Preface: Ballot propositions, originally designed to bring political control of the state back to the people, is now largely run by the very wealthy. It makes it easier for people (and companies) with money to influence politics, and worse yet, many of the ballot propositions are very difficult to understand and decide on. In most cases, it’s things that our elected representatives should be taking the time to understand and decide on, not individual voters. So by default, I vote no on every proposition unless I fee strongly that it deserves a “yes” vote.

If you’re looking at good sources of info on these measures, I encourage you to check out:

• San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association’s Voter Guide, covering SF propositions.
• San Francisco Chronicle’s Endorsements page, covering all major issues on the city and state ballot.
• San Francisco Voter Information Pamphlet, including pro/con arguments on all city initiatives.
• California Voter Information Guide, containing pro/con arguments on all state initiatives.
• KQED State Proposition Guide, with balanced info on CA propositions only.

San Francisco Propositions

Prop A – City Parcel Tax: Yes
A college degree remains essential in this economy, and San Francisco needs to be producing an educated workforce so that its economy can continue to boom. SF City College is a great way to get that degree on the cheap, and a smart investment in public dollars.

Prop B – Parks Bond: Yes
San Francisco’s parks are in dire shape. And while the Parks and Rec department still has major operational issues that need to be addressed (and this does nothing about that, it mostly just funds improvements), parks improvements are badly needed. They’ve also designed the projects funded by this prop to nicely reach parks all across the city, so everyone should see an impact a park near them. All SF Supervisors also support this measure.

Prop C – Affordable Housing: Yes
I’ve lived in multiple apartments that were within 100 yards of a massive affordable housing project that was supposed to be rebuilt — until the project was set in limbo by the elimination of state redevelopment agencies. At the same time, I’ve seen rents across the city skyrocket, forcing friends out of San Francisco. It’s clear that we need more affordable housing in San Francisco. I worry about sending tens of millions of dollars to build low-income housing, because I see few examples of successful low-income housing projects, nor have I ever met anyone who has benefited in an affordable housing unit (though that could be because people I meet are typically yuppies like myself).

I know that there is an enormous need for affordable housing in this city, and it appears like this measure would actually lower the burden on real estate developers to include low-income units — making it easier and cheaper to build housing for the rest of us. For those reasons, I’m voting yes on C.

Prop D – Election Cycle: Yes
Right now, SF staggers its elections so that some positions are elected in off years, forcing us to hold an election when there is little else on the ballot. Instead, this measure would group those elections together to save money and ensure higher voter turnout. Easy yes.

Prop E – Gross receipts tax: Yes
A classic example of why tough decisions should be made by our elected leaders and not citizens, Prop E is a massively important and massively difficult-to-understand change to how San Francisco collects taxes from businesses. It’s clear enough to gauge, though, that this change will be an improvement for tech companies (who often have high payrolls but low gross receipts) and for San Francisco’s business climate. This proposition would have businesses pay taxes based on gross revenue, not just payrolls, as they do today. It also will generate more taxes than today, but more fairly.

Prop F – Hetch Hetchy: No
This ill-planned proposition asks us to consider studying the removal of the Hetch Hetchy dam and reservoir, where San Francisco and the Peninsula gets all of its drinking water. It’s hard to think of many more bad ideas than this. While I wish we hadn’t ruined a pristine natural landscape generations ago, the project is built, relied on by millions and generates (not expends) electricity to get drinking water to an urban area hundreds of miles away. We can’t take that away.

Prop G – City Policy on Corporations: No
This proposition would declare that corporations are not people. However true that may be, voters don’t need to spend their time voicing their opinion on national matters through local declarative ballot measure. I’m voting “no” on G.

California Propositions

Prop 30 – Tax increases for schools and safety: Yes
I hate new taxes. But California’s budget is an absolute mess, and much of that has been due to sliding tax revenues and jobs have been lost and consumers have cut back on spending. Prop 30 raises income taxes on the wealthy and .25% sales tax on everyone to help balance things out. The money will largely be used to fund public safety and schools, and if it doesn’t pass, we’ll be cutting billions from schools. Our state is entirely too dependent on volatile sales and income taxes on revenue, and passing this measure will only make that situation worse. But unless we want our schools facing financial ruin, we must vote “yes” on Prop 30.

