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WELCOME TO THE
NAP TRACK
Please respect the sleep needs of those around you
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Hello from
Austin, TX
the breakfast
taco capital of
the universe
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DOCKERIZING YOUR
REACT CONTAINER:
WHY WHAT YOU KNOW IS SOOO 5
MINUTES AGO
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SORRY,
THAT’S OVER.
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WEBPACKING YOUR
ELM KUBERNETES:
WHY WHAT YOU KNOW IS SOOO 11
SECONDS AGO
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SO YEAH.
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Let’s talk about
mid-life crises.
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HELLO THERE.
THIS IS
MY DAD
THIS IS HIS
FANNY PACK
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BUT THIS IS HIS
MID-LIFE CRISIS
THIS IS NOT
MY DAD
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The web developer’s
career is entering an
endless mid-life crisis.
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A word of
comfort
A word of
caution
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YEAH, IT’S GOT
VIRTUAL DOM
HEY, COOL JS
FRAMEWORK
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BRANDON HAYS
@tehviking
“We do chicken right!”
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I first noticed
these patterns
learning Ember.
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A prediction for those
trying to stay up on the
latest web technologies
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-My prediction?
PAIN.
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PAIN POINT 1:
It’s impossible to keep
up with new tools.
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PAIN POINT 1:
YOU CAN’T KEEP UP
WITH NEW TOOLS
Choice Paralysis
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The Tech Treadmill
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PAIN POINT 2:
New stuff can’t live
up to expectations.
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OMG
OMG
OMG
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SPOILER ALERT
IT WAS ALIENS
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New tech: Week 2
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PAIN POINT 3:
The technology you
love is now obsolete.
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Pour one out for Rails
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Alas, poor
Tomster,
we hardly
knew ye
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WHAT IF I TOLD YOU
THIS IS ENTIRELY PREDICTABLE
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The Hype Cycle
PLATEAU OF
PRODUCTIVITY
SLOPE OF
ENLIGHTENMENT
TROUGH OF
DISILLUSIONMENT
TECHNOLOGY
TRIGGER
PEAK
OF INFLATED
EXPECTATIONS
VISIBILITY
MATURITY
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Also, your favorite
technology didn’t really die
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WHY DOES THIS HAPPEN?
PAIN
CURRENT TOOLS
ARE FAILING ME
OH HEY
SOMETHING NEW
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This realization can
happen instantly.
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How it works
History of Rails
How to apply it
The Hype Cycle
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A Movement in
5 Medium Thinkpieces
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TECHNOLOGY
TRIGGER
Technology
Trigger
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Peak of Inflated
Expectations
PEAK
OF INFLATED
EXPECTATIONS
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Trough of
Disillusionment
TROUGH OF
DISILLUSIONMENT
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Slope of
Enlightenment
SLOPE OF
ENLIGHTENMENT
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Plateau of
Productivity
PLATEAU OF
PRODUCTIVITY
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No one upvotes the
plateau of productivity.
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“Hype” is not an insult, it’s an inevitability
PLATEAU OF
PRODUCTIVITY
SLOPE OF
ENLIGHTENMENT
TROUGH OF
DISILLUSIONMENT
TECHNOLOGY
TRIGGER
PEAK
OF INFLATED
EXPECTATIONS
VISIBILITY
MATURITY
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The “Whoops!” heard
‘round the world
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TECHNOLOGY
TRIGGER
Technology
Trigger
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Peak of Inflated
Expectations
PEAK
OF INFLATED
EXPECTATIONS
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Promise: This will make
you the 10x developer you
always hoped you were
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You are literally
a Jedi Rockstar
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(We’ll talk about the
real promise at the end)
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****
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You’re on a rocket ride to
the moooooooon!
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Except then…
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Trough of
Disillusionment
TROUGH OF
DISILLUSIONMENT
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Slope of
Enlightenment
SLOPE OF
ENLIGHTENMENT
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Plateau of
Productivity
PLATEAU OF
PRODUCTIVITY
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MySQL isn’t cool. You
know what’s cool?
