wonder -out loud I might add- WHAT THE HELL DO THESE SO CALLED COMPUTER EXPERTS DO WITH THEIR TIME?

Example #2: I am at work, and my pc decides to freak out so I figure I will just reformat it. It is a simple thing really (???), so after chasing down ever single person in the whole site that works there -or claimed to, I am not picky- I tried to get the instructions on how to fix disk. They proceeded to tell me it was easy and to follow the directions. I did, and it didn't work. I was now on a vengence. I -ONCE AGAIN- went to find someone to tell me how to fix disk the computer and was told again that 'it's easy, follow the directions.' BUT oh no, I wouldn't stand for that. I made them tell me how to do it and turns out it wasn't 'easy.' So, I go back to fix disk it again after wasting and hour already. After another hour, it still didn't work. I -ONCE AGAIN- .... 'is there and echo in here?' went to find someone to tell me what the hell was going on. I took no shortcut, would not allow anyshort cuts, I went straight to the top (or the bottom as I soon realized) and he looked up at me with this 'dull dumb founded stare (refer to the poem at the top for clairification)' and said I don't know. It is then I came to the realization that if it was to be done at all, it must be done by one self. Then I looked at the clock and it was 10:20 (20 minutes past when I get off work and for the records, you don't get paid for extra time). This is when the most intense and enthralling revalation hit me - GOVERNMENT AGENCYS SUCK, WORK FOR THE PRIVATE SECTOR. And that is just what I plan on doing.

P.S. If mispelled words is a sign of ignorance, then disreguard this message and proceed on in life thinking everthing is Peachy.

P.S.S. For the records, any persons resembling live people is purely a coindence.

P.S.S What made me write this I will never know.

P.S.S.S Um, then again, maybe is was frustration of idiots.

P.S.S.S.S This was ment to be a letter to friends, then I read the fray (again) and saw your story on work and it cheered me up. I thought this story might bring a couple of smiles to a couple of faces.

Adam Pfeiffer {shaggy@asu.edu}

Lance {unstoked@glassdog.com}

I often wish I had the life of those I see around me... I don't have many friends, which has meant that the pursuit of friends has become my singular goal and constant source of disappointment. When I'm in the right mood, which tends to come in cycles, I'm a really silly guy and people think I'm swell. But soon my confidence fades, I can't think of anything to say, and I'm alone again. The fact that I married a wonderful woman has made things much better, and I realize I have it much better than so many people do.

Like the author, I started my job here about a year ago. Upstairs from him, in fact. I haven't felt the turmoil, the intense frustration and elation he clearly felt, and I certainly never had such an emotional attachment to my company (though that's at least partially because it never had any such attachment to me). But I can't believe how far I've come in this year, and I never would have guessed a year ago, sitting in a comfortable but mundane life in Iowa City, that I would be here, doing what I am doing. I suppose my life is still too mundane, even in SF, but I'm working on it. Regardless, I'm still me, and I'm stoked to be me.

I'm going back home in two days. I wonder if they'll recognize me...

pgreen

phoug {faido@netcom.com}

Right now, I am completing the last three shots of about thirty five that we are doing for Baz Luhrman's new film of Romeo and Juliet.

It truly is a gorgeous movie and I am very proud to be involved in making it a reality.

I love all the small parts of film making, I love how they all come together to make a work that can be appreciated by so many people, over a long period of time.

I especially love the craft of Visual Effects, it's a dream job and I am definitely stoked. %)

Peter Webb {tjebi@mpx.com.au}

filo {filobedo@bonejangler.com}

I've found that to be a really defining feeling. Especially in the world of technology. But I'm stoked with my job anyway. I've been here for over a year, designing web sites, coming up with ideas to keep our company afloat. Sometimes I feel like I'll just walk out...quit...because sometimes it really sucks having everyone bash my designs, my ideas. But some days, when I hear people talk about what they do, I get stoked thinking about how much I love my job....the creativity, the freedom, the fact that when it finally really catches on here, I'll be the one saying, "I've been here all along," and most likely, "You like that? I did that site...thanks!" I get stoked thinking about the fact that I know more about this then my former bosses....that feeling of power at being an "expert" at something....And I am STOKED about the process of creation I go through, that wholely unique sensation that I'm doing something NO ONE has done before. And when I finish a job...it feels good to put it down and go on to the next, wholely new project, idea, creation.

And you can do that anywhere. Even in Cincinnati.

susan {netgrl@cinti.net}

-S.

Oddball {oddball@mich.com}

Natalie

Robin Miller {roblimo@primenet.com}

i used to be stoked, i guess. right now, though, school is becoming more demanding at the same pace my job is, and i don't know how much longer i can stand it. money is getting tighter and tighter, and i have to keep paying for school and, naturally, my home computer just blew up a few weeks ago and now i have nothing except my work computer, which is no good because my bosses get pissed at me for using it for net.stuff.

right now, i'm giving people large sums of money because they help people with debilitating diseases. or i'm telling them that they can't have any money because the work they do isn't special enough. it breaks my heart to turn down an organization that does something good for people, but i suppose there's only so much money to be given. although it is heartwarming to see that some people actually do *care*.

this afternoon, i have to coordinate some United Way campaign stuff, send out some more gift certificates, and run to three other buildings to hand stuff out to employees.

i really need a drink. tuesday we're having a huge industry event. monday night is a nice concert to slam away at. thursday i see my lover whom i haven't seen in two months. i'm just tired and cold.

hope everyone can get some stokedness somewhere. -cat!

cat

It wuz something i had longed to do....coming back. I landed back here after 9 long years in India. The crisp air, the mass of information, girls wearing short skirts, had me stokeD.

But then came high school. The feeling of rejection because i didn't dress a certain way, talked the talk and played with da players.

"phuck 'em". I still was StokeD.

Gradually, I managed to create the same outersking all people wore at school. The LeCheateu Clothes, the slang talk and the rebellious attitude. The new culture i had come into lost it's novelty and I wuz bored.

I was unhappy.