Prop 31 – Two-year budget cycle: Yes
This proposition is a good-government set of reforms to make Sacramento’s budgeting process a bit more sane. It forces to identify how they will pay for any major ($25mil+) program, requires performance reviews of government programs and moves California to a two-year budget cycle. All good things.

Prop 32 – Bans political payroll deductions: No
Seems like a poorly veiled attack on unions. I don’t see any good reason to vote for this.

Prop 33 – Auto insurance based on driver history: No
This is the third attempt by the founder of Mercury Insurance to pass this proposition, and it should fail once more. As a driver who has had spotted insurance history (since I don’t own a car), I don’t think I should be punished should I decide to get auto insurance. Let’s vote “no” on this. This keeps rates affordable, making it easier to have coverage. That’s a good public policy goal.

Prop 34 – Repeal the death penalty: Yes
I met the creator of Northwestern University’s Center for Wrongful Convictions, David Protess. While Protess has since had some scandal in his advocacy of the wrongly convicted, I learned enough to see that some people on death row are, in fact, innocent. As long as the number of innocent people on death row is greater than 0 (and it always will be), I don’t think we should be sentencing people to death. These horrible criminals should suffer a worse fate: spending the rest of their days behind bars.

The death penalty in California, in practice, is already almost gone. Only 13 people have been executed in the last three decades, despite the 700+ convicts awaiting executions. Abolishing it just formally ends the death penalty, which is largely already over in practice.

If you’re not with me on the moral or practical rationale, well, there’s another dousy of a reason not to support the death penalty. The cost of each of the 13 executions the state of California has carried out in the past 35 years: $300 million. Does that sound like a good use of taxpayers to you? Yeah, me neither. I’m voting “yes” to abolish the death penalty in this state.

The hitch in all this: As Avery Lewis pointed out to me, many death row inmates are actually against this proposition because it suspends their right to state-funded legal assistance if they want to overturn their initial conviction through the appellate system.

Prop 35 – Human trafficking penalties: No choice
I really struggled with this proposition. The main reason: It’s, again, something I don’t think voters should be deciding on. Criminal policies, including exactly what sentence specific crimes should get? This seems like a job for the legislature. You know, the people who are supposed to pass laws like this. While punishing sex offenders and traffickers is a good public policy goal, I’m not convinced this is something that needs to be done on the ballot box. I’m voting no or just leaving it blank.

Prop 36 – Three Strikes reform: Yes
According to HuffPo, since 1980, higher education spending has decreased by 13 percent in inflation adjusted dollars, whereas spending on California’s prisons and associated correctional programs has skyrocketed by 436 percent. One of the reasons is the three-strikes law, which sends third-time offenders off on lengthy prison sentences. While crime has increased dramatically since 1994, when this law was put into place, it seems that was more to do due with national decreases in crime rates, not the three-strikes law. Additionally, the incredibly harsh penalties for minor crimes in many instances has encouraged unequal enforcement of this law by judges.

To stop the ballooning prison budgets and make for a more fair justice system, I’m voting yes on reforming three strikes. For a detail analysis of the effect of three strikes in California, see this report.

Prop 37 – Genetically engineered food labeling: Yes
I can’t say that I often, or even ever, worry about eating genetically modified foods. We have huge problems with our food system (misplaced subsidies, public policy that encourages obesity), but I don’t feel like genetically modified foods is one of them. Furthermore, I don’t see any reason that California voters need to be weighing in on this narrow of a topic. If there’s something to be done about this, it should be done in Sacramento.

OK, Brian McGinn convinced me. Even if there are many more important things we need to do to fix our food system, passing Prop 37 sends a signal to big agriculture that we care about what’s in our food. And looking at who’s behind the money on yes and no, I have a lot more faith in companies like Amy’s Kitchen and Clif Bar than in Monsanto.

Prop 38 – Tax to fund education: No
This is the companion measure to Prop 30. Whichever gets more votes passes, and I believe that this is the worse of two measures. Mostly, I believe that because it ties the legislatures hands even more because it specifies exactly where the money will go. California’s government needs more flexibility, not less — as that’s one of the major reasons we have so many budget problems in Sacramento. I’m voting “no” on this. 

