Principles

We are founded on a set of principles that guide us in solving problems and doing cool things:

  • Do no evil. We will not develop weapons. We will not develop scams, fraud, or even intentionally misleading work. We don’t even feel good about mass email marketing or manipulating search engine results through means other than those recommended by search engines.
  • Play nicely with others. We don’t like when people develop closed systems. We want things to be accessible. We’ll work with other software, we’ll make our software accessible to other services, we’ll give you ways to use your data however you want.
  • Transparency to the extent possible. We’ll open source code when we can, we’ll report progress and time spent on projects, and we’ll give access to work in progress.
  • Do work for those who need it. We have worked at reduced prices or even for free for organizations in need. We throw good things out to the world, and hope good things come to us. Plus, it helps us sleep at night.
  • Deliver frequently. Many small iterations mean visible progress, assurance that it is moving in the right directions, and a delivered working product quickly.
  • Walk a mile in their shoes. We encourage the developers to sit down with the end users and watch them work and ask questions. That’s when they’ll understand not just what the issues are but the reasons surrounding them and the constraints of the problem, and prioritize functions. Also, end users will see their feedback going directly to the people who can do something about it, and can put a face behind the software. Our developers make better solutions when they feel the pain of the problem.
  • Propose the right solution, not necessarily the one that will profit WYZGYZ the most. There are a lot of competing tools, and while we can often build them, sometimes it’s more appropriate to use an existing one. We know the markets; we keep abreast of existing and up-and-coming technologies. If you have a problem that would best be solved by a different product, we’ll let you know, and we may even offer to help you set it up in your environment. Of course, we hope at some point you’ll come back to us with a problem we can solve for you.
  • Leverage free software when possible. Licensing costs can add up quickly, and when each part of a project requires a separate license, a project can quickly consume its budget in fees alone. We like open source software, we contribute to it, and we believe in the idea.