Skewl sucked. Classes were boring, teachers were square, and with a few exceptions, most of the people were hypocrites. I needed some more mental stimulation. I wanted to think; I wanted to create. I wanted out.

So i got into university. I hoped it would get me StokED again. I started Computer Engineer, something i had longed to do, only to find myself, once again, questioning my judgement of doing so.

I wuz learning theoretical theorems, superfulous formulae, day in and day out. With the exception of enjoying very few classes, i spent most of my day either procrastanating, or bitching.

Now i'm in third year of a 4 year program and I can't wait to get out of the hell hole. The feeling of beeing stoked is but a distant memory.

I need to be STokED again.

Maybe when i graduate, and i will be doing what i want to, maybe then i will be SToKED again.

Maybe everything will work out, and my shining armour would start being produced again, and the princess caged in the tower would reappear.

Maybe it won't. Maybe I'll never be STOKED. Maybe a memory is all that i will ever have.

Gorav {arorag@muss.cis.mcmaster.ca}

I'm a digital designer, primarily putting together Web sites for small businesses. I work for myself, in my house, and am still working out the whole discipline thang. My confidence in my work falters occasionally, and I often think it might be better if I was doing something else.

Then again, some days I kick ass, make a client happy, and truly feel warm and fuzzy about my work. Monkeybrain, my company, is personal, so nobody gets more satisfaction out of it, when it goes well, than I do. I write my own rules, set my own schedule, and choose and reject my own jobs. There're days when these aspects keep me remarkably stoked. Perhaps when work picks up a bit more, and I'm actually a little less stressed about paying bills, I'll be able to maintain this level of stokage continually. I hope so.

Wish me luck.

Matt {matt@monkeybrain.con.au}

as to fray. keep the flag flying - i'll be in SF soon. In the meantime if you need people let me know. I'll work for you.

nick

Nick Bicanic {nick@never.com}

Well to tell the truth, I am so stoked that I look forward to going in each day even without the pay. I sometimes even put in extra hours because I love what I'm doing so much. Well now, only after three months, I have been offered an interview for a position that someone else is vacating in the program with a sticker of about $9,000 a year more pay than the position I am holding. And the funding is there for it. Yeah, I'm stoked. I love what I'm doing. Even if I don't get the new position I will continue to hold the position I am in and work for free just because I love it so much.

I'm glad you guys do it, but I don't know how I would be able to stand being at a keyboard and looking at a monitor all day. I need to interact with people face to face and try to improve their quality of life that way instead of with a keyboard. And that is exactly what I am doing, I hope, is improve children's chances of succeeding in this thing called life by giving them and their families the skills to do it. Yeah, I'm stoked!!!

Charlene M. Gretsch {cgretsch@balista.com}

They are all MBA'S and know nothing but balance sheets. They have never managed a restaurant in their lives, and even if a couple of them have had the experience at one time or another in their careers, it has long since been lost because of their association with the Shirts with which they now find themselves working. It's a shame that things in business always seem to turn out like this, but I guess thats the way it is. Hell most of my co-managers do not love what they do for a living. They are hung up on being a MANAGER and thats what Stokes them. I just wish that they would get out of this business and go manage something else, and let the people whom love to provide good food to the public run the restaurants. If a person loves what he/she does, then whatever the endeavor, the result will be good, and everybody will get what they expect -- the customer a good product, and the company --- a happy customer and their profits.

JZ Smith {jzellys@ellijay.com}

First, before I go off on a bitter tirade against THE MAN, let me say that the stoked piece was quite possibly the best thing I have ever read on the web. I got a little choked up. Seriously. I'm better now though.

As to whether or not Iím stoked: Hell, No. Iím not even anywhere close to being stoked. I used to be stoked. It wasnít that long ago. My own chronicle, while not imbued with the inherent coolness of stoked (i.e. working at HotWired, living in San Francisco) , is similar in the journey.

There are several kinds of programmers in the world. Bit-twiddlers, drones, workhorses, and the dreamers. I am a dreamer. Tell me your problem and I solve it, and also solve other problems you didnít even know you had. I see the possibilities in technology. I saw tremendous possibilities in the net. Back when AOL kept saying it would never connect to the net. Back when usenet was worth a crap. Back when packet loss was a rarity and latency was 175 ms, even over a 28.8 PPP connection. 18 months ago.

So at the end of last year when I decided to go deep, deep, deep undercover at work and write an Intranet system,, I was stoked. Piece by piece it took shape: forums, directories, help for the lost, links for the bored, project areas for sharing information. It was cool. Really.

Imagine my surprise when I revealed my creation to the company and got silence. Not even disapproval, simply silence. They didnít care. To my horror, I realized it was worse, they didnít get it. The possibilities were not apparent to them. Never mind that they had something that they not only could use immediately in the company, but something that they could trot out and sell, to our customers. "How does this fit in with PowerBuilder," one of them asked. PowerBuilder. It gets good reviews, but if you are a real programmer you hate it. It may pay the bills, but that just makes you hate it more.

Then to add insult to injury. No one used it. Except for me, forlornly wandering the halls of my ether mansion. That was when I stopped being stoked.

I went to the World Wide Live brainwashing day at a movie theater while on my vacation in July. I got stoked again. I had plans upon plans. I had a whole notebook full of plans and sketches. I was really stoked. I went back to the drawing board on the Intranet. I designed a web site for our company that was more than an electronic business card. I had plans for two sites of my own. I was really, really stoked.

Recently I got told that all the work I put into doing that, and all the effort Iíve put into bring our company onto the net, not to mention all the personal time I spent learning how to do all these things, was worthless and that I was a detriment to the company. Really. The future is a Netscape plug-in for PowerBuilder. Get more productive or get lost. "Programmers are a dime a dozen and interchangeable. Anybody could do what you do," he said.

No, my friends, I am most definitely not stoked.

Preston A. Rickwood {rickwood@mindspring.com}

I was one of the first employees. A new New Media company...and just like all of the other new media startups, we were actually doing something no one else has done before.

