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@tonyennis

Tony Ennis

@tonyennis

4,360 Tweets
2,743 Following
2,723 Followers

Building software teams & mobile apps Prev: Built a bank in Asia YC S21

Filtered by topic: Tech Philosophy & Takes ✕ Clear filter
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Aug 12 When you expose a *complex* message to a crowd, you’ll have a few who will get it, but the majority will be sufficiently confused as to be non-plussed, at best, so the reaction, whether positive or negative, is small. 0 1 0 0 217 .
Aug 02 I remember reading @AustenAllred tweets and thinking “I really want that" - a product that takes an existing model and makes it *actually work* for everyone & that customers are fanatic about. We got there about a month ago - going to share much more of our journey going forward. https://t.co/h1aVxv2cq2 0 0 0 0 308 .
Jul 31 @bentossell Happy to help here - have used for prob 4 years and built MVPs on the back of the API so super familiar. How do we sync up? 0 0 0 0 135 .
Jul 18 Having been building a tech company in the Philippines for the past 2 and a bit years, it’s nice to have someone publically draw attention to this modern anxiety inducer. Perpetually on edge... https://t.co/Tklr2C1dmP 8 0 0 0 217 .
Jul 11 @G_S_Bhogal You might like this if you haven’t seen it: https://t.co/H26bQ65mOf - I think he articulates it quite well 2 0 0 0 118 .
Jul 01 RT @naval: The ideal school would teach health, wealth, and happiness. It‘d be free, self-paced, and available to all. It‘d show opposing… 0 0 0 0 140 .
Jun 25 Just reminded of this again this evening reviewing a proposal sent to me by a friend. In the interest of not seeming anti-agency (I’m really not!), some good ones I’m happy to recommend: @minicorpHQ @builthq @joshsoftware 1 0 0 0 221 .
Jun 25 In both scenarios you’re going to have to pay more than the actual man hours required to build your V1. Honestly their are pros and cons to each. My personal recommendation, having endured and witnessed heartache in the past would be to pay up front for quality. 0 0 0 0 262 .
Jun 25 Some agencies are more up front about this misalignment of incentives, and will offset it by charging you more up front. In general these agencies will write better, more extensible code, and have much less onerous contracts and terms. 0 0 0 0 235 .
Jun 25 These agencies will be pretty vague about what tech they’re going to use because they know you’re not technical enough to know or care. Most often they’ll extend an existing CMS. Their contracts will be strict about what they hand over - often they own all the code they write. 1 0 0 0 277 .
Jun 25 Many agencies won’t mention this up front. They’ll be the more attractive option because the V1 they produce, on the surface, will look identical to what their more expensive competitors would produce. The differences are hidden 1. In your contract and 2. In your codebase. 0 0 0 0 273 .
Jun 25 Agencies can be a great way to get your product MVP built, once you know: 1. What you (probably) want: Something you can extend easily (by them or a team you build later) 2. What they want: Something they can maintain and extend (for a price) You will get what you pay for. 0 0 0 0 273 .
Jun 23 @safeortrue Disagree with both. Feeling others' plight until you side with one of them is a race to the bottom, + affective empathy isn't a very reliable guide of moral reasoning. Cognitive empathy + a simple principle -- does this cause significant harm? (A: Yes) seems to work here 4 0 0 0 283 .
Jun 22 One of the most counterintuitive parts of building an engineering team early on is navigating the fact that no-one wants to be the smartest person in the room - in a room full of very smart people. Finding teachers is tough when the best teachers want to be learners. 8 0 0 0 269 .
Jun 22 @shaunau Almost always to do with objectivism - I’ll be aligned with someone on “this is how it’s optimal to behave” but either their reason will be “because it just is” or they’ll describe a principle that it becomes clear they only apply very selectively 0 0 0 0 256 .
Jun 18 @colmtuite @Modulz @Larkef Nice! 0 0 0 0 32 .
Jun 18 @colmtuite @Modulz First vote! I actually really like Bridge - monosyllabic, descriptive, memorable, easily brandable, cc @Larkef ;) 0 0 0 0 132 .
Jun 17 People who de-prioritise building wealth based on the fallibility of “Money solves all problems”, miss the extent to which *not having money* creates problems. 2 0 0 0 159 .
Jun 12 I’m not a very disappointable person, but I’d say 90% of it comes when I’m getting on with someone well, only to realise they haven’t yet developed any intuition for identifying their own motivated reasoning and have big epistemic blind spots as a result. 2 0 0 0 256 .
