The story of how I ended up at Twitter is typical of my embrace of serendipity. I was working at a large technology company on the east coast, fresh out of school, and moonlighting at night with the Twitter API. I had long since realized I was ready for a move to the consumer web and was a few months into a job search. I had a few offers on the table but nothing looked compelling. I wanted something that exciting, and just another programming job failed to meet the bar. As I plugged away on to API one night in December of 2008, I realized that Alex Payne's emails were getting short. I could tell he was spread thin. "How could this guy develop the API and manage the needs of developers at the same time", I thought.
So I shot him an email. "Alex, I have noticed you are running what amounts to a one man show on the API front, and tend to a lot of developer relations when I assume you would rather be developing. That said, is Twitter looking for someone to help manage the developer community (answer API questions, serve as liaison to development, etc...)? ...". "Funny you should ask.", he responded, "I put in a request to our executives for some part-time developer community support." Zip ahead a couple of months and Twitter decided that there was a role here but we agreed that we didn't know quite what it entailed. Naturally, I quit my job, moved to San Francisco, and accepted a contracting gig to prove the full-time need existed. Anyone heavy into the Twitter developer community around March of 2009 noticed a few changes when I started: * The API suddenly had a dedicated face to contact * Whitelisting, account maintenance, and development needs got immediate attention * Platform communication increased * Documentation improved * Alex and Matt began focusing on the code * Our business development folks had technical help A few months later I had demonstrated the value and was offered a full time job. It was clear then as it is now: we need a dedicated team to give developers the attention they deserve. We believe that developer happiness and Platform success are strongly correlated. Although I have moved on to other projects internally, the rest of the Platform team have taken up the slack in supporting the community. But we want to do more. Developer happiness and growing the community are major strategic priorities for the Platform. To achieve our lofty goals we need superstars to make big things happen. We like the idea of experienced API developers supporting the community which is why I am writing this note. If you are crazy passionate about the Platform and want to work toward making it the best platform on the web, please apply: http://bit.ly/Twitter_Platform. The work here is fast and dynamic, and we don't always know where the road will lead. Which is what makes it fun. We look forward to hearing from you and all of your ideas to make the Platform great. Thanks, Doug Williams http://twitter.com/dougw