It's amazing when I think about what has happened in the last year. We have all grown so much...inventing our own little corporate culture as we go along. We're about to move into a huge new office downtown and for this I am STOKED. Finally, our own place. It will lend an air of stability...which for a business like ours is HUGE. We all walked in here knowing that this thing could fall apart within months. But it hasn't, and now we're ALL stoked!

Corey Menscher {corey@adone.com}

Until I found out he worked for the P.D.

Oh well, it was fun anyway.

lightbeing {lon@jps.net}

To be honest, I have been stoked, in the sense of having something which can be thrown onto the fire, for a long time. Unfortunately, with the dreaded 30th birthday so close that I can smell its fetid breath, I now realize that what I was stoked with, I've too often thrown onto the wrong fires. I even feared that I was running out of fuel for the fire. I pursued, and then joined, the American middle class. I worked 16 hour days, made connections, learned. I became disillusioned, but I did learn. In the process, I built myself a life with which Iím not always comfortable.

For the last 8 months, I've been trying to figure out what I'm going to do when I grow up. Circumstance/Providence over the last 3 months has pointed me back to technophilia, writing, and something like art ... which is right where I was when I was 17 years old. The difference now is that I am unafraid. I have traded my twenties for "security." Learn from me. Thereís no such thing.

I have gained the courage to say bullshit to the whole corporate galley slave phenomenon. Granted, I'm only saying it under my breath right now, but I am saying it more frequently, and the volume is gradually increasing. I think John Perry Barlow has it right: bureaucracies are inept, not malign. It's not that I hate my employers: after all, it's through their largesse that I've got access to a mighty T1 trunk, and they are, in their own way, generous. But they are buying my time, which is the only coin I have to spend. I feel the time fast approaching when I will begin spending it myself.

As I write this, I'm preparing to spend the better part of my Sunday morning, and a chunk of the afternoon, processing intercompany transactions between 16 different subsidiary companies. Does this make me a hypocrite? No. It makes me just like most of the other 6 billion of us. Doing what I have to get by, and trying my damnedest to improve my lot. But Iíve got a plan, and hope. I really am stoked. Iíve got something to throw on the fire, again, at last. I think this will burn much brighter than my last attempts. I am writing again, after a 10 year hiatus.. I am getting ideas. I am writing query letters I am moving forward. God, it feels good.

Thanks, Fray people, for speaking your minds and giving up some of your privacy. Pray for me that my wild plans succeed. I know Iíll pray for you.

Tim {TKoruna@Limited.com}

Rebecca Miller {bcmiller@pop3.concentric.net}

But it's hard to stay stoked, when everyone around you can't see the forest for the trees. Ya gotta keep your goal in your mind's eye. Allatime.

DeltaS {kurneck+@pitt.edu}

I'd rather be cooking onion soup in a penniless artist community in Prague. I don't wanna spend my time and talent serving rich idiots.

anton salokorpi {kyosti.salokorpi@greypro.salomaa.fi}

i let myself be convinced to take a year off from school (at the least) and work for him . . .

little did i know how hard it can be to work with friends. unfortunately, criticism became personal attacks . . . promises didn't need to be kept . . .

yet it still feels like a betrayal when i think about leaving. i've made the decision to let him know soon. i just hope it doesn't ruin the merger or private placement.

theoretically, i'm supposed to be an officer of this company; i'd believe it if all the decisions weren't already made before i am notified. ugh.

i guess i am stoked though . . . i want to start a philosophy journal at school . . . i've got lots of ideas and enthusiasm. i love philosophy, writing, literature. i think i can pull it off.

i can't wait.

tim {reinert@carleton.edu}

Happy, yes.

Satisfied, yes.

I'm in a big company on a big project, but it's still friendly and personable. I'm learning a lot. Granted I don't get to make cool stuff that everyone on the internet can see, but hey, what are hobbies for?

Eric Mathiasen {emathias@wwa.com}

Now I design web pages, write c/s tools in Java, C and Perl, administrate my Linux box, waste my time coding a MOO, talk to people around the world, etc. And to those of you who insist that the Net is just TV patchlevel 2 (I think the name was Saron or something? Way back in the posts) I'd just like to note that

a) what you do with it is the real question and
b) every other word in your diatribe was misspelled.

The Net is the only real escape I have. The Net allows even the most geographically isolated people to create, think, build, discuss,and research regardless of stripe or, in my case, age.

Please do not tell me that my time would be better spent doing mindless homework or studying for one of my Bio teacher's facile 'pop' quizzes.

I could not withstand the boredom.

And yes, I am stoked. Right now. Here, bathed in the light of thousands of precious phosphors.

Of course, I won't be tomorrow at 9am.

Oh well.

BTW Does anyone actually bother to read these posts? :)

Chris "SnaFoo" Marston {cmarston@lands.ab.ca}

Rai {rai@happypuppy.com}

12.5.96

Today I leave HotWired.

It was an amazing stay and I learned so much: about the web, about myself.

As of January 6 I will be a producer for a young, idealistic web company. I'm looking forward to it.

The other night my friend Jim asked me if I was going to be stoked again.

I thought about it a bit.

The answer I came up with was "yes ... but differently stoked." An older and wiser kind of stoked.

Never again will I assume that a company I work for will do the right thing. Never again will I assume that they have my best interests at heart. But, most of all, never again will I define who I am by where I work.

derek m. powazek {floyd@fray.com}

I've gone from a few contracts to a few contracts, with new media becoming a larger and larger part every time.

It's exciting at first and then you start working longer and longer and getting less and less out of it. I'm stoked, the fire's burnin', but then it starts to die out.

This column triggered something in me...I remember...

I was sitting down and I had read about Mosaic a few months earlier in Wired. It sounded cool, but I only had a little laptop that didn't do Windows.

Then I had a machine with Windows and a 2400 baud modem...I downloaded Mosaic...fired it up...and I was stoked...

Text ... formatted ... and pictures...