Jun 02 @HPluckrose Congrats! Not that it's any of my biz, but @ScrivenerApp might be worth checking out. Have only used it moderately myself but seems much more suited to writing book length than Word, might save you some time 😁 1 0 0 0 221 .
May 16 The idea that “There are no truly selfless deeds” A) Is depressing. Altruism is zero sum. Helping others for personal gain is gross. B) Is beautiful. Altruism is positive sum. Biologically aligned incentives are wonderful. 0 0 0 0 225 .
May 12 So much conflict and disagreement is borne from applying our methodology for interpreting the material world (universally applicable rules) to how we interpret the social world. Human behaviour is complex. Guidelines: 👍. Rules: 👎 1 0 0 0 229 .
May 10 @mironieminen I wasn't big on touch ID either tbh. Agreed they're both unbelievably cool, but sci-fi tech != better solution to problem. Question: before face ID did you have your notifications text hidden by default? 0 0 0 0 218 .
May 09 Today’s first world problem: Apple's Face ID is a step backwards by any metric I can think of - amazing tech but solves a problem the company had, not the user. Doesn't "blend in", actively gets in the way several times per day. 0 1 0 0 228 .
May 09 @hadronapp hey guys. Just signed up for early access and this looks like one of the best implementations I've seen so far. Would love to get in asap and play around, happy to provide lots of feedback. Thanks! https://t.co/ZLsojD6gAd 2 0 0 0 232 .
May 05 @levelsio Surprised at this level of conspiracy theorism from you. Knowing what you know about the breadth of traits and skills required to build something, do you think *most* people are better off on their own? IME investors recognise increased chances when burden is shared. 9 0 0 0 277 .
Apr 28 @MikeBoyd That’s the one! A few of your tweets struck a chord (opportunity in trad lucrative, low trust industries not used to tech) as they map on closely to what we’re doing here and the kinds of businesses we meet. 0 0 0 0 217 .
Apr 21 Philippines-based friends: I'm speaking this Thursday evening at the @freelancer office in BGC on "Bridging the gap between tech and non-tech" for #productph. Come along if you're around! https://t.co/AdEy4jd0Do https://t.co/Gup5hwlkep 1 0 0 0 235 .
Apr 16 @paddycosgrave @ChMurphy @WebSummit @SaaStock Whaaaa! Congrats @ChMurphy! 3 1 0 0 73 .
Apr 16 This is a really great piece from @jessitron . Love the idea of building a camerata and the line "When the world is ready for an idea, it doesn't come to just one person" https://t.co/vM8biQAuIJ 1 0 0 0 194 .
Apr 09 @can @80000Hours My understanding is there's "EA as an org" (although I'm not sure of ownership etc.) and "EA as a concept/community". For example, from https://t.co/CjhQtYTq0k https://t.co/lYL4KBrsnW 0 0 0 0 200 .
Apr 09 @can @80000Hours Donate to orgs who promote effective altruism. Effective Altruism being: "Using evidence and analysis to take actions that help others as much as possible." 0 0 0 0 173 .
Apr 09 @can @80000Hours Effective Altruism is “Using evidence and analysis to take actions that help others as much as possible”. If you take issue with that, as you’re entitled to, a more honest thing to do would be to tweet about why you think it’s not a good approach. 0 0 0 0 264 .
Apr 09 @can I think you’ve misrepresented Effective Altruism & @80000Hours here - whether intentional or not, by conflating EA as a concept, with 80000 hours, an organisation who practices and promotes Effective Altruism. 0 0 0 0 218 .
Apr 07 @andreasklinger Things I’m most interested in: - Team, culture, performance & incentives - Workflow & tooling - Product, product strategy, technology strategy and the intersection of each. Highly technical topics have their place but tend not to be as generalizable across orgs. 1 0 0 0 287 .
Apr 07 @andreasklinger If you decide to open this up to people outside SF I'd love to get involved - mentorship/advice/discussion on these things is something I find lacking, particularly out here in SEA. 3 0 0 0 197 .
Apr 05 This is a sentiment many early @WebSummit employees will also appreciate. https://t.co/mdyDrHk85w 3 0 0 0 97 .
Apr 05 @visakanv I think what I was trying to articulate here is that to do (2) requires a lot more responsibility than (1) - it’s very difficult to get people excited/bought in unless you’re leading from the front 1 0 0 0 207 .
Apr 05 @visakanv It sounds like for you (like me), number 2 doesn’t come natural. My advice would be to find and team up with people for whom it does. Figuring this out was for me the most significant thing that happened in my career, and has completely removed that tension you spoke about. 0 0 0 0 284 .
