Jay Margalus

Three years ago, at 24, I got married and bought a house in the suburbs.

Two (and 1/2) years ago I quit my job in downtown Chicago, started my own company, and co-founded a hackerspace (and worldwide space blimp competition) with a few friends.  I also started brewing beer, which I consider to be one of the best hobbies I’ve ever taken on.

A year (or more) ago I became co-owner of a video game company and started working with a great group of people at IGDA Chicago (who I would later become a board member with).

This year, at 27, I’ll be having my first child.  Having a child will be my biggest responsibility and undertaking to date, but I can’t help wondering: what else am I going to do?

The question haunts me.  The idea of being comfortable with where I’m at is frightening.  Many of my friends and family talk about retirement; about reaching some comfortable age where they’ll stop working and start enjoying life.  For me, my work is part of who I am… it is the way I enjoy life.  Yet the idea of doing the same work — of not creating or innovating — is unacceptable.

So, what now? What comes next?

German Hackers Are Building a DIY Space Program to Put Their Own Uncensored Internet into Space:

In a decidedly 21st-century twist, team of German hackers bent on fighting the powers that be has chosen a rather ambitious means of taking the power back: building a hacker-owned and -operated space program, complete with a constellation of communications satellites beaming uncensored Internet to users on the ground.

(Via Popular Science – New Technology, Science News, The Future Now)

A Man. A Van. A Surprising Business Plan.:

At first Tong was a little unsure about getting into a rental van parked along a busy highway, but he took the chance.

(Via NPR Blogs: Planet Money)

This is one of the simplest ways I know to set onblur/onfocus states for input fields (you can also swap “input” for textarea, etc), and I couldn’t find anyone out there that had posted the same solution:

Much better than the inline javascript stuff.

I’ve been alive for 10,000 days.