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3 TYPES:
Pioneers
Settlers
Town Planners
http://blog.gardeviance.org/2012/06/pioneers-settlers-and-town-planners.html
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PIONEERS
http://blog.gardeviance.org/2012/06/pioneers-settlers-and-town-planners.html
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SETTLERS
http://blog.gardeviance.org/2012/06/pioneers-settlers-and-town-planners.html
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TOWN PLANNERS
http://blog.gardeviance.org/2012/06/pioneers-settlers-and-town-planners.html
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PIONEER
SETTLER
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Pre-0.14β: Pioneers Arrive
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lighthttpd/FastCGI
Built-in SOAP
“Email me your gem list”
Pre-0.14β: Pioneers Arrive
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Shopify
Engine Yard
Odeo
Pre-0.14β: Pioneers Arrive
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Shopify
Engine Yard
Odeo Twitter
Pre-0.14β: Pioneers Arrive
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1.0-2.3: Settlers Move In
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acts_as_everything
Restful routes
Bundler
Passenger
1.0-2.3: Settlers Move In
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Thank you,
Ryan Bates
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Heroku
Zendesk
New Relic
GitHub
1.0-2.3: Settlers Move In
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3.0-5: Town Planners Take Over
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Merb merge & Arel
SOA
Rails as API
3.0-5: Town Planners Take Over
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Fortune 500 companies
Basically all of Y Combinator
Most hacker schools
3.0-5: Town Planners Take Over
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QUIZ TIME
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Which irritates you most?
1. Being required to use outdated tools
2. Team members that try to rewrite your
codebase in the latest “hipster stack”
3. Anything that gets in the way of shipping
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Which do you enjoy most?
1. Accepting a PR for an OSS library
2. Applying a technology in a way
that makes the company money
3. Solving a tricky performance issue
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Where do you feel most helpful?
1. Showing someone that there’s a new,
better way of doing things
2. Improving someone’s documentation
3. Automating a tedious deploy process
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EACH ROLE IS VALUABLE
Pioneers: Vision/Experiments
Settlers: Strategy/Synthesis
Town Planners: Tactics/Execution
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PIONEERS OR “HIPSTERS”?
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SETTLERS OR EXPLOITERS?
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TOWN PLANNERS OR
“ARCHITECTURE ASTRONAUTS”?
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Wrong, but
hilarious
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Whichever you are, don’t
beat up on others
(or yourself) for not
being the other two
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Yeah, but how do I apply
any of this stuff?
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There are ways to
win and lose at the
hype cycle
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HOW TO LOSE:
1. Dismiss new stuff, become
commoditized
2. Get caught up in the cycle & burn out
3. Bet and crash with tech that doesn’t
clear the trough
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THE TECH TREADMILL
BUT YOU CAN HACK
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How to win depends on
your preferences
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Remember me?
PLATEAU OF
PRODUCTIVITY
SLOPE OF
ENLIGHTENMENT
TROUGH OF
DISILLUSIONMENT
TECHNOLOGY
TRIGGER
PEAK
OF INFLATED
EXPECTATIONS
VISIBILITY
MATURITY
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2 QUESTIONS:
What stage is it in?
Should I concern myself?
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TECHNOLOGY
TRIGGER
Technology
Trigger
PIONEERS: Probably.
SETTLERS: Maybe…
PLANNERS: No.
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Peak of Inflated
Expectations
PEAK
OF INFLATED
EXPECTATIONS
PIONEERS: Yes!
SETTLERS: Maybe…
PLANNERS: No.
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CAN SURF THIS WAVE
PIONEERS
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Trough of
Disillusionment
TROUGH OF
DISILLUSIONMENT
PIONEERS: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
SETTLERS: Probably.
PLANNERS: Maybe…
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Slope of
Enlightenment
SLOPE OF
ENLIGHTENMENT
PIONEERS: Nope
SETTLERS: Yes!
PLANNERS: Probably.
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Plateau of
Productivity
PLATEAU OF
PRODUCTIVITY
PIONEERS: No.
SETTLERS: Maybe…
PLANNERS: Yes!
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THE COMFORT
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If I don’t switch to Elixir
and Phoenix, am I going
to be left behind?
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If I still use the Asset
Pipeline instead of
Webpack, am I headed
for unemployment?
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No content
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If I haven’t built a side
project in Elm, am I
intellectually lazy?
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Your favorite technology
isn’t dead.