I was working on some films at the time, then I started doing some html, but it wasn't my job...I was stoked on a shoot...but someday...and then I started using the web more, then I started teaching the stuff a bit and then I produced stuff for a year...now it's time for some new wood, but this time I'm picking it out and it's for me and I can't wait, because you've triggered some memories and sparked the fire again...thanks

Chris Campbell {chrisc@nbnet.nb.ca}

So why did I quit? The company thinks people who go to school aren't going to stick around--it's sort of an unsaid policy not to promote enthusiastic college kids. All the executives get their degrees after they become executives. It sounds strange, but it's true.

Fine then, I thought. I'll be a smart guy. I'll immerse my self in school and teach myself about all this "new media."

So I get hired as the news editor/ temporary webmaster for the campus newspaper. The people I'm around, not just at the office but at school in general, are very different from me. Their parents fund their every move. They revel in the fakeness of their little cliques, be it a fraternity or a sqaudren of hipsters. Nobody wants to be sincere in public.

I feel like, no matter how hard I work, there will always be well-funded backstabbers that will always come out ahead of me.

I'd like to just be a regular blue-collar guy, but I can't get promoted at a job like that unless I keep my desire for education private. What should I do?

Nick Suffix {vivmj@pe.net}

chris {ccurtiss@nmc.uoregon.edu}

al stern {astern@mail.idt.net}

I'm not really sure. I've asked myself that question more and more this last year. Most of my friends think I am. I have a great, "steady" job, a wife who loves me, great friends, and a strong church behind me. I am pretty content with the life God has given me. But stoked? What does it take to be stoked?

I remember being stoked about Legos. I could make anything with them, and I did. The need to create has never left me. Really, the projects I do now are the visual descendants of the obsessive Legocraft I loved as a child.

I work for an educational software company. On my cards, it says, "Marketing Graphics Guy". It was a suitably vague title for the broad area of responisibility I have. This is my first job out of school; it practically landed on my lap. The first year, looking back, was kind of frustrating, but some important lessons were learned:

1. Just because the company has lots of cash, and lots of "experts", doesn't mean they know what they're doing.
2. The Educational market is lame, but at least I don't have to design for some plumbing company.
3. Don't become attached to your work. I spent the first year slaving away on a product that was never marketed well (and thus never sold), and now is relegated to the bin of nothingness. I was pretty mad, but I realized what good training it was for later (now, that is).
4. Find people you like and work with them. If you don't like them, examine yourself and find out why- and be honest with yourself.
5. Stick up for yourself, and ask for what you want. This was the hardest for me.

I know I'm rambling. If you've read this far, you probably don't mind. But, at least someone asked. I was stoked when I found fray- we are the next generation of worker bees, and someone has to make us look inward and demand to know our dreams, grand or small.

Allan White {awhite@pierian.com}

Cynthia Rapak {crapak@sfsu.edu}

Rena {reebob@icess.ucsb.edu}

shar {shar@best.com}

Caryl {emarcon@tallships.istar.ca}

steve rullman {muse3000@aol.com}

joseph {thenewhouse@earthlink.net}

Desperately Seeking Stoked:

1) On verge of hating current empoyment.

2) Luckily, interview for dream job is lined up.

3) Fingers are crossed, resume is finessed.

4) Will return upon reaching elusive "Stokedness"

Ima Tikett Holder {CanBeBought@NameYurPrice.com}

Why? I like design, in fact I am addicted, but there is no creativity, no originallity allowed here. I can feel it being slowly sucked from my soul to satisfy those who gravitate to the mediocore.

Someday. . .

I must endure until then. . .

I hope that I can

Jason {youngjm@irn.pdx.edu}

fc brandt {bainst@etheria.com}

Now, I'm looking to be as un-stoked as I can be in a small out of the way place - throwing pots and singing softly to myself as I wonder through the wilderness.

Cliff Vick {cvick@usa.net}

alan timms {atimms@adelaide.on.net}

natalie

oh sure, i had a high-paying job that put me in the top whatever percent in SF. oh sure, i was working in "new media" doing "web development". oh sure -- i had options and was looking at only burning 4 years of my life to get the promise of these perhaps mythical "options". oh sure i had the title, the job, the money and the equity...

it sucked. it SUCKED.

so i left, and joined a startup that i'm one of the co-founders of - that i'm one of the owners of.

and i'm so stoked.

derek... having your own product rocks. i know. but having your own company...

do it. now.

chris {chris@enginered.com}

It's funny... I'm 19 years old and just a few years ago I was on the "other" end of the Internet. Just a kid in High School who used Prodigy more than the "net" and swore that "Political Science" was the major to be in... damn... I guess I've changed.

I became a web developer by mistake... I was just looking for a job while I was in college... good thing those "mom and pop ISP's" were around. I was the tech support guy... you know the one, "Hi, (add your fav ISP), can I help you?". That was me... but then the company started to dig in my brain and realize that I had experience in some HTML and graphic design. So I was thrusted into the business making extremely boring low budget ( under $1500.00) web sites for people who had no idea about design, content, creativity, and quality. I worked a long side another "web designer" (damn there are so many huh!?) who's ambition was to be a C++ coder. I made up my mind then that coders were not creative! I also worked with a Graphic Designer straight out of junior college who's major accomplisment was a picture of SHAQ infront of a gradient background.

I was disgrunteled with the web. Can I make this my career? Everyone said "NO" Then I met Mike Lin (Gigwidth) and we worked on a different collaborations. Vans Warped Tour, Airwalk SnoCore... I looked up to him as a designer. He had a degree in Internation Marketing! He "inspired" me. Inspired me so much that I began working on a site for the DJ's at the #1 radio station in Los Angeles... filming quicktime at clubs and being backstage with a variety off different music artist... and I was VIBIN!

Then I got a call from Sherise Bright... she is Janet Jackson's Public Relations executive... well she wanted me to create Janet Jackson's site. I was so "STOKED"... but nervous... could I hack it? Then I constantly visited Box Top Interactive... they were so huge. I was so little. But I was determined. I worked 19 hours a day... I only got paid for 8. I was still Vibin.