Apr 04 @visakanv 1. Things you would think are pre-requisites of leadership responsibilities: Virtue, ideas worth listening to. 2. Things which are significantly more synonymous: The ability to get followers excited and bought in. The best leaders have both, but are a dime a dozen. 1 0 0 0 276 .
Mar 28 @dtuite @airtable We use it a lot & have a custom frontend built using the airrecord gem to interface between tech and non-tech parts of the business. Plan to write about this in future but short on time now so this screenshot might add more context or help in some way, also happy to answer qs https://t.co/l2lIM8SarO 1 0 0 0 322 .
Mar 28 .@stratechery's cleverly curated new concepts page is awash with wisdom. Read if you’re into: ✅ Mental Models ✅ Tech & Society ✅ Incentive Systems ✅ Business Strategy ✅ Product Strategy https://t.co/BOjsNqrZe7 4 2 0 0 215 .
Feb 28 @apotonick Have been using https://t.co/h5gZ5rE6LB for years and find them great. Intuitive UI, great support 1 0 0 0 109 .
Feb 27 @cjquinners @100minds Amazing!!! Great work again! 🙌 0 0 0 0 52 .
Feb 04 @colmtuite Have always been interested in making tech teams more efficient - design tooling was definitely an area of interest which was piqued by following you guys on here. I'm sure I'm not the only one taking note. Keep up the good work. 2 0 0 0 240 .
Feb 04 @mkeftz @colmtuite Thanks Michael, super interested in what you guys are doing - let me know when I can give @interplayapp a whirl 😉 1 0 0 0 132 .
Feb 04 Colm wrote in much more detail about this recently, which is well worth reading. And some related accounts worth following are @colmtuite, @getcompositor , @mrmrs_ , @markdalgleish , @interplayapp https://t.co/GCOdtYPWP9 1 0 0 0 220 .
Feb 04 I’d also be surprised if bigger players like @adobe and @invisionapp aren’t already quietly working on their own new-generation products in the background. 0 0 0 0 155 .
Feb 04 To be clear, I don’t believe this new generation of code-generators will kill pixel-manipulators like Sketch, framer, figma etc - In fact I think that market will continue to grow. I think there is room for, and a need for both. 1 0 0 0 228 .
Feb 04 At @firstcircle our designers are already experimenting with some of these tools and practices, and we intend to blog about our own experience moving further in this direction in the coming months. 0 0 0 0 197 .
Feb 04 Like any new technology, adopting this tooling in the early days will require high effort with little short-term reward. But in the long term, teams who do will spend less money, produce better output, and have an advantage over teams who don’t. 0 0 0 0 245 .
Feb 04 In the ideal scenario, building an interface that someone can *use* (minus backend) goes from taking a few weeks to a few hours, and the shortened feedback loops compound to result in a much better stress-tested product in substantially less time. 2 0 0 0 247 .
Feb 04 In my experience, a big chunk of product design feedback (maybe a majority) comes after an interface is built. Working with images in Invision/Marvel etc. is ok, but the closer someone comes to being able to use the actual product, the more comprehensive the feedback tends to be. 9 1 0 0 280 .
Feb 04 Design libraries, grid systems, and componentisation are now well understood concepts and relatively standard practice in most decent tech teams. Reactive programming has also obsolesced the need for frontend MVC frameworks. These are the simple abstractions we need. 0 0 0 0 267 .
Feb 04 Designers and devs will always have distinct roles, but as Colm points out, the current practice whereby they work on separate “products” is a relic of historical necessities, ignoring what’s now possible. It’s starting with the solution, not the problem https://t.co/lyUMGkkd59 0 0 0 0 278 .
Feb 04 As a result, the typical tech team has traditionally needed high degrees of specialisation to write and maintain what is essentially boilerplate. But as tooling has improved, these specialisations have become less relevant and roles more similar. 0 0 0 0 246 .
Feb 04 I’ve always been vocal about the extent to which building software is unnecessarily convoluted - we’re using infrastructure & tooling which wasn’t originally intended to deliver what is now expected of it - fast interactive interfaces. 1 0 0 0 239 .
Feb 04 It’s exciting to watch a small group of people working on an idea which will fundamentally change a discipline, and flying (relatively) under the radar. If you’re involved in building software in any way, I would recommend reading this, from @colmtuite: https://t.co/JjVsdkBoqJ 12 2 0 0 277 .
