Missing the Spot

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Posted on 28th August 2007 by michael montez in About Me

Today Acer Computers announced that it will be acquiring Gateway Computers Inc. This marks the first company that I have worked for that, essentially, no longer exist. When I started Cal State Fullerton, I was living off my loans and grants. During my sophomore year, I needed more cash, so I went looking for a job. I was hired by a temp agency and my first job was at Gateway.

I was going to school in Fullerton, and then commuting to Lake Forest for work. During the summers, I worked full time in the marketing department. I created brochures and catalogs for the business marketing division. When I started, Gateway could do no wrong. Free lunch, bonuses, and perks abound. It was a great place to work. My boss was laid back, and all the people were driven and believed in what we were doing. The people made the company.

It was a good time to work for a tech company. But of course, the bubble burst and Gateway took a hit along with all the other tech companies. The whole company changed. No more free lunch, no more free soda. We started clocking in and out and submitting time sheets. The upper managers were trying to protect themselves. Saving cash wherever they could and trying to make their numbers.

This went on for several months, and then 9/11 happened and the rest of the economy slipped. Gateway laid off a lot of middle managers. The people who moved to Orange County from Iowa and were there from the beginning. All the people who put their heart and soul into the company. People who gave everything to something they believed in. Those people were the first to go.

The Gateway Campus turned into the Gateway Ghost Town. The building I worked in, with it dozens of people, and multiple departments was reduced to a nineteen person crew. Marketing, support, development, we all had lunch together daily. We all had nothing to do. We would put together our ideas, ship them to our bosses in Iowa, and never hear from them again. I collected a paycheck. I clocked in, surfed the web, read, wrote, designed, ate lunch, and repeated. The days were slow.

9 months later Gateway moved the Lake Forest campus to San Diego. I was given a package and sent on my way. Gateway survived another 5 years, until now. It was fun, I learned a lot in those three years. I worked with some really great people. I was given a lot of freedom to learn and innovate. Looking back, Gateway always seemed to be playing catch-up. They never had the lead. Not in sales, products, or R&D. Dell crushed them on price; Apple and Sony were pushing the limits of innovation, and Compaq had the back to school market cornered.

Life Lesson: Cool companies become less-cool when the going gets rough. Your job is never safe.

You’re OUT!!

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Posted on 19th August 2007 by michael montez in About Me

Saturday was TDP Dodger night. Office field trip to the Dodger game. We started the evening at the Short Stop. Beers are $1.50 before any Dodger home game. I enjoyed 5 beers and we were off to the game. During the game, hot dog, peanuts, and nachos. It was the perfect game. Until the Dodger police showed up. Apparently, lining up empty peanut shells on the railing and flicking them off to the people below is not an approved activity within stadium grounds. Betsy and I were escorted out of Dodger Stadium. After the game we headed back to the Short Stop and danced till 2am. It was a great night.

Uploaded photos are at the Michael Montez Photo gallery.

Las Vegas – Putting the sin in single

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Posted on 13th August 2007 by michael montez in About Me

This weekend was James Miller’s bachelor party. Naturally, we headed to Las Vegas. Of course, man code requires that I not say anything. I will let you know that I reached a few Vegas milestones this trip. Here they are in no particular order:

  1. Longest time to get to Vegas: 8 hours
  2. Shared a room with only 1 person (normally this is a 4 to a room situation)
  3. Longest time at a Pai Gow table: 5 hours straight with $100
  4. Fewest hotels in one weekend: 4 (Flamingo, Harris, Hard Rock, Palms)
  5. Largest all guy trip: 16
  6. Largest Pai Gow win: Jon sat down with $120 and walked away with $450
  7. Third poker tournament cash: $260 (we chopped at 3 players – I am now 3 for 4 cashes in Vegas tournaments)
  8. Longest consecutive buzz: 15 hours (noon’ish Saturday till 3′ish Sunday morning – thank you TDP)
  9. First time eating at the Mad Greek in Baker, CA

So it was a great trip. Thank you to Ryan for hosting such a grand event. Now onward to the wedding. I love you Las Vegas.

YouTube – Bringing the funny

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Posted on 9th August 2007 by michael montez in About Me

I don’t know about you, but when I get into work, I don’t start working right away. I have my coffee, check my (personal) email, check CNN, stuff like that. Just to get settled into the craziness that will soon be “The rest of the day”. Part of my new morning routine is YouTube. Surfing YouTube as a way to find the funny (or amazing) or whatever. Here are a few “Day Starters” that you might enjoy watching before you have to get the job done (they are all work safe).

Blow Job Girl – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hm7pp_JFOs

Girls are no to be Trusted – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rcx4_CszaDI

Ali G – Science – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjKMhtyI3L8

reinventing the wheel

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Posted on 7th August 2007 by montez in About Me

So at work I do a lot of research. People ask me to build products that are pretty much already built. Like a photo gallery, video upload, and blog. These are great work tools, and for a personal site, they really make sense.

I have a hosting account, that account has a blog and photo gallery. It also has the option to add video upload and Bulletin Board. All these things I can get online for free. I could use WordPress for my blog, host my images and photos on Flickr or Picasa, upload videos to YouTube or blip.tv.

So what am I doing with a hosting account? Well, I am concerned with who owns the content once I upload it. If I post my videos to YouTube, and the servers crash (very unlikely) where does it go. Who can I blame? Of course I keep backups of everything, but anything can happen.

So should I move everything to these free services? I already started moving my images to Picasa, I will move my blog to WordPress later this week, and I don’t have any videos – so no worries about that.