During all this time I worked for another web development company... this time I had the lead... I was in control... with music blasting and my PC and Mac (yes I can use a PC) with me I took control... creating fun, well designed sites for "mom and pop" spots.

Well I was noticed by a few firms in San Francisco. I was hired by a firm in San Francisco. The money they offered is good... almost twice as much as I am currently making... they have very big clients, and I am Vibin! Nervous... vibin... vibin. I leave southern California in a couple weeks for the "HUB" of multi media. I am 19 years old... working in downtown San Francisco... going to college and making more money than my friends who graduated from college last year.

I AM V - I - B - I - N ... I hope to continue to vibe. Inspiration is out there...

Dantley Davis {dantley@linkline.com}

Paul Schrank {scharke@mailbag.com}

Kevin {kmoore@udiaho.edu}

I was once stoked about HotWired. I was even more stoked when I got a job there.
Then I was stoked that I was meeting all the incredible and creative people that worked there with me.
Then I was stoked when we started growing and eventually moved our offices.

Then I was stoked when we were going to make a lot of money by going public.

Then I started not being as stoked...

when the IPO fell through.
when the people started to leave.
when the IPO fell through again.
when the layoffs came.
when the people who worked really hard and made HotWired successful were forced out.
when people that were sucking up payroll remained.

Let's just say that I am now re-stoked to be out of HotWired.
And I am now stoked once again to be here at CNET.

You can be stoked and stocked out of HotWired.

Peace Derek and Taylor!

-Coitus

Coitus {curtis@angst.net}

father {ted@re.com}

I got my bubble thing last night, and by this morning I was able to float 4 foot bubbles over my apartment block.

Cars were stopping to look, I was dripping with soap, and wave after wave of giant rainbow orbs floated off in the mist

Tim Gregory {timothy@intekom.com}

It's time again for the bears.

Glenn Rueger {rueger@usa.net}

What happened?

Some broken promises, a vending machine and a sales department.

What's worth while?

I'll always be stoked about the experiences gained while working in interesting work. I'll be proud of the things I've created and the PROCESS that went into it. But I doubt I will ever be stoked about a job or a company. A job is a job. A company is (usually) about making money. But I begin to ask myself the better questions. What did I make that wasn't there before?

ben {ben@netobjects.com}

I taught myself everything I needed to know to get a job with a small, young, hip multimedia company. I got what I asked for. I kicked ass. Designer, Project Manager and then Director of Operations. In less than 2 years.

We did big sites, small sites and lots of Director stuff. Something happened along the way though. I am not stoked anymore.

What happened? Between the almighty buck, receeding deadlines and know-it all clients, I lost my passion. I don't even like the web anymore. So damn corporate.

So now I am looking to get stoked again. I know it can happen again... maybe Multiplayer Games, or Interactive TV, or hell, maybe I should just go back to delivering Pizza and being a no-pay intern.

At least I had passion then.

Marc Sirkin {sirkin@swanmedia.com}

reminds me of politics. poeple see the potential, get into it and pour their lives away for years. but they forgot about people.

people will always provide the grit, the problems, the "managers" who are there to convert ideology into profits. or else, to ensure that something actually happens.

trouble is, when you mix ideology (just do it) with corporate naysaying prudence you get tension. then the creatuives, the ideologues, those who make things ahppen get forced out by those who say what will happen.

which is sad.

what's happening with hotwired? it seemed such a cool place, so much new stuff happening - did the ipo pressures just kill the place - or did those who left just not know how to cut it in the corporate world? when you;re on your own the only risks you take affect yourself.

when you're working for a coporation every desicion, every risk, impacts on the others around you. you fusk up, the others feel it too - especially the shareholders and stockholders. and since they're the ones who own the place, they'll fire you.

shit happens. if you don't like it where you are, do something else. just remebmber, when you're stoked up, that unless you're in charge it's all going to slow down eventually.

life goes on. sometimes it goes without you.

the second oldest profession {perhaps I am@perhaps I'm not}

the second oldest profession?

I turned up here one day while wearing my suit for another interview. The guy here said come back tommorow. I was looking for work experience but within a week i was working on about 4 pretty major projects, alone.

This a multimedia creation company that basically outsources but when I tuned up, suddenly they had a "guru" in house so I get lumbered with everything. It is certainly less romantic that walking into the Wired building.

I am getting to do some pretty exciting stuff and meeting some interesting people but you quickly realise how few people really grasp the idea of a computer , letalone the visions we have of 'connecting the world'.

With the posting i read just before I posted this, the concept of remebering that it is people is only a little off track. The internet is much more about conveying spirit as well. You cant help remember that it is humans who are generating all this content. Even if you don't see them, you are seeing, and increasdingly hearing, their self expressions.

It is this spirit that we should never forget and what I would like to create, which brings me back to why I have responded to this. I have been dreaming about creating a Fray and today I have discovered that it exists here.

I am still going to do my own connection of souls, spirits etc but with a bit of a more etherial focus. Thank you for being like me and inspiring me to do it and remain stoked.

Steve.

Steve Black {sblack@enternet.com.au}

yeah, i'm stoked. couldn't take the days here if i weren't.

i mean it's like this: i was unemployed for almost hald a year, couch surfing between jaunts out to the desert, and wondering where my next month of money was going to come from. then, a small windfall right before i was going to be a bike messenger: UNIX admin. i studdied for 2 weeks, worked on anything i could get my hands on, and scored the job. i remained on that stoked high for months, working my ass off to be at least equal to everyone around me. yeah, i had no clue what i was doing at first. but i learned fast, had to to keep my job.

now, a year later, i'm considered indispensable. i still take all the work, and the hours that no one else wants, just to keep at the forfront of my job. it's not been a bed of roses though, i work for a small startup that's going through some growing pains, and well, i've had my differences with my boss, and my bosses boss. yeah, i'm stoked. i can't afford to be anything less.

zippi

And I love it!

