Author Archives: tig

MCE Controller supports the Windows key

October 5, 2011
Coding, Smart Home, Uncategorized
2 Comments

MCE Controller, allows you to simulate a press of any button on the Windows Media Center IR remote control by sending a text command to a TCP/IP port on your Media Center computer. For example if MCE Controller receives the string “mypictures” it will tell Media Center to go to the “My Pictures” page. I wrote this app in back in ~2003 for my own use so I could integrate Media Center with my Crestron …Continue reading →

Filtering My Angel Investments

October 3, 2011
Startups
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I love early stage startups. So much so, that I will sometimes invest my own money when the startup is not much more than a few bright people with an idea. This is called angel investing. I have the following currencies I can offer early stage companies: Money Time I decided long ago that I would separate those two currencies. I did this partially because , when I worked at Microsoft, it was impossible to …Continue reading →

What to do With Your Old Kindle

September 28, 2011
Books, Uncategorized
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We now have quite the collection of various generation Amazon Kindle Book Readers in our household. I purchased the original the day Amazon announced it and have purchased at least one of every subsequent model.  Today I ordered one of each of the new Kindle Touch, Kindle Touch 3G, and Kindle Fire.  I’m sure my wife will want a Kindle Fire as well so that will up the number we have between the four of …Continue reading →

Crowd Sourced Design Works

September 26, 2011
How To, Startups
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I have updated the look and feel of the Kindel Systems, LLC website and this blog using a crowd source design. And I like how it turned out. Now that I am no longer working for a big corporate giant I have a bunch of endeavors I am working on (including my yet-to-be-announced new company). I’m doing consulting, angel investing, serving on boards of directors/advisors, and several other things that either generate income or assets. …Continue reading →

Be Either an App or a Platform, Not Both

August 24, 2011
Business, Leadership, Platforms, Startups, Technology & Execution
9 Comments

If you think the thing you are building is both an “app” and a “platform” you will fail. Oh, and if you think it’s going to be a just a platform, you will fail too. (Update: April 6, 2012 – I updated this post with some typo fixes and minor tweaks). A recent story on Hacker News gave me an excuse to write down my thoughts on this subject. I’m reposting here in order to …Continue reading →

After 21 Years: Goodbye Microsoft

August 8, 2011
Kindel, Startups
55 Comments

Today I announced that after 21 years I am leaving Microsoft to build a new company. I’m not yet ready to disclose details about the new venture but I can say I will be staying in the Seattle area to build it. It has to do with sports, advertising, mobile, social-networking, and, of course, the cloud. I’m insanely excited to get started. Subscribe here or follow me on twitter if you want to hear more …Continue reading →

90% of the Decisions You Make Don’t Matter

August 6, 2011
Clarity of Thought, Leadership, Startups
7 Comments

In my post The 5 Ps: Achieving Focus in Any Endeavor, I noted that “90% of the decisions you make don’t matter; real success comes in being able to identify the 10% that do and focus on those.” The best, most effective leaders can free their teams up to get stuff done by making lots of decisions quickly and enabling those decisions to stick. We all regularly hear criticisms of ineffective leadership voiced as “Decisions …Continue reading →

June 22, 1991

June 22, 2011
Kindel
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On this day 20 years ago I married my lovely bride Julie in Golden, CO. It’s been an amazing ride so far and I am excited for what the next 20 years bring. I love you Julie!

Some of my Favorite Quotes

June 20, 2011
Books, Leadership
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“A long, healthy, and happy life is the result of making contributions, of having meaningful projects that are personally exciting and contribute to and bless the lives of others.” – Hans Selye “Fools ignore complexity. Pragmatists suffer it. Some can avoid it. Geniuses remove it.” – Alan Perlis “Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity.” – Charles Mingus “No matter where you go, there you are.” – BB …Continue reading →

From the Archives: STOP 0xC2 aka BAD_POOL_CALLER Blue Screen and bad memory

June 19, 2011
How To
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In 2004 one of my computers had a bluescreen with a STOP 0xC2, BAD_POOL_CALLER fault. It turns out it was a bad memory chip. I wrote a blog post about it here: STOP 0xC2 aka BAD_POOL_CALLER Blue Screen and bad memory It is amazing to me that after all this time, my blog post remains the top hit on both Bing and Google for this blue screen. If I had a nickel…

