Timothy Dalbey dot net All things Timothy Dalbey et cetera

About

At some point you have to begin writing auto-biographical content. It's an ackward experience for those of us who don't particularly care to moonlight as a public relations agency for their person. That said, I'll quit dancing around the proverbial bush and get straight to it.

I live in Brooklyn, New York - more specifically, I live in Greenpoint. Greenpoint is a neighborhood just above Williamsburg bordered by the East River and Newtown Creek. You can read more about that here: Greenpoint.

Anywho, I keep myself busy as a programmer and I really love what I do. For the last few years I have been focused on server-side open source technologies. Before then I was mostly interested in music-oriented applications which were prototyped primarily in Java and deployed in a really neat little software package called Max/MSP/Jitter.

That brings me to another point: I guess I'm pretty into music. Lately I have started playing sitar (please see pics for proof of said eccentricity.) Otherwise, I have a trusty old Guild D-55 that has become something of a conduit for Hank Williams or Jonny Cash or something (it's about the only way I'll tolerate guitars anymore) and I'm constantly threatening to deploy some sort of new disposable innovation in the arena of electronic noise. No really - right now (June 10') I am dabbling with what I refer to as a "Hyper-Genetic Algorithm" for step sequencers.

I also co-built / tinker with EardrumNYC - If you live or play around New York and like live music you should take a look. It's the most comprehensive and well curated show listing in New York. It's managed editorially by my friend John Ruscher whom I met at the University of Virginia (in an experimental electronic music course nonetheless.)

Which brings me to another point! I graduated from the University of Virginia a few years back with a double major in Mathematics and Economics. I spent some time studying Statistics as well. In all seriousness, Statistics (the field) is really amazing. If you don't beleive me do a little research on Pattern Recognition, Data Mining or Neural Networks - That's right. Statistics. (I could go on forever about how people mistake the field of statistics with polling theory and data in general but that's a bit off topic. Maybe I'll write a blog post about it.) Here's a great book on the topic: The Elements of Statistical Learning: Data Mining, Inference, and Prediction, Second Edition

But it wasn't all fun and games and numbers at the University of Virginia, no sir. I met my partner Lindsay at U.Va. where she was the captain of our ACC Volleyball team and also a Math major. She earned her Masters in Economics from U.Va. a few years back as well (with a Ph.D. comp pass too but that's another story.) Two months ago we had a son, Liam. He's about the damned cutest kid in the world - but then again we have a bias and polling problem. In all seriousness though, he is. Nice work Lindsay.

I'm looking forward to the day when Liam's big enough to roll around and tumble at the gym. I feel like I train Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu now not only for myself, but also for him. Did I mention that I practice Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu? That was a rhetorical question. Of course I do and you can read all about it here, on this very website.

That's a short summation of my life lately I suppose. There are of course innumerable details not covered here (for instance I prefer Joel to Mike and Crow to Servo) but that is neither here nor there.

Best,
Timothy Dalbey
June 2010