....And you know what's even cooler???? I don't live in NewYork or LA. I work and live and where I was born and raised, in a city that many people call "small".

yep, I'm stoked.......

AMY ELKIN {amy@martinagency.com}

When you get paid to sit around and experient with c.e (cutting edge) tools all day long...stoked is a good way to put it.

Many times, stoked comes after all the hard times. I learned the web in 94 after losing my business, money, belongings. I succumb to helping my dad out in his office. An easy job with a lot of down time. Gave me a lot of down time to learn HTML.

One thing led to another and an inside job with a technical recruiting firm (www.intpart.com) as a full time webster. Dream job. Cool young company. High salary. Microsoft Solution Provider and free software and betas (even alphas...stuff I can't talk about here).

Sidework pouring in. Who can handle all of it. Wife gets cranky cause I'm spending too much time here and not enough time feeding the new baby. Things are looking up when you get new clients like Jonathan Moffett (drummer for Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, George Michael, Elton)...shouldn't name drop.

Stoked.

rich palarea {richpal@superstore.com}

David {dcorsi@wwa.com}

They said no. ěWhat would put there? Who would care? Our clients are not savvy enough. Cost too much.î

I did not let up, I went ahead and bought the software, read books, mags & zines, newspaper articles, collected information on what a great place the web is to inform people about all the amazing things one has to offer.

I built the site without anyone knowing.

I finally leaked it to the marketing director and she smiled. This was a good sign. Timing was on.

The presentation went off without a hitch and the guy at the top loved it -its done, its up and I had the most amazing experience while basking in the aftermath of it all, this is what I want to do with my life. After years in production graphics, different mediums, clients and job descriptions-I felt I was home-Iím stoked.

Now the boss wants our company to change platforms in a few months-here I go again-reading books, mags & zines, newspaper articles, collecting information on what a great computer the Mac is. . .

Deborah Harkins {dharkins@hotmail.com}

Get it? Guess not.

Me neither.

If you're surrounded by assholes, you may know how I felt at that time.

Peh Lee {pehlee@mail.tm.net.my}

Yes I am.

Maybe it's just because I only started working here 4 weeks ago. Many people ain't anymore, after working here longer. It was the same with my former jobs: Last year - just out of school - I started working for a hippie kind of internet startup - they did http://www.subaudio.net and a few other, rather small things. They had some kind of vision (a very blurred one), and what they earned was from small-time drug dealing - people would come and buy their dope from them, it was a bit more expensive - it was welfare in a way.

After three months it occured to me that these guys were becoming increasingly paranoid, and it was beginning to piss me off to work 17 hours a day, 7 days a week with a bunch of nice yet clueless paranoid dopeheads. I quit.

I started working for a big TV production company with a small internet branch. In the beginning I only worked on http://www.vh1.de, the website of the german section of the video channel VH-1, and I really liked writing reviews, doing graphics and layout for it. We were having a good time and mainly did what we wanted to do.

December last year was when it was beginning to piss me off, too. I was paid shit, and I had to start working on commercial sites which most definitely didn't relate to me. I did most of the programming for http://www.kraft.de.

And it didn't feel right for me.

After the Kraft thing, the suits started to think big, and organization changed. We got a real boss. And he's an asshole. In July i took a vacation. And I quit.

Now I'm working for Kabel New Media, and it's not like HotWired. It's more like BBDO. And it's a bit yuppie.

I'm beginning to like being a part of it.

I'm beginning to think doing cocaine is quite normal.

I'm beginning to think I want more of this.

And I think I am going to get it.

Yesterday my mother told me on the phone I sounded very adrenalin. Maybe I should start doing Yoga or Tai-Chi.

Yes I am stoked.

But still I think about wether it's right or wrong. And I still think I want to do something like fray. Because I want the web to be more than a giant billboard. http://www.untergrund.org is nothing but a weak attempt. I'll keep trying.

Ruben Malchow {ruben@untergrund.org}

I do like my job.

I spent 6 occasionally agonizing years getting a Ph.D. so that I could go out into the world and become gainfully employed. Sometime near the end of the graduate school process, I discovered that my fondest hope was never to have the kind of high-pressure job that my boss has--constantly scrounging for grants, spending most of my time in negotiations of one sort or another, forced to administrate when I really want to do research.

So I failed to find a job. I just stayed on in my graduate student gig, which has become a bit more gainful since I got those coveted three letters after my name. This is generally thought to be a "Bad Career Move" in my field. Now it looks like I might be able to sneak my way into a comfortable life of research and programming without having to spend several years working 14 hour days, dragged around the country from job to job, like the people I know who have made the 'Good Career Moves'.

We've just started working on a prototype web interface for a big scientific database. The project is up for grabs because the granting agency isn't satisfied with the way the database is currently run. There's tough competition and we are in many ways the underdog. Ah, but if we win....

Ha!

And even when I don't enjoy my job, there are many other things to be enthusiastic about. As my dad is fond of saying 'I work to live, I don't live to work'.

Cindy {dragon_fly@geocities.com}

lara {lara@coe.missouri.edu}

Colin {yingko@nooster.nosc.mil}

Rick Whittington {rick@richmond.net}

g

AL {lugito@hotmail.com}

Peg {pbabcock@cyberg8t.com}

Jarod {jbelshaw@interaccess.com}

Josh {jokir@technologist.com}

jesse {jesse@imationstudio.com}

jason brunton {praktikant@factor-product.com}

taber {taber@50k.com}

Craig Big Eagle {birdofprey@gocougs.wsu.edu}

Laura {lostalice@aol.com}

I read this story and decided that it was my turn now. I doubt that anyone will even read it as my post will be buried deep in the archives of Fray but it's the act and not the consequences that seem to matter.

Once upon a time I was stoked. The year was 1997 and a young group of seven university graduates decided that they would take a chance. We were going to start our own company. Screw the corporate life. Make millions. Do something for ourselves. Take on the world.

So we all turned down the 50K+ a year jobs that we were offered and did it. We got an office, business cards, brochures, the whole nine yards. We were for real.

