Ben McCormack

The Customers, Etc. newsletter is one year old and has a new home. Browse the archive and subscribe here: customersetc.substack.com

It's a jungle out there, and I outta know

Do want to hear my favorite troubleshooting story? It involves lots of reverse engineering, ancient MySQL databases, even more ancient VBA code, and a concept called "Banker's Rounding". Also: Abductive Reasoning. Not deductive. Not inductive. Abductive. customersetc.substack.com/p/abductive-re…

Productivity apps track everything, so why bother with manually writing an update? That's the focus of this week's Customers, Etc. newsletter: open.substack.com/pub/customerse…

Hear hear!

Looking back on what I've written in 2023, a few themes stand out: - Retreat - ChatGPT & AI - Systems thinking - Customer experience If you've been a reader of Customers, Etc., what post from 2023 resonated the most with you? customersetc.substack.com/p/2023-custome…

A few sundry thoughts on being sick, travel, and friends: customersetc.substack.com/p/etc-ii-custo…

I *think* this SNL skit, "Airplane baby", from last weekend explains why Sophia and I saw two guys carrying airplane seats on the streets of New York last Friday when we were walking between Rockefeller Center and Central Park. youtube.com/watch?v=_yyq5C…

I don’t think she remembers her first visit

Visited the old Fog Creek HQ with Sophia today

Ever thought solving 'easy' customer queries would free up a lot of your team's time? Dive into my latest post to uncover why these 'easy ones' might not be the burden we think and how AI in customer support really impacts a team's efficiency. customersetc.substack.com/p/the-easy-one…

@lkonsko 👏👏👏

@AndrewJDavison Ah yes, that's a thing. Check out PEP 8, the style guide for Python code: peps.python.org/pep-0008/

TIL "Pythonic" wtf?

Starting to learn that ChatGPT doesn't write the most efficient code 😅 It gave me the left and I rewrote the right... and even asked to make sure I couldn't make it shorter.

@rsobers Rob that's amazing! Congratulations to Everett!!!

What an incredible show. This cast is unbelievable. Words can’t describe how proud I am. 🥺

@shanselman @poppastring 100%! Couldn’t miss it. I was like “did they really quote that?” Perfect.

@poppastring It was perfect. I love that @bmccormack NOTICED our work. He SAW us.

It makes me so happy is that Ben *got it.* Some #DevRel talks are just someone vibing on stage. But @poppastring and I put a MASSIVE amount of work into this talk. From demos, to the T-shirt that I wore, it was all curated. This is a great analysis of how my team works. #Copilot

@BranMacMuffin @shanselman Welp, I *was* going to update my post but I'm getting a weird error from @substack that says "Post out of date". I didn't realize these things could expire. 🤷‍♂️

@BranMacMuffin @shanselman *That's* what it was called. You're exactly right. I remember him talking about it forever ago. I'll edit my post with a link to ZoomIt. hanselman.com/blog/the-ultim…

You have to watch this video from @shanselman. 1. He does an outstanding job demystifying AI 2. He’s a masterful teacher Just watch the first 10 minutes. It's incredible. youtube.com/watch?v=5pbPLH…

Part of the value of writing things on the internet is that you can refer back to them when trying to explain nuanced concepts. Twice this week I was in conversation with colleagues and I was able to tee up a topic and follow it up with "I've explored this in depth here."

@shanselman Wow, you made my day. It means a lot that you took the time to reply, but perhaps even more so that you took the time to read what I wrote. Like you said, I too wonder sometimes if anyone's paying attention.

@bmccormack What a gift this write up is. Thank you for appreciating the work, the nuance, the effort and the multi layered subtext. I wonder sometimes if anyone’s paying attention. Thank you for taking this time and for writing it.