Prop 39 – Tax treatment for corporations: No
Currently, companies in California can choose between two methods for calculating their owed tax. This measure would require companies pay income tax purely based on sales. It would then direct about half of the money to clean energy projects. While I like fair taxes and clean energy, I don’t see much of a convincing reason to vote “yes” on this.

Prop 40 – Redistricting: Yes
Our new redistricting policies are already helping California, and I love what the redistricting comission has done. Prop 40 would approves what they’ve done, while voting “no” rejects it. Even the people who promoted getting this on the ballot have given up. So should everyone else. Vote “yes”.

1. The foul ball

Every kid’s dream at a baseball game is to come home with a foul ball. The two brothers in matching Buster Posey jerseys sitting right in front of us were no exception. Early in the game, a ball was hit to the front row of our section. The seven-year-old, Joe, ran for it, but not before an older guy snagged it. Immediately, he turned and saw the kid and gave him the ball.

Joe went back to his seat, sat down for a second, and then walked back down to the older guy, who had returned to his seat. Without getting his attention, he came up from behind and gave him the biggest bear hug his small arms could muster. Everyone within 100 feet gave a big “awwww” and starting applauding, and Joe returned to proudly display the ball.

The story doesn’t end there. Minutes later, Joe’s dad returned from the concourse with an enormous ice cream sundae to thank the fellow. Another round cheers and applause followed.

Of course, this was all great for Joe, but his younger brother was getting a bit jealous with the attention Joe was getting — not to mention the ball. So a few innings later, when another ball was caught by a fan just across the aisle from the guy in blue, the crowd starting cheering for the other brother to get the ball. The lucky fan who caught the ball agreed, and soon both brothers found themselves proud owners of special edition, postseason foul balls.

The entire section got up to cheer once more, and everyone wanted photos of the gang of four.

2. The cheerleader

Sitting right behind us at the game was a former 49ers cheerleader and very spirited Giants fan. Not only did she rally our section to cheer their minds out, but every time the opportunity came to get on the big screen dancing, she grabbed the nearest kid, and made him dance with her. Needless to see, these were some very, very excited 11-year-olds. I think Tommy is going to be bragging to his friends for a long, long time.

3. When it rains, it pours

As anyone saw who watched the game, it was POURING by the 9th inning. Amazingly, that only seemed to brighten the mode. In the craziness of watching a team that was about to win its sixth straight elimination game, the pouring rain only made the moment even more magical. The crowd got louder and more excited as the rains got heavier.

When Romo got that final pop out and the rains continued, almost no one left their seats. They stayed, soaked with excitement (and water). And so, on the series we go! It’s going to be hard to top Game 7 of that NLCS, the first Game 7 victory in Giants history.

1. Side projects can lead you to a new job

Snowpals.org was (and is) an online community of people who love to spend time visiting Lake Tahoe, most of whom are based in the Bay Area. Their old website was very spartan, and I signed on to completely overhaul it.

One of the main purposes of the group has been to coordinate ridesharing, which was done by individuals sending an email out to an entire Yahoo Group of 5,000 people. I knew there had to be a better way to coordinate rides, so when I started to redesign Snowpals.org’s site, I researched existing options (as any good PM does). I figured, maybe there was some site out there that could let us embed a widget where our community could post and book rides. Turns out that didn’t exactly exist, but I discovered that the clear industry leader in the ride sharing space was a company called Zimride.

I not only checked out their site (which was impressive and pretty unique), but scheduled a call with one of their marketing/biz dev folks, Zac Matthews. I had a great time talking with Zac, and while there wasn’t any widget options, I learned a lot about Zimride and got a feel for the culture.

I wasn’t the only one who thought it was a good idea. A few months later, I spotted a post on Techcrunch about Ridejoy, a Zimride clone that sprung up out of Y Combinator and raised some money. Seeing the similarity, I posted a cheeky comment on the Techcrunch post, ribbing them for the similarity:

Not surprisingly, some Zimride folks read the comment as well, and a few hours later I had a Facebook message from John Zimmer, the COO and co-founder of Zimride:

With my then-employer, Ning, already announcing that it was headed toward an acquisition by an advertising company (an industry I wasn’t eager to work in), I took John up on his offer. I went in once, twice, three times and then a fourth, and was soon talking start dates. Ready for a change and excited about working in the transportation industry, I started at Zimride at the beginning of 2012.