The first four months were a smashing success. Clients were coming in at a good pace and we were working to the bone to make it happen. Work was a drug and I, a hardcore addict. We threw a party for all our friends to celebrate our initial success. It was a terrific party with over a hundred people attending. It was to be our last.

Then things slowed down. No problem. Don't panic. Nothing that seven smart, motivated people can't think their way out of. We were stoked, no sweat.

Then things didn't turn around. Paychecks stopped coming in. Morale started to drop. I couldn't get myself up in the mornings anymore. I was tired all the time. The parts of my job that I loved weren't any fun anymore. The dreams and visions that used to possess me were gone. I couldn't believe it was all crumbling around me.

All of us were friends, comrades in arms. I used to think we were fighting the good fight and somehow along the way it got turned into fighting for the sake of fighting.

I realize now that I have to go. It hurts coming to that realization. It hurts to leave this all behind.

Reading the story made my want to cry. I want desperately to be stoked again.

Chris {claw@indigo1.com}

dustin {dustin@e-corp.com}

aylay

Adina {adinag@interlog.com}

Scott {faust@tiac.net}

Hoon {hoon@environs.com}

I once was stoked. In high school, I got nabbed by my local paper to help with the development of their web site. At first I couldn't believe it. I was getting paid to work the web? What could be better? Over time I learned that just like everything else, it had its own problems. I even quit for about a month to go back to work for the comic shop I worked at before. Of course... dealing with a website was a lot better than sweeping floors, and I went back to Hot CoCo. I stuck around for another year until I became really unhappy and thought that I should be paid more than I was.

I started to look for a new job

It took me one summer to find a new job, but the one I found I was pretty sure it was going to be cool. I mean... it had to be... it's Wired. Well... Hot Wired really... you see where I'm going with this. Since I got this job, I've read this essay about four times, trying to think if I've met any of the people mentioned, but knowing that I've only run into one. I'm excited, as one always is, but I'm a little bit saddened by the optimisim that isn't in the halls. I'm at a different Wired than Derek was. I guess we'll see.

Colin Ferm {spud@hooked.net}

About a year ago I was fired from my job because I write fiction and publish it online. Yes, it's true. Journalists started calling me and I didn't know what to do, so I granted only email and radio interviews. No television. No way. The coolest thing was reading the hundreds of emails I received from people after my story appeared in the New York Times.

But, that's in my past. It's behind me. I still act as an advocate for online rights, but most of my time these days is now put into focusing on my current job, building the Amazon killer. Being on staff for a multi-million dollar site launch is definitely an experience most new media industry workers need to experience.

I'm stoked that we have a chance to dethrone Amazon, the most absurdly hyped Internet company of all time. Sure, their service is great and sure, they're the Wall Street darlings, but whe are they going to post a profit? Soon, my friends, the walls will come tumbling down. Soon.

Cameron Barrett {cameron@michweb.net}

David "Keet" Valdez {valdez@spiritone.com}

later,

Eric

Eric Simon {esimon@lycosmail.com}

maggie

Thanks for the boost. Fray is one place I feel at home, where I feel that I'm talking to infinite numbers of copies and slight mutations of myself. Everyone out there is me, just a warped otherworldly me. Thanks for being here.

Matt {Sputnik.Films@usa.net}

I'm no longer in the piss-ant town I used to live in. Imported talent, they say. I'm a systems administrator. I assit 20 other people to maintain a rather large web farm.

It's hell.

Long hours, bad legacy code, PD and Marketing treating us like shit and then taking all the credit. Management tie-downs, reorgs, incompatibilities, bad food, bad hours. I work about 100 hours a week. I'm asleep the rest of the time. No, I'm not exaggerating. "Right now" is such an over-used phrase here. "I need it right now." That's nice. The thirty other people standing outside my cube also need it "right now." Take a number.

However.... Decent infrastructure, great great folks, excellent equipment, and more fibre on campus than was in my whole home town. Terrific coworkers. My team of 20 and the other 40 people we work with are the finest individuals on this planet. They're intellegent. They listen. They help, and they respect each other. In spite of whatever anyone else throws at this team, we pull it off. We get it done. I'm proud - no, I'm stoked - to be a part of this group. And free espresso whenever I want it.

I keep my individuality. I keep my respect. I don't work 100 hours a week for nothing anymore. I work 100 hours a week for my network, my web farm. I have purpose again. And while it may not last, keep me awake at all hours and offer nothing in return except more bad code to rework and more problems to solve right now, I love it.

No, the honeymoon isn't over, I guess. But that's ok; when it is, I'll move on, looking for someone else to demand a "right now" from me. And I'll love that, too. Or, I'll go back to doing the only thing I ever wanted to do in life: drive a cab. Either way, I'll be happy.

Gilbert {jonathangilbert@netscape.net}

Other things I'm stoked about: moving here to San Francisco, being accepted as an intern into the Multimedia Studies Program at San Francisco State, going to Burning Man, starting a whole new life...

Rosalind Lord {rclord@seaserpent.com}

Now two. Up thru the maloderous clouds of Zappa and Beefheart, sailing far above an en-muraled and winged Spiro Agnew wearing a "tricky-dick" cartoon wristwatch and old-glorious diaper while hoisting a fat-fingered peace sign... ....done in poster paint, realism and a timely lack thereof. A year in post-68 Haight that became wife-beaters and winos and smack cut with Comet when the paint wore off. I covered my eyes with posters for UCB and Fillmore West. Smoke.

I smell something burning. Swirling beyond Captain Nemo's disco-coat check wearing hand-painted and dyed shreds of fabric pieced together in layers like feathers, leggy hit of the platformed night, doe eyes lined thick with Tornado Teal Khol got big bucks in tips, cocaine and joints...the nothing decade...filled with big pads, pastels, colored pencils, oils and piles of anything I could rip apart and put back together to make something else. Someone smashed the glass and pulled the handle.

