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I liked computers, so I decided to become a developer and studied. While studying, I worked at a venture company because I didn't have to pay tuition, but I thought I should go to a large company. After working at a large company, I thought I should start a startup, and I wanted to do it properly in the United States rather than in Korea. So I started doing crazy things. I was still pursuing my dream, but at the same time, my family sacrificed a lot and I disappointed many people who believed in me.

Although I left Facebook, I re-read the posts I had backed up at the end of the year and organized them into short posts. It was a very difficult three years, but I grew a lot. I gained a new perspective on the world and a new dream emerged. Although these are rambling posts, I am sharing my feelings between the lines with the hope that it will provide some comfort to engineers and entrepreneurs who are going through a difficult time mentally.

November 2011

November 1st last year. The day I attended Startup Weekend without thinking and returned with great shock and stimulation. I can definitely say that my life changed from this day on. I was able to get out of the slump by immediately buying and selling out iPhones and MacBooks, and I gained freedom by letting go of my attachment to success at a large company. When the mind follows a dream, the body automatically follows.

Now, just one year has passed, and this year feels more valuable than any other year in the past 30 years. I realized, thought, and acted. And now, as I prepare for another start, I am excited and looking forward to what November 1st will be like next year. Let's never forget this feeling for the rest of our lives. Stay hungry, Stay foolish.

December 2011

I love that I am the organizer, make my own decisions, and make my own moves, even though I work the same hours. I am responsible for the results I create. Attempts and efforts to achieve results by putting not only development but also networking and people under my control. I can't be satisfied with just one thing. There are so many things I want to do and I want to do them all well. I don’t want to miss it without at least trying it.

January 2012

I feel this regardless of whether the organization is big or small, but people who work work. People who can't find, don't have, or can't find work engage in office politics. And they mistakenly believe that politics is their job. If there are more people like this, who will do the work and where will the organization go? For an organization to run properly, the leader must get his hands dirty.

February 2012

Rocket Internet CEO Hwang Hee-seung meets with Yoon Shin-geun. The most shocking drinking experience in the past 5 years. A series of moments where one's head is smashed with a hammer. There is a long way to go. A situation where the very perspective on the world has been shattered and needs to be reestablished.

March 2012

Life in the U.S. is going smoothly, but it's a pity that my two-year-old son can't adapt. It's natural that day and night change due to the time difference, and I don't even eat the food because it doesn't suit my taste. Always yelling. The most embarrassing thing was that the smile on my son's face, who used to smile so much, disappeared. This is such a big pain for me as a father.

April 2012

The good thing about coming to the United States is that at least the people I meet here clearly know what they want to do. In Korea, honestly, the majority of people don't even know what they want to do and what they should do to be happy. I couldn't stop talking when I saw someone preparing for the civil service exam after working for a large company. Since when did being a civil servant become such an attractive profession? After the IMF broke out and the Iron Rice Bucket became more popular, it became a place of refuge. What meaning does life have when you get tired of being swayed by the standards set by others instead of doing what you want? Will the standards of the world be the same 10 years from now? You must listen to your inner voice through self-reflection. Life has value when you follow that voice.

May 2012

The reason it must be a team, not an individual, is because everyone goes through ups and downs. Even if you have a lot of ability, it is really difficult to endure difficult times alone. Team members must hold each other by the collar and move forward.

June 2012

These days, when I talk about my experience, I talk about Ium more than Samsung. Although it was a short period of time, it certainly seems like it was an impactful time. If anyone is wondering whether to go to Ieum or Samsung, I would recommend Ieum without hesitation.

July 2012

It's been 5 months since I came to the US and I'm a New York kid. If I compare it to what my son does, I have been born into a new world and am heading about this and that without fear. The funny thing is, the more I find out I'm at the bottom, the more interested I become. I feel courageous, knowing that there is nothing to be afraid of because I have nowhere else to go. Isn’t hesitation something that happens when I have something to lose? I know my shortcomings, but what makes me keep going is the desperation of the 0:100 possibility of not being able to achieve anything if I don't meet here. There is a long way to go and a lot to learn. These times will never make you regret it.

August 2012

Since coming to the United States, I really enjoy working at night, but the feeling of working at night is quite different from Korea. This time, I felt it again after going to Korea. Here, when the sun goes down, you become more focused and your mind becomes clearer, whereas in Korea, when the sun goes down, you feel like you have to quickly make an appointment with someone and go have a drink. If people in our country just reduce their drinking, their productivity will increase by 30%. The overall social atmosphere is a society that encourages alcohol, and the time and energy of the people wasted on this is too precious. If we pour that into starting a business, several global companies will emerge.