Not to get too Sliding Doors on everyone, but it was clear that Snowpals lead me to Zimride. Without it, it’s unlikely I would have found my job at Zimride.

2. Side projects give you something to own and be proud of

When I first joined Snowpals and used it to find members for ski lease, it was in bad shape. There was no CSS or common design templates, and for users, it was a mess to navigate. While it functioned, it wasn’t a great experience.

However, there was no other place online to post a ski lease and find members, except for Craigslist. So I redesigned the entire site from scratch, coded the new design and built it on top of a CMS, so the Snowpals staff could add and update content without knowing HTML.

I’m extremely proud of what I built:

The new Snowpals site looks great (at least, I think so) and is easy to update. Because it’s something that I built from start to finish, I have a sense of a pride over the project like few other things I’ve worked on. I was there at the beginning, and I’m still there, even though it’s “done”.

I tell people about it, I show it off and I pointed to it frequently in my interviews at Zimride as an example of both the quality of my work and my level of commitment. Knowing that this was something I did on the side, outside of normal working hours, made it even better.

3. Side projects can help others.

Side projects don’t have to just be about you. They can be about others. It could be improving the landscaping on your block, coaching a little league team or helping a friend reach a goal. In my case, working on Snowpals was definitely about helping the community of people like me, skiers/snowboarders who go to Tahoe, have an easier time finding rides, deals, rentals and ski leases.

Rebuilding the Snowpals site has turned it into THE destination for ski leases or “ski shares” in Lake Tahoe. So not only have I made it easier for me to find members for my own ski lease, but I’ve made it much easier for anyone else who’s organizing a ski lease to find members.

It’s not curing cancer, but it’s making something I love (repeated snowboarding in Tahoe) much more attainable for Bay Area residents. Instead of paying hundreds of dollars to rent a hotel for a weekend, joining a ski lease promotes friendship and allows people to have “their own cabin, when they need it” in Tahoe for $500-1500.  And the feeling of knowing I’ve made it easier through my hard work has made the Snowpals project incredibly rewarding.

4. It teaches you new skills

I’m a product manager by trade. Being a designer and web developer for a decently large, CMS’d web site like Snowpals meant learning a hell of a lot of new stuff.

First up, I had to sharpen my design skills. Then, I had to do a ton of research on how to build exactly what we needed. Building the site itself was tough, but building in a concept of a section of “Ski Leases” (each with its own common attributes, like price and region) was pretty tough for a light web developer like myself.

I spent hours upon hours tinkering, researching and posting questions on the Web. I picked up a ton of new skills, from CSS to php to WordPress mastery. It came in handy in job interviews, and it’s kept my brain sharp for my day job. And the skills I sharpened working on Snowpals (information design, analytics analysis, etc.) come in handy daily at Zimride.

If you’re not feeling challenged at work, challenging your brain outside of work on a regular basis can really keep you sharp.

5. It could turn into something big.

Last but not least, side projects might just end up not being side projects. They might just take over your life.

I don’t forsee that happening with Snowpals, but it’s happened for a lot of people. Zimride itself started out as our co-founder Logan Green’s side project, and many companies have started the same way. It could lead you to a new friend, a new wife or maybe even a massive, multi-million dollar business like it did for Pete Cashmore, founder of Mashable.

You never know. And you won’t, unless you get out and try.

I’m a fervent supporter of California’s fantastic high-speed rail project. The massive infrastructure project would shuttle between California’s southern and northern urban centers in as little as 2.5 hours.

It has some issues, but I firmly believe that it’s a great project for California, and something we desperately need. This was underscored recently, when my girlfriend decided to move to the Los Angeles Area. As a San Francisco, I’ll be taking frequent trips down there.

When discussing high-speed rail, people have often asked, why not just fly. It takes an hour! Well, I flew back up to San Francisco this past weekend and I did a little time-tracking to see how long it actually took. And when looking at these times, know that I’m the kind of person that arrives at the airport at the last possible minute — which was true for this trip.

6:55 – Left my girlfriend’s Orange County home
7:25 – Arrived at airport
7:39 – Finished going through security
7:40 – Boarding began
8:10 – Flight was delayed due to fog
8:43 – Flight takes off
10:00 – Flight lands
10:15 – Got on BART, luckily only waiting 1 min for train
10:58 – Arrive at my office in SOMA

As you can see, it’s not exactly an hour-long trip. Now, high-speed rail probably wouldn’t have been faster, considering I was coming from Orange County and not downtown Los Angeles (where express trains will likely depart).

