This is the first blog post in a series for the Online Capstone Project – CS 467 – at Oregon State University Ecampus, Fall 2022.
In 2008 when I was 13 years old, I started to notice the world changing around me. The iPhone had just been released, Facebook was rising, and people were consuming media at an alarming rate. Xbox Live and Myspace had been around for a while, but people weren’t so consumed by those media platforms to elicit my concern. But something seemed off to me about the emerging direction of mass media, and I was freaked out.
By the time I was 14, I had stopped playing video games, watching TV, and using network applications. The world was going virtual, and I was running the other way. I spent high school studying the natural sciences and physically exerting myself – mostly running and wrestling. In college I studied geology & geophysics, and I did a thesis in metamorphic petrology. I was so far from modern technology, I had no idea how the stuff even worked.
By the time I was 22, I knew close to nothing about computers, networks, or how to navigate the most common applications. Then, in my last year studying geology, I took a class that involved a lot of coding. I was awestruck. I couldn’t believe that I had never been exposed to the vast world of computing. I saw boundless possibilities; I realized that anything that can be imagined can be created. And then I was confused. I knew that I had to pivot away from geology to make room in my life for this new discovery.
It wasn’t an easy transition. I had rejected modern technology for half my life, and all of a sudden I wanted to make the stuff. I was making a huge change in my life’s trajectory. I needed to figure out where to start, and how to end my previous life. I became my name – perhaps I’ll write about that experience one day. It was a tumultuous, exciting, uncertain period of my life.
I started pursuing Oregon State’s Post-Baccalaureate Computer Science Online Program in January of 2020 when I was 24. By the end of my first term, the whole world was in Covid Lockdown, and everything was virtual. I went from playing with rocks and wrestling with friends to a world of computers and virtual networks. It was like I had started over in life, and I was a child in an adults body. I had no idea what I was doing, and I was not very confident in my ability to produce value through code.
My life fell into place this year – I turned 27 about a week ago actually. When I landed a Software Engineer Summer Internship at JPMorgan Chase, I knew I was going in the right direction. Around the same time, I was presented with an opportunity to develop a really cool mobile application that I think has potential. It’s a virtual farmers market called Gone Local – this is my Capstone Project. At this point I have completed the internship, and I’m beginning this new venture with Gone Local. My confidence is way up compared to last year.
I can barely remember my life before now. I used the money that I made from the internship to get my girlfriend a nice engagement ring. I accepted a full time offer at JPMorgan Chase, and I start in February next year. I plan to continue working on the Gone Local app as a side project long after the Capstone Project is concluded. Maybe if I’m lucky I’ll be able to quit my job and work on Gone Local full time. Regardless of that, I’m very happy with my current position and trajectory.