September 2012

When I draw a direction by completely connecting the dots of my life that I have accidentally or intentionally taken throughout my life, I can discover what I can do best and what only I can do. The answer is not far away. And every process has meaning. Unique competitiveness comes from unique experience, and unique experience is usually relegated to mere nitpicking.

January 2013

Everyone is discussing the growth and potential of big data, but it seems that there are still not many people who are just collecting data and taking meaningful action. By creating a recommendation engine, I want to create a year in 2013 where more developers and companies can create new services that were previously unimaginable. I want to quickly build a core and help them. My heart has finally become an active volcano from a dormant volcano.

February 2013

Even though we narrowed it down to software among the numerous technology fields, data mining among them, machine learning among them, and recommendations among them, some customers want technical settings, some want easy installation, and some want marketing functions. So far, we have put a lot of effort into building algorithms and infrastructure, but now we focus on commercializing them properly and maximizing the value that customers can get. I make it so that customers have no choice but to use this product.

March 2013

The reason I like JavaScript and Ruby is because they have the largest number of open projects. There is a lot of code out there to look at and learn from. The shoulders of giants that Newton spoke of are currently best implemented in JavaScript and Ruby. Disclosing, thinking together, exchanging code, and the results can contribute to someone else's startup. As a developer, it's 100 times more exciting than liking shit posts on Facebook, and it's the biggest contribution to humanity I can make right now.

April 2013

I found out that my mother had been secretly stalking me on Facebook. Even if you're worried that I'm having a hard time from afar, I can't even talk to you. I love you mother. Father too. :)

May 2013

The more I develop, the more I think about how to code less, more concisely, and more intuitively. A good service should make viewers say “Wow”, and good code should give viewers confidence that “It wasn’t a big deal.”

June 2013

My dream is to become an attractive developer. The code I create and the actions I take become examples so that I can be with the people I want to be with. This is the reason why you should just shut up and study hard and persevere. My biggest motivation. The more I do it, the more I feel like it's not enough, but I can't give up. A single line of code or a small service that we created that never existed in the world can change people's lives in a valuable way. Making more people around me happy.

July 2013

Minpyo knows that I made my iPhone myself. I keep saying I'm going to be like my dad. If your mom says you can't do it because it's difficult, then you need your dad? I answer. I feel like I'm still very lacking and young, but I'm actually quite embarrassed that my son treats me like this. How long will a perfect father be? When will I be able to confess to myself and be friends?

August 2013

When I tried it, I realized that starting a business was so difficult, and it seemed ironic that people who said they had experienced all kinds of hardships were recklessly recommending starting a business to young people. But it was like this. “He who is courageous wins beauty.” Until now, I had misunderstood the meaning of the saying, “He who is courageous wins beauty.” It didn't mean that you could get that beautiful woman right away if you had the courage. It was said that if you have the courage to approach, you will make a difference several times in the process, you will understand the woman's feelings and learn about yourself, and eventually you will meet a beautiful woman in the future. Instead, if you confess with the feeling, “If a man pulled out a knife, I should at least cut off the radish,” there will be nothing left if you get kicked. There can be success and progress only when you approach and sincerely think about establishing a mutually beneficial relationship. Whether in love or business, success and failure are not opposites. It is a series of processes that continue throughout life, so there is no need to be overly concerned about current successes and failures. As long as I continue to be confident that I am heading in the right direction, everything is a process, not an end.

September 2013

No matter what you do, you can't really do it well without loving it. And if you love hacking, you'll inevitably end up working on your own projects. —Paul Graham

Many people don't try something because they don't know enough about it or they think someone else has already done it. However, only a few people have the right ideas and even fewer people try them. So if you really try your best at something, you can do pretty well. — Aaron Schwartz

October 2013

These days, if you look around github, stack overflow, and development communities, it seems like this is the atmosphere. “Let’s not argue without code. Let’s show the sense to write what we want to say in code and make a pull request. That’s your skill. The answers are already available on Google.” In fact, this is the most efficient way to lower communication costs. People who don't know talk about it and people who know show it.

November 2013

The feeling I get every morning when I drop my 3-year-old son off at daycare, which is filled with blue-eyed children, and then I turn around and look out the window for a moment. Sometimes I laugh lively and sometimes I feel intimidated. It's the biggest emotional moment of the day, but I don't know how to express it. I shouldn't make my son suffer...