Jan 24 Watching @JohnLilic speak this eve, it strikes me that the ratio of addressable market -> receptive government -> smart evangelists in the Philippines positions it pretty well as a country with massive potential for impact from blockchain/crypto tech in the next few years. 8 0 0 0 279 .
Jan 21 RT @iam_preethi: The best thing you can do for someone is believing in them. It's magical what can happen when you show someone that you be… 0 0 0 0 140 .
Jan 20 Now that we have reactive front end programming, one of the last missing pieces of cloud software infrastructure is a standard database format which can be natively interpreted by both server and client. 0 0 0 0 203 .
Jan 18 The abstractions we commonly use are there for many different reasons, but they’re mostly not the best abstractions for the job at hand - building software 0 0 0 0 155 .
Jan 18 The answer in this case of course isn’t that engineers are making it more complicated (though sometimes it may be) - the answer, as with similar examples, is that very few parts of the system were originally built for what they’re currently used for 1 0 0 0 249 .
Jan 18 This rings so true when it comes to software building. The system, at it’s core, is about moving data from a database, to an interface, to a user, and back again. I find myself increasingly taking the non-tech-person’s side when they ask “Why is this so hard?” https://t.co/B3xsCtUG31 6 1 0 0 284 .
Jan 18 @DanielleMorrill Intern + @FrontApp 1 0 0 0 35 .
Jan 17 @davefromdublin @RevolutApp @airtable @metabase @Bose @SECRID Yeah I think they struck the balance very well. They've also changed how I view a lot of common undesirable experiences, to the point that I no longer find them undesirable. Long walking commutes, intercontinental flights etc. feel way less stressful when you control the noise 0 0 0 0 339 .
Jan 17 @levelsio @jokowi As well as freezing them, @RevolutApp also lets you set withdrawal limits on cards. Haven't used it myself but worth a look 1 0 0 0 141 .
Jan 16 Feeling and reason are symbiotic. They inform each other. Feeling comes naturally, reason requires practice, and the best results usually come when they're used in tandem. 8 1 0 0 171 .
Jan 12 @patphelan @WordPress @donncha Your SSL cert is coming from Squarespace, which means, assuming you're certain you're using Wordpress, your CNAME records are likely misconfigured. You need to update your CNAME record for WWW to point to where the site is hosted, and also ensure there's a valid SSL cert there. https://t.co/lUXcR6YvW7 3 0 0 0 333 .
Jan 11 My mental model for dealing with unconditional oughts: In programming if you attempt to run a function which requires an argument, without passing an argument, it will fail. Language regrettably doesn’t enforce the same constraints, but not everything we say has meaning. 0 0 0 0 271 .
Jan 11 @colmtuite Haha it's never too early for a good spirited twitter discussion! Also it's 7:15pm here 😏 1 0 0 0 100 .
Jan 11 @colmtuite I agree here. My qualm is with semantics rather than epistemology. What Sam labels "moral truths", I label "stuff that causes suffering". 0 0 0 0 148 .
Jan 11 @colmtuite Interesting and fair point - I'll look out for this in his stuff. Question: What meaning does an *unconditional* ought statement contain if not to convey moral obligation? 0 0 0 0 182 .
Jan 11 @colmtuite That said, many people I respect on this topic (Pinker, Parfit) disagree with me, so it’s likely I’m wrong. I’d like to think I’m open to changing my view - part of the reason I’m talking about this stuff more on twitter is to have my points critiqued, so thanks for engaging 0 0 0 0 286 .
Jan 11 @colmtuite This is why I don’t eat meat/fish and why I co-founded a kids charity. I’m just not convinced I, or anyone else, have any *intrinsic* moral obligation to do this. I’m also not sure most altruistic people are altruistic out of obligation. We do it because it’s mutually beneficial 0 0 0 0 290 .
Jan 11 @colmtuite As a separate point - I don’t disagree that suffering can be quantified, and that we would all live more enjoyable, prosperous lives if we work collaboratively to alleviate each others’ suffering. 0 0 0 0 207 .
Jan 11 @colmtuite The "but" in your tweet implies that you're disagreeing with my point (Sam is answering a question based on a dubious premise, using that dubious premise to prove his hypothesis), but I'm not sure what you're disagreeing with. 0 0 0 0 237 .
Jan 09 RT @tonyennis: A more effective cultural approach to increasing charitable giving globally is: 1. Extending the realm of “moral imperative”… 0 0 0 0 140 .
Jan 09 A more effective cultural approach to increasing charitable giving globally is: 1. Extending the realm of “moral imperative” beyond existing norms: "You have an *obligation* to help." 2. Educating maslow-complete groups on benefits of giving and how to give effectively. 1 1 0 0 270 .