But the rail-based trip would be almost imperceptible to weather and delays, and instead of a ton of mode changes to my final destination, I could have sat down on a train in Anaheim and, a few hours later, arrived in downtown San Francisco. I could have worked the entire time (no turning off my laptop until 10k feet), and my trip would have been cheaper — I paid $99 months ago for the flight — and more environmentally friendly.

And of course, I would get to see the scenery up close, and not 30,000 feet up

Let’s Pour (2012)

Living Social (2011)

Mint (2008)

Netflix (2009)

Ning (2011)

OMG Pop – Draw Something (2012)

OpenDNS (2010)

Path (2012)

Pinterest (2010)

Quora (2012)

RedBeacon (2010)

Ridejoy (2012)

Safeway (2010)

Skillshare (2011)

Smugmug (2011)

Songkick (2012)

Stamped (2011)

Strava (2011)

Taskrabbit (2012)

Trip.it (2011)

Tripping (2012)

Trulia (2011)

Ubashare (2010)

Vayable (2012)

Vimeo (2011)

Weebly (2010)

Zazzle (2008)

Zimride (2011)

Zimride (2012)

The most important email a Web service can send is the welcome email. OK, maybe that’s not true, but it’s damn important! It’s your users’ first view of your company, your aesthetics and it sets the bar for communication to come. Like they say, first impression is everything. So spend some time making sure your welcome email shows off the best your company has to offer, and gives a user a reason to come back.

Some best practices for welcome emails:

• Wait a bit before sending the welcome email (15-30 minutes). This will allow for enough time for the user to likely no longer be on your site, which will deliver some extra value as they see the email later on, and are reminded of your service. Additionally, this will allow you to customize the email depending on their initial actions.
• Include a call-to-action for the single-most important thing a new user should do on your service
• Give users a support/knowledgebase channel if they have questions
• Tell users how to get the most out of your service

In my work at Ning and Zimride, we did a lot of work on welcome emails, so I’ve amassed a collection more than 60 welcome emails from services around the web. Am I missing something, or is there a newer version? Let me know!

View entire collection on flickr »

About.me (2011)

Airbnb (2008)

Airbnb Groups (2012)

Airtime (2012)

Apple iPad (2012)

Atlassian – Jira (2012)

Beluga (2010)

Billmonk (2008)

Blackboard eats (2010)

Blockboard (2011)

Bloomspot (2010)

Branchout (2012)

Code Year (2012)

Dopplr (2008)

Dropbox (2011)

Evernote (2011)

Facebook Ads (2010)

Facebook Pages (2010)

Fandango (2011)

Flavors.me (2011)

Foursquare (2009)

Gigwalk (2012)

Goodreads (2011)

iCloud (2011)

Jetsetter (2010)

Want to see more? Check out the second page of Welcome Email examples.

As an avid news reader and fan of local journalism, one of the most exciting things about getting my new iPad was being able to drop my print subscription to the San Francisco Chronicle and give the SF Chron’s iPad app a try. I’d be saving paper, saving myself money (an all-access pass to the iPad app is cheaper than a Sunday-only print subscription) and I’d get news from the Chronicle between editions. Best of all, I could sample firsthand how newspapers are moving to the 21st century.

A few months in, I wanted to stop and take stock, and offer some feedback that hopefully someone at the Chronicle will find useful.

The Upside

After a few months of reading the newspaper on my iPad, I’ve found that it’s coming close to being as enjoyable as reading the Chronicle in print. I don’t get to see quite as much information at once, but I love the “Live” edition which updates throughout the day. I can find everything I used to read (even if it takes a little longer), and my fingers aren’t covered in newsprint at the end.

I love the photo/multimedia spreads. They are much more engaging in print than even on sfgate.com. The upside, though, isn’t all that interesting. Let’s get to my feedback on the faults with the app.

The Problems

(I’ve broken them into mini-rants).

