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12 articlesThe Logic and Story Behind Data Domain's Success
Data Domain is a data backup service provider that went public in its sixth year after founding and was acquired by EMC two years later, becoming EMC's second fastest-growing business after VMWare. The CEO of Data Domain shares the story and logic behind this in the book "Tape Sucks," which may be the best SaaS book I've read in recent years.
Four Principles to Enhance Website User Experience
To provide a better user experience, we have summarized four fundamental principles from Don’t Make Me Think, Revisited: start with a clear and simple navigation bar; create an impressive homepage; use visual hierarchy to present information; and improve loading speed on mobile devices.
David Kadavy: Why you hate Comic Sans
People hate Comic Sans for its unbalanced visual weight, bad kerning, undeserved popularity, and people's misconceptions of design.
Advertising is a business of monetizing attention
Advertising is a business that monetizes attention. The forms of advertising have evolved with time including informational notices on newspapers, radio and televisions, emails and the Internet. However, the ultimate goal behind never changes — to draw attention and sell.
Advertising is a Business of Monetizing Attention
The forms of advertising have evolved over time: from notices in newspapers to radio and television, and then to emails and the internet. However, its fundamental purpose remains unchanged: to attract attention and successfully sell products.
Amazon's 2016 Letter to Shareholders: The 4 Foundations for Sustaining Growth in Large Companies
Bezos believes that every day should be "Day 1"; without growth, there is death. So how do we prevent "Day 2"? There are four foundations: a true obsession with customers, resisting proxies, embracing external trends, and making fast decisions.
Nir Eyal: How to be indistractable?
The world is full of distraction. Distraction has both external and internal causes. We need to understand the triggers and avoid distraction from inside. Nir Eyal, the author of Hooked, provides some practical advice for us to turn off distraction and remain focused.
Nir Eyal: How to Stay Focused?
Every day, there are too many temptations to distract us. Distractions have both internal and external causes, and we need to understand their triggers from the inside out to analyze and solve this problem. Nir Eyal, author of the bestselling book "Hooked," has written a new book, "Indistractable," which provides us with practical advice to help reduce external distractions and focus our attention.
Google's Software Engineering: Project Management
How does Google manage projects? Why encourage 20% time? How is OKR implemented? How do they decide whether to continue or terminate a project? Do companies like Google frequently reorganize?
Google Software Engineering: Software Development
It is widely recognized that Google is a company with exceptional engineering capabilities. What are its best engineering practices? What insights can we gain from them? What aspects have drawn criticism? We will discuss these details gradually, with this article primarily focusing on development.
Lean Analytics: Key Metrics for Evaluating Startups
Data is crucial for startups. The book "Lean Analytics" offers many insights for entrepreneurs on assessing the metrics of business success. By effectively choosing the right metrics, entrepreneurs can explore unknown business territories more efficiently.
From Uber Layoffs: To Build Wheels or Not?
Between 2014 and 2018, Uber built several "wheels," such as the service discovery tool Hyperbahn, the task queue Cherami, the MySQL-based NoSQL Schemaless, the resource scheduler Peloton, and the service deployment platform uDeploy, among others. Now, with layoffs affecting even engineering teams and stock prices falling below 15-year valuations, were these "wheels" a success or a failure? Should startups hire people to build wheels, or should they adopt existing solutions?
About Tian Pan
I'm Tian Pan, an engineer-founder focused on agentic engineering — building autonomous AI systems and scaling engineering teams. I write practical guides on system design, technical leadership, and shipping with AI agents. Previously an early engineer at Uber, Brex, and IoTeX.