Dec 30 Better way to word: As cost of storage/processing improves, would it be viable/profitable/economical to package mainframe model for smaller businesses/households/consumers where previously it was enterprises/govts. Similar thing happened with dedicated server -> VPS 0 0 0 0 269 .
Dec 30 @docligot Agreed. I also think A & B are closely related. Regulation seems necessary because traditional methods of application (paper/manual) are so prone to human error. With infrastructure standardisation this becomes less of an issue. See also @patio11's thread: https://t.co/U6hy1huFOa 0 0 0 0 294 .
Dec 29 @shaunau Yeah sorry that's what I'm getting at - badly worded. Point is previously both were important, now the former seems significantly less so. And the application part tends to come post study/qualification 0 0 0 0 211 .
Dec 29 Do I have many followers in other highly skilled fields (law/medicine/engineering/accounting) who think the excessive study/qualification period can be optimised similarly to tech industry? If so is that likely to happen any time soon? 1 0 0 0 235 .
Dec 29 For example, in the software industry a college degree/qualification is now rarely a hiring pre-requisite. And you can go from 0 knowledge to employable within a year. E.g. @LambdaSchool @GA 2 0 0 0 190 .
Dec 29 In the past, *possessing detailed knowledge* and *applying that knowledge* were both important for highly skilled labour. But now that information is accessible and processable in real time, knowing that a thing exists is important, but knowing the details seems less so. 2 0 0 0 271 .
Dec 29 Serious question: When, if ever, will it become possible to enter highly skilled fields outside tech with <1 year of education? 2 0 0 0 130 .
Dec 29 @colmtuite @Modulz What are you building this in? And when can i try it? 0 0 0 0 72 .
Dec 25 Programming is one of many skills great programmers need to have. It's rarely enough on its own. https://t.co/iJBI5iLL6b https://t.co/31KB0yuXwJ 1 0 0 0 144 .
Dec 25 @RevolutApp @airtable @metabase @Bose @SECRID 2017* 😩 1 0 0 0 53 .
Dec 24 How to build a product that sells itself: 1. Convenience: (Is it always there?) 2. Reliability (Does it always work?) 3. Does it do the basics *really* well? Products that did this for me in 2018: @RevolutApp @airtable @metabase @Bose QC35 headphones @secrid wallet 21 4 0 0 273 .
Dec 22 Grass roots programs are tricky to scale but can have huge impact on the people and communities they reach. @ChangexHQ are using tech to ease these scaling issues and their year-in-review is heartwarming and makes me proud to have worked with them https://t.co/jtB5NjZACB 5 3 0 0 271 .
Dec 16 RT @dhh: Patagonia founder talks about the environment here. But it applies just as well to patronizing any other form of corporate abuse w… 0 0 0 0 140 .
Dec 03 @Noahpinion This seems relevant here. From https://t.co/AmAto6yst0 https://t.co/6iVquxYEFz 3 1 0 0 90 .
Nov 30 @colmtuite And question is, would this basic knowledge requirement be a high enough barrier to entry to push a decent number of people toward pixel generators like existing tools 0 0 0 0 178 .
Nov 30 @colmtuite Indeed, and I'd add speed to that list. But as per previous tweet, do you think better design tools will replace the need for creators to know about these things? I agree *detailed* knowledge not required. But it seems *basic* knowledge would be 0 0 0 0 256 .
Nov 30 @colmtuite Haha this is a very Socratic exchange, we seem to switch position with each tweet. To clarify here - I don't mean designers who write code - just ones who understand how a browser works - rendering elements with layout properties, which can be separated into components 0 0 0 0 280 .
Nov 30 @colmtuite By "Need" in this context I mean market need - people often buy things they don't actually need. I think creating full fidelity output will always require more detailed knowledge of how browsers work, so the need will come from people who don't have the time/will to learn 0 0 0 0 283 .
Nov 30 @colmtuite That said, maybe I've been lucky but I've yet to meet a designer without the ability to grasp the front-end concepts which would be required to create full fidelity output, particularly considering how much more intuitive modern browsers have made them. 0 0 0 0 264 .
Nov 30 @colmtuite There will always be a need for tools that create output that's higher fidelity than pen and paper, but lower than production ready front-end code. It's a real need, particularly at conception phase of a project and on smaller teams 0 0 0 0 243 .
Nov 26 @Sirupsen wanted to thank you for this: https://t.co/dMtyc9LZ6a . Infinitely useful for building MVPs, much appreciated 🙌 0 0 0 0 121 .
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