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No one gets to make
you feel ashamed of
liking the stuff you like.
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IT’S OKAY TO NOT
LIKE THINGS
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PLEASE DON’T YUCK
SOMEONE ELSE’S YUM.
https://medium.com/@lizzerdrix/being-comfortable-enough-to-talk-15a6eb105ab9
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But Brandon! If Ruby isn’t
dead, why do you run a
JavaScript consultancy?
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Doesn’t that make you a
humongous hypocrite?
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But yeah,
I’m a hypocrite
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THE CAUTION
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There comes a time for you
to leave the plateau.
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WHEN TO PIVOT
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Day job
(productivity)
Side project
(curiosity)
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Make longer term
bets, less often
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Avoid tech that
targets the peak
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Align with tech that
targets the plateau
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The emotional roller coaster of your
first production app in a new tech
PLATEAU OF
CONTINUOUS
DELIVERY
SLOPE OF MASTERY
TROUGH OF
“IT SHOULDN’T BE
THIS TOUGH”
“EMBER NEW”
TRIGGER
PEAK OF
TUTORIAL-
DRIVEN
DEVELOPMENT
ENTHUSIASM
PROJECT DURATION
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So you bet on a tool and
got to “Hello World”
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That post-tutorial high tho
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Re-entering Earth’s gravity
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The problem isn’t “the peak”,
it’s “inflated expectations”.
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3-week PoC
6-month slog
Estimation is hard
impossible
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TRUE 10x ENGINEERING
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The problem: Your boss
thinks “Proof of Concept”
means “Production”
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Yeah… If you could just put
that into production by
Saturday, that’d be great
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The emotional roller coaster of your
first production app in a new tech
PLATEAU OF
CONTINUOUS
DELIVERY
SLOPE OF MASTERY
TROUGH OF
“IT SHOULDN’T BE
THIS TOUGH”
“EMBER NEW”
TRIGGER
PEAK OF
TUTORIAL-
DRIVEN
DEVELOPMENT
ENTHUSIASM
PROJECT DURATION
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Why wade through the
trough of disillusionment?
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While your boss wasn’t
looking, everything changed
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While we swam the
avalanche,
everything changed
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Client-driven UX is a thing
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At 2.x, Ember is approaching
the plateau of productivity
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How did Rails & Ember
“cross the chasm”?
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Because while some
churn in this cycle…
CIRCLE OF
ETERNAL
HOPE
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PLATEAU OF
PRODUCTIVITY
…things like Rails and Ember
have always targeted this
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I used to think the
promise was to make
me a 10x developer
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“Look at all the
things I’m not doing!”
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The real promise is
about helping you
reach the plateau
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On the plateau,
there is time to focus
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Focus on things
that add value
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(BUSINESS VALUE)
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On the plateau,
there is time to think
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Maybe about how
your boss is an idiot
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And since you focus
on business value,
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You can afford to
fire your boss.
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…and then you do
****
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And you turn out OK.
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But that’s another talk.
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No content
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Thanks.
@tehviking
http://frontside.io
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IMAGE CREDITS
Ruby on Rails book collage by Antonio Cangiano http://programmingzen.com/2007/01/05/collage-of-ruby-
and-rails-books/
Ox wagon by University of Pretoria Library http://repository.up.ac.za/handle/2263/8033
Last Spike at Craigellachie by Wikimedia Commons https://www.wikimedia.org/
Old map of Austin by Wikimedia Commons https://www.wikimedia.org/
Meditate by Nadir Hashmi https://www.flickr.com/photos/nadircruise/
Sandwich by Adam Sherer https://www.flickr.com/photos/arsherer/
The Weight of Thought by Evan Leeson https://www.flickr.com/photos/ecstaticist/
The New Fred Meyer on Interstate on Lombard by Lyza https://www.flickr.com/photos/lyza/49545547
DHH during Dave Thomas' Talk by Jesper Rønn-Jensen https://www.flickr.com/photos/jesper/252308266/
Main Street Replica by Pioneer Trails Regional Museum http://www.ptrm.org/programs/?program_id=21
Hipster by Luca Rossato https://www.flickr.com/photos/funky64/16637883503/
Capitalist Pig by Brandon https://www.flickr.com/photos/darthdowney/3271642232