I've been a professional developer for about 15 years, and a hobbyist for a lot longer than that. Over the years, I've seen waves of "technical celebrities" come and go. At the beginning, I recognized named because they wrote magazine articles or books. Everyone's heard of Charles Petzold. Do folks remember Jeff Duntemann or Michael Abrash? How about Scott Robert Ladd?

Later, at least for me, the "in the know" folks were the ones who did the conference circuits. Chris Sells, Don Box, Jeff Prosise, and such were my idols (and, luckily enough, some of them later became coworkers).

These days, it seems the key to recognition is the blog. Many of the the though leaders in the technical community (or up and coming leaders) haven't published a thing but blog posts.

It seems my first post on my new blog is a complaint about blogging. ;-) I get asked at work constantly where my blog is. I think it's time I grew up and joined the 21^st century. And maybe this'll give me a place to write down those half-solidified ideas, confident that when I forget them later (as I always do) I know where to go look for them.

Talk to you soon!