Updated: August 19, 2010
Since no one in the industry wants to interview me, I decided to interview myself. The reason is probably the fact I'm either too interesting and hence too intimidating, too boring, which seems highly unlikely, or just plain simple open and honest, so there's no need for any interviewing.
Anyhow, I could not wait any longer. Therefore, I've compiled this interview. You may find the fact both the interviewer and the interviewee are one and the same person somewhat problematic, but it's not really. If you've worked in high-tech industry, you know that most engineers talk to themselves. So having a self-conducted interview is not much of a fuss.
Anyhow, dive in and enjoy!
Q: How do you feel about being interviewed by yourself? Isn't this a little odd?
|Many technical interviews feature random pictures of interviewees, usually seen at leisure in their home, to sort of show everyone that they have a deep and engaging personality; see below weird closeups of my knee|
A: Well, it's good actually. Since I know all the questions in advance, I can prepare some really daring answers. Plus, the choice of questions is absolutely stellar.
Q: Tell us a little about yourself.
A: That's not really a question, is it? Well, most of it is there on the FAQ/About page. Now, what else could I share so that you may find me an engaging and interesting personality?
Well, here we go. I believe I'm the perfect human being, on this planet. While there are many people who are better than me in certain individual categories and skills, overall, I'm very good in a wide range of things. My quality integral is much bigger than that of many people. Typical geniuses are characterized by spikes in their quality function; I have a uniform distribution of goodness. As such, I probably qualify as the perfect human being. This may be a very egocentric thing to say, but why deny the cold, hard facts?
Q: Why did you disable comments on your site?
A: I did not disable them; they were never enabled in the first place.
A: I do not feel like moderating comments, filtering out spam, bad spelling, sentences that begin with lowercase, or anything else that may irritate my rather anal sense of tidiness. Oh, I absolutely hate the word lol. Now, imagine purging those hundreds of comments containing a self-defensive lol in there. Oh, dear.
Q: Do you have a Facebook, Twitter, etc account?
A: No. I don't believe in e-society. Friends are like kidneys you can donate. How many? Not a lot! Oh, I've written what I had to say about Facebook not that long ago. Similarly, I don't have Twitter, LinkedIn, identi.ca, or anything else. If you want to talk to me, email me.
Q: Why is your Google Reader via Feedburner count so low?
A: I've added that function approx. half a year ago. Most of my established readers have subscribed to my RSS feed long before that option was available, using other tools. Furthermore, my audience leans on the more serious side and they tend to use alternative RSS readers.
Checking my website statistics using Google Webmaster Tools, I have many more Google Readers that are not accounted for in the Feedreader icon, so looks and numbers can be deceiving. Even so, Google Reader accounts for only about 15-20% of my RSS audience.
Q: What technology do you use for your website?
A: It's called DIY. Dedoimedo started as a vague hobby in early 2006. Back then, I did not know one bit of HTML. But I built everything from scratch, learning along the way. Consequentially, Dedoimedo is a very simple, very static website. Pure HTML and CSS. This makes updates and changes more difficult, but scripts and regular expressions take care of most of that. On the other hand, I need not mess with security issues in server-side scripting languages and plugins or worry about running out of hosted GPUs. My only limitation is the traffic cap, and that should take a long time to reach, but hopefully not too long.
Besides, the backbone technology is irrelevant. The only important thing is the content. Providing simple, honest, most accurate advice to your readers. Do you really think someone with a pressing GRUB 2 problem really cares that my hosting company uses LAMP or whatever? People want to come to Dedoimedo and enjoy themselves. It's very simple. Pure integrity. Everything else is perks.
Q: Do you have a role model?
A: Do you mean is there someone out there in the IT/technological crowd that I truly admire for their hard work, effort and impact on society in the past 20-30 years?
A: Well, no.
A: Well, yes. It goes back to me being the perfect human being. I cannot identify with other people, merely tiny aspects of their work. For example, both Chuck Norris and Steven Seagal are cool dudes, but I would not really call them my heroes, idols or anything alike. Similarly, I can't think of anyone who has truly impacted my way of doing and thinking or changed my life, except my close family, but that does not count here.
Q: Do you hate Microsoft?
A: No, I'm above the age of 16, so I understand how business works.
Q: What makes Dedoimedo special?
A: Except the awesome owner and author, you mean? Well, I did lavishly praise myself earlier, but here's some more. The simplicity of it all, that's the key. KISS. People come to Dedoimedo for help, tips and tricks on computers, learn about games, and enjoy sophisticated art and humor. I make sure they get what they want.
Q: Do you get any hate mail?
A: I've only got one such mail :) Sometimes people disagree with me, but there's no hatred or curses. I guess I do not piss off people, although this is a great way of boosting your traffic. Besides, I'm just too funny and cuddly to hate. Finally, let us not forget the fact I'm impartial and reasonable in everything I do, which leaves no margin for hatred.
Q: Is there going to be a forum on Dedoimedo?
Most likely not, for the same reasons I never enabled comments. But maybe.
Q: What is the best article you have written?
I think the most informative, no-nonsense article that really made the difference was the original GRUB tutorial. While there are many other articles and reviews with similar popularity, this one really started it all. I invested a whole lot of time in preparing it, and I guess it shows.
Q: Have you published any books? Do you intend to?
A: No. Yes. No books yet, but I'm working it. I used to write an all-inclusive, step-by-step series of books about anything and everything in Linux, but kind of got bored with that after the first 1,000+ pages. Now, I'm aiming for a more specialized book on more focused content. I am also working on publishing my fantasy works, a couple of books which have yet to see editorial light.
Q: What's your favorite music?
A: If you have not guessed that from multimedia screenshots in my myriad Linux distro reviews, then it's mostly 80s music. Declaring any one band or singer as the best would be tricky, but when it comes to composing music, Jan Hammer is the man.
Q: Well, Dedo, I'd like to thank you for your time, it's been fun!
A: Without a doubt.
There you go - the most sincere, objective interview since Internet was invented.
While there may be many more questions left unanswered, like what Dedoimedo stands for, what is the meaning of the smart guy avatar, how much traffic Dedoimedo enjoys, and what is the meaning of life, worry not! There will probably be a sequel to this interview, hopefully conducted by someone other than myself.