hi, my name is eric bogs. i currently live in brooklyn and have previously lived in london, san francisco, near berlin, los angeles and elsewhere. some would call me a bit of a global soul (vagabond wanderer), but i’m attempting to stay put—for now—as new york is stimulating in its own special way.

i crave new experiences, and my default answer to most propositions is “yes”. well, sometimes it’s “no”, but if you ask me twice more i’ll say “yes”. at the age of 34 i’m lucky enough to have had some awesome life experiences, and really my only gripe with life these days is that my circle of friends and family are so scattered around the globe.

aside from my gluttony of chasing after excitement and experiences, i am driven by technology and by media (art, music, stories)—my passions tend to lie in the intersection of the two. i love connecting creators, curators and consumers, and by solving impossible problems with technology. you’ll find some examples of that below, and in my portfolio.

not to say that being a geek is bad or anything, but i have spent much of my life programming and building websites. i ran a bbs when i was 13, started building websites in 1996, earned my nerd credentials at caltech with a computer science degree in 1999.

as the dot-com bubble burst in san francisco in 2001, it catapulted me over to london. much of my adult personality was formed whilst living in the united kingdom for 5 years, discovering life with my crazy friends, in the pub and club, the park and the picnic.

i’ve built a myriad of websites for clients large and small, as a corporate cog and a caring consultant. for a few years, i chased after billable hours at scient, leading an entire division at the age of 23. my blood ran purple for four years at yahoo!, including 2 years of jock strap jokes at yahoo! sports.

to contrast my nerdiness (and that sports reference), i’ll mention that i served as editor for xy magazine, a popular gay youth magazine. websites fizzle, but the glossy copies of xy tend to have left permanent impressions on readers.

planning editorial content for an issue is far more entertaining than debugging compiler errors. also: interviews, photo shoots, models, and empowering young people to lead better lives. i continue to explore sharing curated content via pet projects such as qr magazine and boredgayboy.

i joined google in 2007, building awesome web applications alongside incredibly brilliant kids. all the synapses are firing within the google docs team—all day, every day. i still enjoy hearing about how google spreadsheets and forms (my babies) are making a positive impact on the world (e.g. helping to mobilize obama’s grassroots campaigning efforts).

i am the biggest electronic music fanatic you’ve met, and although i don’t go dancing/clubbing/raving like i did in the nineties and naughties, i do still love to get my swerve on in the club, at a good concert, live show, or houseparty. i’m an equal-opportunity funseeker, and rarely turn down an invite to a good time.

jonny moirée is my superstar deejay alterego. i/he compiles, curates and frequently releases all sorts of interesting/commercial/quirky/mainstream/unique mixes, which are sometimes adored by a handful of friends, and sometimes downloaded [for free] thousands of times or pirated on ebay.

i’ve been trying to cut back on my travel these days, to fertilize my roots in new york. it’s difficult, being a global soul and all.

i attempt to follow my own advice, and to this day i play an interesting philosophical trick on myself whenever i’m at a crossroads. it’s recursive, but otherwise quite simple. i ask myself one question, and then answer it honestly:

wwebd?

random factoids:

• i was was interviewed on a japanese talk show for about 8 minutes, where i played some complicated trivia game involving famous japanese actors. there was much screaming and laughing, and me pretending i knew what was happening.
• been to 16 depeche mode concerts. and over 300 other ones. i’m a rocker, and i rock out.
• i have urinated next to 3 billionaires.
• a pbs documentary was filmed about me. there’s really nothing quite like waking up with a camera crew in your face.
• i am an out and proud star trek fan. i have sat in captain picard’s chair on the original set.
• i have a vast storehouse of intelligence from caltech that i will never use, e.g. fourier transforms, kjeldahl reactions, multiprocessor architectures. and what sort of blue jokes steven hawking tells after dinner.
• i was on the price is right. i left with some fabulous parting gifts, including a dirty sticky feeling after watching bob barker flirt with the serviceman next to me in contestant’s row.
• i have many fond memories of living in germany when i was 15, including stepping into my first discotheque and realizing that i never ever wanted to leave the dancefloor.
• my first boyfriend was also my first girlfriend’s boyfriend. oops. 15 years later, we’ve finally reconciled. i think.
• i keep my life ridiculously organized, for maximum spontaneity.
• the closest thing i have to an idol is richard branson. i look up to my mom, of course. she’s a hero for raising my two siblings and me by herself, working double-shifts so that i could afford the top-notch education i got at caltech.
• i’ve got entirely too many brightly-colored shoes. and sunglasses. and belts.
• although i’m a big-city boy and love my creature comforts, i’ve been lucky enough to enjoy many magical journeys. places visited more than 3x: ibiza, manchester, paris, amsterdam, burningman, las vegas, new orleans, bristol, brighton, miami. then there’s all of 40+ gay pride adventures, including sydney mardi gras (twice).
• my favorite job ever was serving ice cream at dairy queen in indiana. it was a bunch of girls and me, overcaffeinated and on sugar highs. my dog would attack me when i’d get home at 1am, trying to lick all of the wayward toppings off me.
• second fave was managing xy magazine, where i got to flirt with models, writers and fanboys 24/7. ooh, and craft witty and intelligent themes to share with our readers. and occasionally save or seriously improve a reader’s life.
• i was once set up on a date by a famous pop duo. it didn’t work about, but at least i got serenaded in their dressing room at the bbc.
• i have several famous exes. or, put another way, several famous people have me for an ex. there will be a tell-all book at some point. i hope one of them writes it.
• my family and i caused international scandal when i was 15 and we took our foreign exchange student to visit niagara falls in canada, and pretended that he was american because he’d lost his passport.
• i once danced booty-to-booty with madonna.
• i can’t cook to save my life, and often set off the smoke alarm when cooking frozen pizzas or boiling water for pasta.
• i’m not religious. i was raised roman catholic and don’t mind participating in the rituals, but would much prefer attending a new age wedding reception or a lively gospel service.
• i was that dork in school who had perfect attendance and straight-a’s and was valedictorian and won the science fairs but never went to parties or went on dates or really enjoyed himself. making up for lost time now?
• travel writing, particularly books discussing the philosophy of travel inspires me. i adore gay fiction. i love classical texts. i love bitter saracastic texts. i love david sedaris, alain de botton, dave eggers, kurt vonnegut, translations of plato, armistead maupin.

about evijhserf

• the bo.gs domain name is registered in the south sandwich islands.
• evijhserf 1.0 was launched in 1997.
• evijhserf 2.0 was launched in 2001 and is really quite cool to play around with.
• evijhserf is pronounced eve-sherf, and is dutch for naughty laugh.