I hear something. zines and underground home-recording artist one-off cassette covers, video taped in saranwrap and scotch rocks playing bass at Maxwells pretending to be smarter than I was, half-shaved head since '78 when even "cool" people thought it was weird, Mudd and Hurrah and trying to aviod Lydon's flicked cigarette butts for ignoring him, lenses on the camera so strong I could see the molecules and sub-atomic particles I wanted to draw...everything...a million film cans and mine all contained...film. It roared.

It's dark in a fire. An accident, an incect bite for a year of freedom and manic obsession with fibers and spinning and weaving with wire and sticks and the space between the fibers began to look more like pixels but I didn't know what they were yet. I tried AOL when there were only 2 subscribers and they wreren't speaking and the Net was more desolate and reflected more of it's government roots so I decided that my convalescence needed a web site and that graphic art would become a curious footnote in the binary scheme of things... and that any one could do any thing if they only knew it was possible. So I did.

I bought lighter fluid. Though there are many worthier than I, here I am...webmaster. I'm bemused and in awe and full of giggles at the things I still don't know. And am bemused and in awe and full of giggles at those who need to tell the rest of us how stupid we are about technology and the bleeding edge. There are a million more talented than we are...thank god or whatever other thing you pray to for that...I want to feel good about passing the flame on to someone who needs it as bad as I do. Live it or live with it. Stoked.

szzn {sgriff@catskill.net}

Glenwood Morris {gemorris@execpc.com}

bisko {bissko@hotmail.com}

Robert Poulk {robert_poulk@alliedtelesyn.com}

Juan Gonzalo {jgonzalo@earthlink.net}

victoria {VaHah@aol.com}

Jimbo

R. Blue {blue@danni.com}

I was one of the faceless temps at a large corpoation that sells Barbies and Myst. I worked in "Creative Services" doing uncreative Web design, production and coordination. My boss - an imp, a back-stabbing schemer from the East Coast, wouldn't give me the time of day from 2 cubes away.

They were content to keep me as I was - a lowly temp. They could let me go on a moments notice, despite their promises. They had promised to hire me. I turned down a great job for this one, before I realized I had been shnookered, hoodwinked, had. They really had me. They offered me less, changed my job description - communication ceased.

A wonderful thing happened. A co-worker knew someone who needed somebody that could do some stuff. I was that person who could do that thang and I jumped ship!

I now work at home, sip coffee in my slippers, ftp my work to my Canadian client and spend the day with my dogs. As co-workers go, dogs are the best. I recommend them highly.

Anyone else make the transition to telecommuting? I'd love to know if you wake up before noon...

B

Beth {beth@product9.com}

I was definately stoked then. More money, more responsibility. I WAS THE MAN. That wore off after a while. Now I am married, and want to move on. But the money keeps me from moving on. I know that sounds bad, but I make my own schedule, receive full benefits for my wife and I, and have it pretty easy. That is until the 4am calls of employees who are sick, or high-schoolers who do not want to work on a Friday night, or having to deal with stupid customers who don't know what the hell they are talking about. The cons are starting to outweigh the pros.

Thad Ortez {bigtoe@thevision.net}

I'm as content as I have any right to be, I suppose. I've got assets. I'll be able to retire a millionaire, unless the world financial system collapses. I'm only 29, and I'm not even sure that I know how to have fun any more.

I guess that I really shouldn't expect more than that -- more money than 99.95% of the global population, a secure life, everything I might reasonably want.

Unfortunately, I *do* want more than that. But I think I've already sold my soul. Hell, I don't even know if there's anything on Earth that I'd find worth getting stoked about.

I guess this is why humanity invented alcohol.

Mithra

I think to be "stoked" means to have your supply of fuel renewed on occasion in order to keep you going and feeling alive.

Chris {chris.little@sympatico.ca}

I work for the Outlook Press. Its a student run newspaper at a community college in Rockland County New York. It used ot be exciting, when we were going to start intoroducing our articles on the web, and changing our layout, and doing a hundred new and inovative things with our dry boring newspaper. Then people stopped showing up at meetings and the student senat cut our funding by 12 grand.

If work is ever gonna get you stoked, then it has to be your own. I mean you have to work towards what YOU want. No one else will ever give you anything that will make you as happy as what you can give yourself.

Jason {rossitto@warwick.net}

Then, a light. Ray the Body Man comes in to say that he's leaving for the day and that he was finished with the Storm. I frantically called Evangeline to tell her the good news. I stayed a half hour later to make sure she was satisfied. She left happy, grateful.

Every job I've held has had its small stoked moments; being all customer service jobs and none of which use a computer, they may not figure in as well with the shared experiences of computer geeks (a term I use with affection and admiration, by the way) but they made certain days worthwhile because I was able to make someone else happy, I was able to prove wrong someone's rightfully negative preexisting notions about people who worked at department stores, restaurants, coffee shops, hotels and now, auto body shops. That, to me, is something to be stoked about.

If I ever make use of my English degree, I hope to do the same thing in a job that would make the most of all that loan debt. I know to do this is harder than what I do now, since how many theories do people have about writers that aren't in some ways, valid? And do they really care that much about being shown a new perspective on the subject? Or is the attempt through this medium captured in the act of writing itself? From what I've seen, there are a lot more ways to be creative and unique in even the least desireable jobs than people realize or care to note. And there is a need for people to alter the world's perception of those who choose to hold such jobs, so until something better comes along, I tend to hold the torch and take pride in what I can, with what I have, where I am.

templeton {laurauhl@mailcity.com}

Salvador {chavaart@aol.com}

pam

cyn {lucimay@aol.com}

mark m. {jstsano@aol.com}

Johnny Z {john@zimmerman.net}

Michael {mykey4u@unm.edu}

Joe {jbowers@perspex.com}

Atul Yadav {asamee@asamee.com}

felicia raman {ramamama@yahoo.com}

PeaceGirl {rucrazy@stranger.com}

Mark {paperboots@yahoo.com}

Tita {CyberScribbler@email.com}

laura {kizphair@yahoo.com}

f i s h r u s h

WendiWolf {purrwolf@erols.com}

Jon A.

{ add your experience }