Hi, I’m Allen!
I’m a software engineering executive and technology enthusiast based in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Having worked for companies big and small, I’m most energized by the dynamic potential of startups, early in their journeys. I’m at my best helping scale teams while up-leveling the people that I work with.
With my wife and two kids, we enjoy the quiet serenity of reading, nearby national parks, and simple crafts. I get overly excited by new gadgetry, and nurture a bad habit of picking up new hobbies. Since 2011, this site has collected my regular, late-night musings.
The Demise of Tesla’s Flagships
Tesla announced they will end production of their Model S and Model X vehicles. The factory…
AI’s Bland Writing
Starting around high school, people began asking me to help proofread their writings.…
A Retreat from Game Subscriptions
Remember the persistent idea of an evergreen gaming service, a “Netflix for…
Review: On Writing Well
I was thinking of The Elements of Style. I asked ChatGPT for suggestions to get deeper into…
Executing Organizational Cartography
A few years back, during my early days at Affirm, a couple of us engineering leaders were…
Year in Review — 2025
This was a quick year. Perhaps it’s an effect from aging time acceleration—when the…
Law of Conservation of Vehicular Modularity
Most in the startup world have heard of the idea of disruption; many have peddled it for…
Year of the Linux Console, Steam Edition
A few weeks back, Valve—the company most famously behind the Steam platform for PC…