December 2013

I'm spending the year-end and New Year's holidays just doing what I normally do without anything special. My husband and I are living each day intensely in the three adventures of living abroad, raising children, and starting a business, and perhaps that is why, even a few years after turning 30, the ‘around 30’ syndrome has not yet hit us. Our goal naturally became to live as if we were not yet in our 30s for a few more years. As we always take on challenges, laugh, cry, chat, and rely on each other, we have a vague premonition that we will be a little happier in the future. Together, we’re strong. dedicated to Jiyeon Park.

January 2014

I think reverse engineering experience is a huge plus to being a good programmer. Knowing the principles of operation and the ability to dig into them are cultivated. People who only play in user mode cannot imagine that there are bugs in the kernel or hardware. The pleasure of collecting small hints, peeling off the veil one by one, and then creating the desired action can instill in programmers a fiery spirit that does not give up.

February 2014

Shouldn’t we continue to take on challenges in order to become humble? People who are complacent easily become arrogant. Mistakes happen when you lose your sense of the world.

March 2014

Think about it from a slightly different perspective. Starting a startup means taking on a big challenge, and big challenges are possible with confidence based on previous success experiences. If you take on a big challenge in a situation where you have nothing and fail, it is very difficult to stand up again, so you need a ticket to offset it. In Korea, there are usually three types of tickets.

1. The original house is in good condition. (So ​​even if it fails once, it is not fatal.) 2. I went to a good school. (So ​​even if I fail once, I don’t starve.) 3. I had a good job. (So ​​even if you fail once, you will still get a job.)

So, I think that if you come from a rich family, have a good academic background, and have a great career, you can try three times. Until you decide to risk your all and take on a challenge, you must judge that it will work out before thinking that it will not work. This is based on the big and small success experiences in your life before starting a business. Graduating from a good school, working at a good job, and working with good people around you is bound to have a huge impact on your success experience.

If you want to start a business but have nothing to show, I think it wouldn't be a bad idea to secure one of those three tickets and give it a try. Of course, if you can see the business clearly, your capabilities match, and you are confident that the timing is now, you should go without a ticket, but in order to be able to make this decision, you must have been a person who lived a very intense life even before starting your own business.

April 2014

I was born in Korea and lived in Korea for 30 years. The moment I decided to create a service for people around the world, my competitiveness could not help but become the production of sexy products, and all the facades of talkativeness and personal connections flew into the sky.

May 2014

A developer must be someone who delegates his or her work to the computer. If you look at leaders throughout history, those who treated their subordinates well were the ones who rose to prominence. Now, in a changed world, just as capitalists hire tens of thousands of workers to make profits, developers must have the ability to entrust their work to tens of thousands of computers, manage them, and connect them to business.

When looking at the definition of a rich person as a person who can survive on real estate, businesses, interest, etc. without having to work right away, a good developer can be said to be someone who creates a situation where computers can do their work for them without having to code right away. Therefore, to judge a good developer, you can assume that the computer is an employee and imagine how many employees this developer can take on, whether they can share the vision, and whether they have management risk management skills. Just as a boss who does not trust his subordinates is always busy micromanaging, a developer who cannot delegate work that can be automated to a computer cannot begin to think about new, higher-level tasks above that work, and this is where the gap between developers and good developers arises.

So, rather than saying that you need to have surplus to be a good developer, I think that good developers have surplus.

June 2014

My mother said she wanted to see photos of the kids, so I took a few selfies and sent them to her. As I was looking at the photos, I suddenly realized how proud I was of my family. Is there greater joy than being proud of the people you work with? So that I can bring great joy to those who are with me, and so that I do not disappoint those who trust me.

July 2014

I judge people who say they are too small to be greedy. I keep trying to pick it up, but I don't have enough dishes. If you empty it before putting it in, you can fill it with a variety of fillings even with a small bowl. When I think about something I don't want to lose, I can't move.

August 2014

You should not misunderstand the advice to do what makes your heart beat. My heart races when I do something I have never experienced before. Some people run with imagination about things they have never done. If you live according to the correct answer without worrying about life, and then look around in frustration and see things that make your heart beat, you should not be confused. If your heart beats when you face something, you should humbly pursue it and think, ‘Oh, I have no idea how difficult it will be.’ You should not use it as an excuse to throw away other things you don’t want to do. However, a life without a heartbeat is a life without newness and is like standing still, so you must not neglect to always dream anew and move anew to move away from death so that your heart does not flash once.

