I started this blog about a year ago with pretty modest expectations. It started as a place to organize my thoughts on management, engineering, and everything else in between. I figured maybe a few colleagues would read it. Maybe some friends?
I really did not expect that I’d have more than 230,000 unique visitors in the first year.
In a single year, this little blog went from basically nothing to nearly 0.2M people reading my random thoughts about software and leadership.
I’m still processing this, honestly.
The April spike in particular caught me off guard, that’s when The Hidden Cost of AI Coding went viral. It hit #1 on Hacker News, got shared around, and suddenly my quiet corner of the internet wasn’t so quiet anymore. October had another bump when Stop Avoiding Politics resonated with people (and also hit #1 on Hacker News). Turns out engineers have a lot of feelings about workplace politics. Who knew.
For those of you who are new here (and statistically, most of you are), here are my personal favorite ones (not necessarily the most read ones) from this year:
- What Actually Makes You Senior (40,000+ views). This went viral on both Hacker News and Reddit, the main takeaway: it’s all about reducing ambiguity/derisking projects. This one clearly struck a nerve.
- Your Strengths Are Your Weaknesses (22,000+ views). The traits that make your best engineers great are usually the same ones causing your biggest headaches. Two sides of the same coin.
- The 7 Most Influential Papers in Computer Science History (32,000+ views). A bit different from my usual stuff. Foundations matter. This was my love letter to the papers that shaped everything we build today.
- Stop Avoiding Politics (40,000+ views). I used to hate workplace politics too. Then I realized that hating politics doesn’t make it go away: it just means decisions get made without you.
- The Management Skill Nobody Talks About (35,000+ views). Repair. That’s the skill. Knowing how to acknowledge your mistakes and fix the damage. Borrowed from a parenting book, applied it to management.
Looking at this list, in hindsight, I can identify something interesting. Most of it is about the human side of engineering. The soft skills stuff. The messy interpersonal dynamics that nobody wants to deal with but everyone secretly struggles with.
Maybe that’s the gap I accidentally filled? There’s no shortage of content about the latest framework or how to scale microservices. But content about how to actually work with humans, manage yourself, navigate your career without losing your mind? That’s harder to find, and maybe that’s my thing.
I don’t have some grand vision for where this goes. I’m still writing mostly for myself (again, to organize my thoughts and learnings). But knowing that these posts are helping people, that someone out there learned something from these, that means something.
So thank you. For reading, for sharing, for the occasional kind email. See you in 2026.
Terrible Software 