Flawed basic pagination

The single-biggest design flaw in the Chronicle iPad app really comes down to a basic they should have nailed: pagination. Just reading through an article is a painful, clumsy experience.  Here’s why:

• Bizarrely, the app uses two different kinds of pagination. Occasionally, you’ll find that you can scroll up or down through an article. I think most people will find that scroll up or down is a much more pleasant experience. This is a tablet, not a print book or newspaper — let’s drop the idea of “pages”. Just give me the entire article, and let me scroll through it as I please. If you’re worried I’ll feel it’s too long, or I need other ways to break up an article, there are other ways to solve that problem through interface elements, like surfacing subheader titles while scrolling, etc. Path has done this beautifully with the tiny scrolling clock that scrolls with you as you scroll down or up.
• When you do scroll to the right or left to change pages within an article, you’re greeted with a horrible experience. The entire page disappears! Instead of just replacing the content within the bounding box of the article, the user sees all the content on the page — the masthead, the navigation, etc. — disappear and then load once again. It’s a very distruptive experience for what should be one of the most lightweight actions a reader will take: simply reading on! The answer should be obvious — but only the content that’s being scrolled through should change, not all the other page elements. Here’s a visual of what happens:

Navigating between articles

On the topic of basic interface design that misses the mark, there’s another experience that leads to strange outcomes and user confusion: Navigating to a new article. What should be a simple experience isn’t quite as elegant as it could be, because the iPad’s nav jumps around after each use.

A basic tenant of good Web design is “placement consistency“, meaning that “navigation appears in the same location on web pages.” The Chronicle app is breaking that rule, because each time you click on an article name in the left-hand article navigation panel, that article jumps to the top of the page (not to mention all page elements refresh, as discussed above).

This isn’t the way it should work. Usable, well-designed navigation should stay right in place, allowing users to quickly jump between articles. By moving the article to the top each time, you’re forcing users to quickly re-learn where each article link is found, each time. Instead, use a background color to signify the “current” article, as the iPad app is already doing!

Sidenote: Also helpful, would be a “pressed” color for links in the article nav. They should change color after being pressed (currently they only change after being visited).

Don’t show me ads!

Perhaps I’m being naive, but I’d hoped that in moving to an tablet news source that I was actually paying for, I could avoid ads. This should be the case, because it’s damn clear that ads are destroying the user experience of the app.

Tablet real estate is very limited, and the app keeps an ever-present banner ad at the bottom of the app. Additionally, on occasion I will get flashed with a full page, instertitial ad. That’s just too much. For $5.99/mo, I shouldn’t be seeing this crap. It’s brutal for the user experience, and seriously turns me off from using the app. If you need to charge me a dollar more each month, do it. These ads are horrific and make me want to put the iPad down.

Sleep mode loses your place

The Chronicle iPad app seems to very quickly lose its place in memory when put to sleep. When I put the iPad to sleep and then wake it from sleep, the app typically has to reload completely. Instead, the app should just bring me back to where I just was, instantly.

This is a common use case, as I’ll frequently be reading the app while watching TV, talking to friends or in transit. I’m constantly putting it down and picking it back up; don’t force me to wait 5-15 seconds each time for the app to refresh.

Gallery thumbnails disappear too quickly

I’m a big fan of the multimedia galleries. However, they can be a bit tricky to use. Left/right swipe works fine to move between images, but if you wait a few seconds, the thumbnails will often disappear automatically.

Want to get them back? Swiping up from the bottom doesn’t bring them back. Think that tapping on the screen will bring the thumbnails back? Me too. It doesn’t — it hides the caption as well. You must click again, a second time, to bring back the thumbnails.

My advice: Just don’t autohide the thumbnails. Add a prominent “Hide Thumbnails” button or icon, and let the users do it on their own. They’re not very disruptive and they are very helpful for most users, so let them be seen!

Links should be buttons, not plain text

Many of the action buttons in the iPad app are links, not buttons. This is a little confusing, and not super easy for the user to click. Instead, try using buttons. They’re a lot clearer to users. Hitting an individual link — especially one that only takes up one line of text — can be hard for users, especially older ones.

Check out the comparison below of action links in the Chronicle iPad app vs Flipboard, one of the best-designed print magazine-style apps out there.

Vail Resorts added Kirkwood Resorts to their skiing empire earlier this year. Kirkwood has obviously been struggling for a while now, and this could open a world of possibilities for Kirkwood.