September 2014

The Incomplete Life drama is a new drama. I remember when I was in my fourth year of college, when I was struggling to get a job. The money I had earned before going back to school dropped out after paying for my tuition and my younger brother's tuition for the second semester. I barely survived by doing things that my professors helped me do.

Meanwhile, a few of the resumes I submitted here and there were passed, so I had to go for an interview, but the suits were expensive. I didn't know what to do, but then I heard that the graduation photo shoot fee was already included in the tuition for the second semester of the fourth year, so if I didn't take the graduation photo, I would get 250,000 won back. I traded my graduation photo and suit. I gave my parents the excuse that I couldn't go because the filming and interview dates overlapped. With that money, I bought a ready-to-wear suit, asked my mother for just 50,000 won, bought a shirt at E-Mart, and told my girlfriend to buy shoes at an underground shopping mall in Jamsil. The shoes at the Jamsil underground shopping mall were cheap, but they were only available up to 270mm. My feet are 295mm. By the time I finished attending the interview in the cold winter, my foot had completely healed.

I went to Samsung for 3 years with just those shoes. I even had a wedding with those shoes. I could replace the heels, but later on, the leather became so damaged that I couldn't wear them, but I couldn't throw them away. I couldn't throw it away because I thought it was proof of my hot years.

October 2014

Developers and lawyers have quite a bit in common. 1. They communicate in their own language. 2. After revising, view as diff. 3. The ability is to understand what the customer wants at once and present an accurate solution. 4. If you have the ability, you can make a lot of money. It would be nice to have a tool like git to manage the history of revised documents sent and received by email. However, lawyers who are paid by the hour may not like it if their working hours are reduced that much.

November 2014

I'm embarrassed. It's a night of shame. Last night in LA. I couldn't have done anything on my own. Every single moment of the past two years comes to me vividly. I'm embarrassed. It's a night of shame.

All Recom.io servers have been taken down. The kpop recommendation app and the Korean news recommendation app, which I had created and used beneficially two years ago due to inconvenience while living in the United States, can no longer be used. I was having trouble listening to Korean music, so I installed the Bugs Music iPhone app for the first time in a while, and I was surprised to see a lot of changes compared to a year or two ago. Recommendations have also improved considerably. The first time I tried recommending music was because I was inspired by Pandora Music and Econest and wanted to listen to pop music like that, but now I feel less disappointed. If they even accept third-party plug-ins, I will slap Spotify. The world continues to improve through someone's efforts. I ask myself if I was one of them.

As I was reorganizing my company, I backed up all my mailboxes from the past two years. All records of that fierce battle are here. It contains a roller coaster-like cycle, starting from company establishment and investment attraction in the United States to exit. If someone asks you what your treasure is, you can answer, “This is it.” It was true that the process is the reward.

December 2014

I have worked on Thanksgiving Day for the past three years. This Thanksgiving Day, I spent time with my family. It's truly thanks, giving, and holy. A few days ago, I rented a house and was alone in the garage, running the washing machine and washing the car. It may not be a big deal, but it was something I had dreamed about while working hard with my wife, so I wiped the car with hot tears.

When I look back on my life in LA, there are two scenes that are emotionally memorable, aside from work. While the deal was in progress, I first sent my family to Korea, unpacked my belongings from the house I was living in, and moved everything into storage. At that time, I discovered a large number of painkiller canisters in every corner of the small house. My wife raised two young children in a foreign country instead of me, who was neglectful at home, and survived each day with painkillers. Without even noticing me.

One detail is a little embarrassing, but my wife and I had so little money that for two years we could not buy clothes, and underwear was no exception. The front of mine was torn through, and the back of hers was torn through. At the time we laughed it off, joking that every pair of underwear we owned had finally ripped apart, but when I looked at my wife holding our child in that condition, I wondered what I was doing with my life and felt almost like a psychopath. Painkiller bottles and torn underwear. That image still hits hard.

If I hadn't had the help of not only my wife but also my family and people around me, I would have remained a person who sins just by living. By starting a business, I learned business, but more importantly, I learned how to live life. I promise to work hard and work hard so that the people I work with can be happier. It's Thanksgiving Day for which I'm so thankful.

January 2015

It may seem crazy for a programmer who was born in Korea and worked there to start his first business in the U.S. for the world to see. Although they were confident in their technology, they were worried about their lack of understanding of the local situation and lack of sales capabilities, while Strong Ventures offered their full support by proposing investment. They connected me with a co-founder who was fluent in English and had experience in product management and development, and gave me a position in the Los Angeles office. Even in the process of attracting corporate customers after the product launch, Strong Ventures was able to easily focus on product promotion activities by setting up meetings with executives of many companies related to the business among their major networks.

