Wingee Wide Web

The beginning…

A couple of years B.I. (“Before Internet”)  my dad was given a computer with a 1200 baud modem to submit his work reports. That was around the time when there was only Bulletin Boards and Newsgroups which you had to dial-in to. The servers would only have a couple of modems and at peak times you’d just get the engaged tones.

I’d just finished my Grade 8  piano exam and was looking for a new musical challenge: learning to play the guitar…

Leaving home…

I left home to go to the University of Surrey in Guildford to study Mechanical Engineering. After a couple of years of loving being a student, I wasn’t loving my course and realised that I was crap at it. However in the meantime I was enjoying the computer programming I was doing in my spare time.

Whilst at Uni I met a few guys with similar interests in music and “Bohica” was born. We gigged and rehearsed at Uni whilst members joined and subsequently left…

During my first house share I met a lovely, pretty brunette with a cracking pair…of arms, the sister of one of my housemates. Little did I know that I’d just met my future wife…

First real job…

I rarely came home during semester holidays and spent most of the time as a ‘Temp’. I must’ve Temped in almost every building in Guildford but it gave me a lot of experience in many crappy jobs. Then I was offered my first job: Web Master for a group of IT companies – brilliant. It also gave me the opportunity to leave the course I was failing…

The problem with being a Web Master is once the website(s) have been built, there isn’t much else to do!

Becoming my own employer…

After leaving the Web Master role I started a partnership business with my colleague who was the in house Designer. “The Vision Studios” began whilst we working from our respective spare rooms. Rolling out of bed into work is a very strange experience and here is where I really learnt my trade. Often I found myself  working until the the birds were singing and the milk man was delivering milk. However I knew I was on the right career path as I had never studied or worked so hard in my life!

Between the two of us we won the chance to build websites for Electronic Arts (being in the right place at the right time helped) which gave us the opportunity to work on some exciting and incredible projects.

Kitting out our first office in Guildford: 1000sq ft of bright orange and yellow walls, was one of the coolest and proudest things we achieved whilst our team grew to 6 at its peak.

I was invited to author for technical books through Wrox/Friends of Ed publishing writing chapters on Flash and being published was another milestone for me.

Meanwhile… Bohica attracted a independent record label and began recording our first album.

I took my first snowboarding trip – little did I know I would get totally hooked and go at least once a year every year from now on…

Taking the rough with the smooth…

With the minor success we achieved with starting our own business, we were hardly businessmen and we learnt our biggest lessons in business when work began to dry up…

When Bohicas first album was released we bought ourselves a mini-bus and began a mini-tour whilst our music videos started to get rotation airplay on the Rock/Metal music satellite channels. It was pretty cool that we also managed to get endorsements for half price equipment!

Around about the time when I realised I needed more stability in my life a local media agency were looking for a new developer. I took up the position at Dial Media Group where I became the Head of Development.

Bohica got our second album deal with Revolver/Universal and continued to gig up and down the country until some git nicked our tour van! We’d lost our home away from home!

I’m getting really old…

You start to feel old when you realise you’re a decade older than the ‘adults’ that now inhabit the local bars, let alone nearly twice their age!

But on the flipside of that my life has changed a lot! I’ve now married the brunette (best day of my life I might add) I met all those years ago, with 3 cats, a nice car, a lovely home and a baby on the way. Ironically I now work for a company called ‘Flipside Group’.

I’m the ‘Head of Web Development’ for the digital arm of the group based in Cranleigh, Surrey. It feels like an exciting time for me now and even though it seems to me that I’ve been through a fair amount of ups and downs, somehow it only feels like the beginning…

PS anybody that knows me: if I’ve missed out anything important, I’ve probably forgotten. Please let me know!!