The resort was increasingly looking out of date, and yet lots of territory was inaccessible via from Kirkwood’s existing lists. With an influx of new money from Colorado, what might the future hold? Will Kirkwood build new lifts? And if so, where will they go?

I received a map of Kirkwood’s Mountain Master Development Plan a few months ago, and it contains some clues. In it are two very exciting proposals: A new lift halfway up the backside, to the top of Thimble Peak and a new lift to the top of Red Cliffs.

That’s some seriously awesome new terrain that today is only available to those willing to hike. Have a look at the Kirkwood Development Plan yourself!

While I was looking for product manager and product designer postings in particular, my list eventually came to include companies hiring for any kind of jobs in San Francisco (and a few elsewhere). I figured other people might get some use out of this list. Of course, be sure to check the Zimride Jobs page first!

All jobs are in San Francisco, as best as I can tell or where otherwise noted.

• Zimride – World’s coolest transportation company
• 99 Designs – Platform for freelance design work
• Airbnb – Allowing people to rent any space
• Airtime – A platform for shared experienced
• Asana – Task management app
• Atlassian – Tools for software development
• Automatic – Car info device
• Automattic – Home to WordPress and Askimet
• Bleacher Report – Sports news tailored to you
• Branch – New communication forum
• Circa – Redesigning news
• Couchsurfing – Host and stay with strangers for free, across the globe
• Coverhound – Car insurance marketplace
• Current – New-era video distribution
• Disqus – Online discussion integration
• Dropbox – Online storage tools for people and companies
• Eventbrite – Platform for creating, hosting and ticketing events
• Everlane – Direct retail-to-consumer clothing brand
• Evernote – Cloud-based note-taking system (Redwood City)
• Exec – Hire strangers at $25/hr for jobs
• Expect Labs – Better iPad conversations
• Echo – New-era corporate websites
• Expensify – A better way for employees to get reimbursed
• Facebook – The social network (Menlo Park)
• Formspring – Social network for questions and answers
• Funzio – Social Games producer
• Getable – Share anything online
• Getaround – P2P Car Sharing
• Gigwalk – Make money doing tiny tasks
• Google – King of search companies
• Guidebook – Mobile apps for events/conferences
• Gumroad – Platform for creators to sell to followers
• Hearsay Social – Enterprise social marketing platform
• Inkling – Platform for tablet textbooks
• Karma – Send gifts to friends
• Kotagent – Mobile app analytics
• Lemon – Receipt storage and processing
• Liftopia – Largest online seller of ski tickets
• Livefyre – Real-time conversation platform
• Marketo – Marketing automation software
• ModCloth – Social Fashion
• Mozio – Getting people from the airport to their destination
• Nest – Reinventing the thermostat (Palo Alto)
• Nextdoor – Platform for neighborhood-based social networking
• Okta – Password/login management
• Outbox – Digitizing in-person mail
• Path – Mobile app for social communications between friends
• Pinterest – Showing off interests
• Postmates – Intra-city deliveries
• Quora – User-generated questions and answers
• Rdio – Paid online/mobile music streaming service
• Red Magnet Media – Content strategists for brands
• RelayRides – Rent our your vehicle to strangers
• RentJuice – Real estate rental application management
• Reputation.com – Online reputation management (Redwood City)
• Revinate – Helping hotels manage the social web
• Say Media – Digital publishing platform
• Skillshare – Teach or learn from strangers (NY mostly)
• Soldsie – Selling products through Facebook comments
• SparkedSocial – Customer feedback platform
• Square – Payment processing via mobile phones
• Squarespace – Easy web site creation (NY)
• Storify – Creating social stories for consumption
• Strava – Track your bike rides and workouts
• Stripe – Easy payments for websites
• Taskrabbit – Hire strangers for odd jobs
• Thumbtack – Find and book local services
• Tumblr – Pretty, easy blogs for everyone! (NY)
• Twilio – SMS and mobile notification platform
• Twitch – Video game tv station
• Twitter – Micro-social communications
• User Voice – Customer support/feedback platform
• Vayable – Marketplace for travel experiences
• Weebly – Easy web site creation
• Wheelz – P2P Car Sharing
• Wikimedia – Home to Wikipedia, knowledge system
• Yammer – Tools for better work communication
• Yardsale – Sell your goods to neighbors
• Yelp – Reviews of businesses everywhere
• Yobongo – Real-time chat with people nearby (Palo Alto)
• Zendesk – Customer Support portals
• Zynga – Biggest social gaming producer

I struggled over this one for quite a while. I actually like Ed Lee, our interim, quite a lot. I think he’s done good things for the city. However, I just can’t get over the fact that he lied to get into office. He might have legitimately just changed his mind, or perhaps he was co-opted by some powerful people in the city to stick around. Whatever the case, I can’t move past his promise not to run for mayor — and I think it would haunt him were he to become mayor.