Starting a business is a roller coaster of emotions, where you feel like your business is going well and you feel like it's going to fly, but you're also plagued by the fear that everything will go wrong the next day. At times like this, after talking with the two CEOs Bae Ki-hong and John Jonam, who had experience in startups, I had several experiences where they shared their experiences and reaffirmed their trust in me, and surprisingly, they shook it off and moved on to the next step. We created three products over a two-year period, and later, when we were considering attracting additional investment, we were acquired by one of the companies that were interested in each product and made an exit.

Unlike financial investment companies, Strong Ventures gave top priority to the opinions of co-founders in all decision-making situations and proved that it is not just an investor but a reliable partner who can be with the start-up from the beginning to the end. We can confidently say that without Strong Ventures, there would not have been Recomio.

February 2015

I started a business, and because of that my wife went through every kind of hardship. Everyone felt sorry for the sacrifices she had to make. They told me there are not many women like her these days, that I was lucky to have found such a good wife, and that I should live with gratitude for the rest of my life. Every time, I admitted that I had been blessed and promised myself that I would never forget what she had endured. But did she really follow me into all of this for no reason?

It took me four years at a large company before I finally decided to start a business. The mentors I had relied on after joining left for other companies within a few months. For various reasons I would rather not get into, I fell into a slump, and I got through it by holding on to the dream of starting a company. During that time, I shared all of those worries with my wife every single day. We laughed when we were happy, cried when things were hard, and imagined a better future together. Over the years, she became my biggest supporter, and more than anyone else she told me to do the work I truly wanted to do, even without knowing what kind of days were waiting for us.

My parents had only one condition before I got married. It has to be a love marriage. My parents were a campus couple at the time and got married at the same age as me. It is said that when you encounter something very painful and difficult in life, the only strength that can withstand it is love. He said he doubted whether it would be possible if it were not a love marriage.

Looking back now, I learned love while living with my wife. Something grand is not love. Love is about the little things, and at the same time, it matches the frequency of the heart. Furthermore, love is not only between a couple. Everyone is love and relationships are love. I just lived without noticing it, but I vaguely feel that the world revolves around love. I love my colleagues, I love my investors, I love my friends. Making them happier is the way for me to become happier. I want to tell this to my children too.

March 2015

Ironically, the best way to stay passionate is to not be doing what you want to do. I've tried something I want to do, but when all my attempts aren't working and I feel like this isn't working, the power to dig deeper or pivot and carry on until it works is definitely a power beyond what can be expressed through passion alone. People who have never started a job imagine that many things can be solved through earnestness. However, more often than not, things in this world are accomplished through waiting rather than earnestness. A person who is desperate for a moment is not strong, but a person who can wait longer is strong.

April 2015

The biggest advantage of starting a business is that you can do what you want, in the way you want, with the people you want. It's not money. When you sell your company, you can choose a place where there are people you want to spend more time with. Considering that a large part of company stress is due to relationships with people, starting a business is not a loss-making business. The major stress in starting a business is related to generating sustainable profits, so at least it is not exhausting. When resources are lacking, technology is used to create resources that require less effort. The more difficult a problem is, the more difficult it is to solve, so you should always try to define the problem easily and solve it simply. Otherwise, you will be dominated by work. Even within a company, there is a difference between doing what you are told and solving the problems you discover in the most efficient way. If you approach things passively, it's easy to become a defensive person. The cultural differences between the United States and Korea are bigger than you might think. Now that I know the pros and cons of each, and it seems like there are solutions to offer rather than complaints, I want to give it a good try.

Organizing

I feel very inadequate. I want to learn more. We believe that doing is the fastest way to learn. If I hadn't encountered it myself, I wouldn't have known that there are different worlds.

I want to do many things better. It's a pity that I couldn't do that. As I encounter various choices, I find out what kind of person I am. It makes me happy to see happy people's faces. I feel a mission to make people around me happier. As you make every effort, you will follow nature rather than what is impossible. When I look back on the past days, I think there were people who felt uncomfortable because of my short-term thinking, unreasonable handling of tasks, and lack of attention.

I do not want to repeat the same mistakes. I want to learn more from many people and keep moving forward. As we live, our priorities change. I have come to appreciate the breathing room you discover when you escape poverty in the middle of abundance. I want to become someone who looks toward tomorrow with humility. Please keep me honest, and have a good day. Thank you.