The 5Ps: Achieving Focus in Any Endeavor

June 14, 2011
Clarity of Thought, Leadership, Startups
16 Comments

Always have a plan. Always. A great, simple, framework for any plan is the 5Ps:  Purpose, Principles, Priorities, People, and Plan. This framework applies to software development projects, job searches, building a garden, or a phase in your life. I have personally found the 5Ps a useful tool for small projects (e.g. prepping for a VC demo/presentation) as well as large-scale projects that include 1,000s of people. The 5Ps : Purpose, Principles, Priorities, People, and …Continue reading →

Griot’s 3” Orbital Polishers Compared

June 13, 2011
Cars, Uncategorized
2 Comments

I recently decided I needed a 3” orbital polisher to compliment my Flex 3401 6” Random Orbital polisher that I’ve used for years when polishing the finish on cars. I couldn’t decide whether to get the Griot’s 3” Random Orbital (which is electric) or the Griot’s 3” Pneumatic Orbital (which is air powered). So I ordered both. Griot’s fantastic customer service and return policy made this decision easy. This post provides a comparison of the …Continue reading →

Charles E “Ted” Kindel 1925-1990

June 6, 2011
Kindel, Skiing
2 Comments

I was communicating with another branch of the “Kindel Family” as a result of the post I made about the Kindel Furniture Factory fire several weeks ago. As a result I looked through some old files and found a copy of the article that was written about my father’s death in 1990.  Since tomorrow (June 7) is the anniversary of his death, I thought it would be a useful tribute to post the text of …Continue reading →

The House Kindel Built Burns Down

May 10, 2011
Kindel
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My great grandfather, Charles J. “CJ” Kindel, founded the Denver Bedding Company in 1900. He sold that company and founded the CJ Kindel Bedding Company in St. Louis in 1904. In 1912 ground breaking began on a new factory focused on wood working in Grand Rapids, MI. My grandfather (Charles M. “CM” Kindel) and great-uncle (Thomas Kindel) ran the company through the ‘60s selling our family’s share in 1964. My father worked for the company …Continue reading →

Now using WordPress

May 7, 2011
How To
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This blog is now running on WordPress. I’ve been meaning to move from Community Server (hosted on a server in my house) to something more modern & flexible (and hosted in the cloud) for ages. The desire to dig into the latest in Linux and cloud hosting finally drove me to actually do it.  I decided to force myself to use no Microsoft technologies for this project. Step one was updating my Ubuntu Linux desktop …Continue reading →

Amazon.com: Shockingly Great Customer Service

April 20, 2011
Amazon Way, Uncategorized
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It’s no secret that I love pretty much everything Amazon.com does. You may think that this is just because they named their Kindle book reader after me, but it’s really because they do such a damn good job of focusing on the customer. Case in point:  A month ago, as soon as the new Portal 2 game was available for pre-order on Amazon.com, I placed and order (using my Prime member ship which gets me …Continue reading →

BendPak: Shockingly Great Customer Service

April 15, 2011
Cars, Uncategorized
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A while ago I posted about how much I love Amazon.com’s customer service and I frequently tweet about great service I receive when out and about. Great customer service should be the norm, but sadly that does not seem to be the case. So when I encounter Shockingly Great Customer Service I want to scream from the mountain tops.  BendPak, a manufacturer and distributor of automotive shop equipment such as car lifts, wheel balancers, and …Continue reading →

Behind the Code

April 12, 2011
Kindel, Uncategorized
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The Microsoft Channel 9 Behind the Code series is managed by the Technical Community Network group within Microsoft and is intended to capture the stories of Microsoft’s most influential technical employees. Last fall I was honored to be invited to do an interview for  Behind the Code and that interview was recently published. I think it turned out pretty well and represents my story nicely. So far it is the highest rated Behind the Code …Continue reading →

Books I read in 2010

March 19, 2011
Books, Uncategorized
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Lame that I have not posted anything since last year’s post on the books I read in 2009.  But whatever… Below are the books I read in 2010. I’m posting this mostly for my own documentary benefit.  Maybe you’ll find it useful and find some gems to read. Title Author My Rating Comments Consider Phlebas Banks, Iain M. *****   Matter Banks, Iain M. *****   Surface Detail Banks, Iain M. *****   The Player …Continue reading →

Books I read in 2009

February 6, 2010
Books, Uncategorized
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Mostly writing this for my own (future) benefit…  These are the books I read in 2009 with ratings/categorization: Most were read on my Amazon Kindle (some on the DX, which I review here, others on my Kindle 2).  ***** means loved it. * means I hated it. Science Fiction – By Iain M. Banks (Blog post on Iain M. Banks): Matter (****) Transition (****) Look to Windward (*****) Use of Weapons (*****) Against a Dark …Continue reading →