Queer computing, interviewing for diversity, Donahue Show flashbacks, so many books
This week I wrote a more personal essay, one I agonized over more than usual. It talks primarily about being out in tech, particularly as an engineer. The gay part wasn’t what made me nervous—I’ve been out since I was 16, I started my high-school GSA, my family is lovely (and filled with queers), &c, &c. I agonized because articles with personal and theoretical examinations of difference are catnip to a certain stripe of “libertarian” buffoon that is depressingly populous in startupland.
Truth be told, I anticipated a lot more haters from both sides: Righteous radicals angry at me for mixing queerness and capital, for playing fast and loose with terms, for not including enough others in my essay. And on the other side, the more predictable, infuriating claims that we are a color- and sexuality- blind industry and how dare you desecrate our Church of Meritocracy with your philosophical gay bullshit.
I was pleasantly surprised! Friends texted me almost immediately, strangers emailed me with their personal stories of feeling estranged. The Internet can really reward thoughtfulness sometimes. There were a few of the anti-diversity crowd who showed up in my @-mentions, but not enough to drown out the many engaged responses. (Note to Twitter product folks on my list: Blocking a lot of users in a row is extremely advanced finger calisthenics. It shouldn’t be so hard.)
This week’s links are thematic with the article, and fairly book-heavy. (Wait, come back! There’s a great clip I found from ACT UP on Donahue!)
Self-promotional
My essay on how being queer has made me a better technologist, how few tech queers make noise about it, and how people on the margins are what make social media companies successful.
Practical
A More Ethical and Inclusive Technical Interview Process
Moishe Lettvin, engineering manager at Etsy, discusses ways he’s tuned the technical interview process to meet candidates where they are and help them show off their abilities, not trap them in gotchas.
I have not yet had a chance to read it, but based on plaudits (and intro) from the likes of Anil Dash, and the quality of posts author Sara Wachter-Boettcher has shared on related topics in the past, this looks to be an important guide to compassionate, inclusive design.
Artistic
Video: K-CoreaINC.K (section a) - Ryan Trecartin
Ryan Trecartin has to be one of my favorite artists working today. To call his video/performance work frenetic would be a gross understatement, but it is a deeply queer reading of internet-age media that I find very compelling. A review of more recent gallery work provides some helpful context.
Historical
A Queer History of Computing | Rhizome
A series of posts examining often overlooked queer figures who have had an outsized influence on computer science.
Video: Larry Kramer and ACT UP on Phil Donahue
This clip is a gem in so so many ways. What’s most shocking to me, though, is the slow pace, the civility, the room to speak and draw out a thread given to guests, hosts, and audience. The level of discourse in 1990’s daytime talk looks like Charlie Rose compared to TV now.
Book: The Fire Next Time - James Baldwin
I got a few nastier responses to my article. What seem to have chafed all of them most was something that seems pure fact to me: Whiteness is fiction. Maleness is fiction. Tai Nehisi-Coates makes a beautiful, irrefutable articulation of this in his recent book. But Nehisi-Coates is reverently echoing James Baldwin, whose writing never ceases to unlock new things for me. If you’ve never read this, run, now, read one of the greatest pieces of writing from the 20th century.
Book: Cryptonomicon - Neal Stephenson
A spectacular novel weaving threads from Bletchley Park codebreakers to contemporary corporate computer wars. What I love most about this book is the life it gives to Alan Turing’s homosexuality. Unlike that recent movie where he has a pitiable, one-dimensional secret, in Stephenson’s novel, Turing loves and pines and breathes like the real human he was.
By Matt Hackett
I'm an entrepreneur and engineer, currently in exploration mode. Subscribe to follow along.
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