So, that leaves the decision of who else to vote for. I’ve always been a David Chiu fan. Aside from being my supervisor and getting the SF Chronicle’s endorsement, he actually personally responded to the two emails I sent him since I’ve been living in District 3 (see below). He’s very smart, and he — like me and many other San Franciscans — does not own a car. He understands what it’s like to depend on Muni or have to bike around SF, and that wins a lot of points with me. That comes across clearly in his plans for transit and mobility in SF. I think he’s the right choice to be mayor, and he gets my top choice.

Next up was a toughie. I really didn’t like that Jeff Adachi and Dennis Herrera both stood up against the Central Subway, because I think it will be a tremendously beneficial project for San Francisco. However, both of them have shown themselves to be strong leaders — Adachi has almost single-handedly forced the city to address pension reform, making him a persona non grata to many city workers.

And, they also met with the Chronicle’s approval as backups.

Here’s one email from David Chiu, after I asked him what he’s doing to get more housing built, considering skyrocketing rents in San Francisco:

District Attorney: George Gascon

George Gascon is current District Attorney. It’s pretty rare to have someone be the district attorney who hasn’t actually tried a case, but I think Gascon has done a great job despite that. With crime still being significant problem in the city — and San Francisco becoming somewhat of a national laughingstock for often being seen as siding with criminals over police — having the DA being a former cop is an asset.

Despite his affiliation with Gavin Newsom, Gascon is my guy.

SF sheriff: Chris Cunnie

I’m confused why we vote on San Francisco’s Sheriff. Seems like something voters are both ignorant about and don’t need to have much say over. So I’m just going with the Chronicle on this one and voting for Chris Cunnie. If there’s one thing I know, it’s that I don’t want Ross Mirikarimi to have more power.

Local Ballot Measures

Prop A (Schools Bond): Yes
San Francisco schools are in poor shape, and this bond measure provides funds to fix them up and open one new school on the eastern side of the city, where the population is set to boom.

Prop B (Streets Bond): Yes
San Francisco streets are in very poor shape. Anything we can do to improve them is a good thing, especially when it includes new bike lanes and traffic signal improvements to speed transit. It would be better to pay for this out of the general fund, but it’s a step in the right direction.

Prop C (City pension/health care reform): Yes
As a former municipal worker, city pensions are out of control. This ballot measure was both (A) put together through a consensus-building process and (B) trims more than $1 billion off the city future expenses. It gets my vote.

Prop D (City pension reform): No
In isolation, Prop D would be my choice between C and D. It goes deeper than Prop C. However, while I respect what Jeff Adachi is doing putting this on the ballot, I have to support the measure that was placed on the ballot by a wide group of people.

Prop E (Initiative reform): Yes
Allows for initiatives to be modified. Anything that reins in the crazy initiative process is a good thing.

Prop F (Consultant disclosure): Yes
Don’t know much about this, but the Chronicle and SPUR said yes.

Prop G (Sales tax): No
Prop G raises sales tax by .5% on every purchase. While I understand that sales taxes were recently lowered and this would just bring them back near their previous high, it’s simply not the right time for this, and it goes to random public and public safety, so I’m not convinced it’s needed. SF would also have the highest sales tax in the state.

Prop H (School assignment): No
San Francisco schools need help, and the school assignment appears to have significantly contributed to the deterioration. To fix this, the school system just re-did the assignment system recently, through a comprehensive reform process. This measure would elevate the priority of letting kids attend their neighborhood school over other factors. There is much merit to that. But not only am I hesitant to undercut the new process just implemented by the School Board, but as David Chiu said, “The reality today is we do not have great schools in every neighborhood.”

For more recommendations:

• San Francisco Planning and Urban Research
• SF Chronicle endorsements
• SF Transit Riders Union Mayoral Questionnaire