MetaLab

When I emailed Andrew Wilkinson, MetaLab’s founder, for the first time two years ago, it was on a whim: I didn’t know what I was getting into. I was impressed with the beautiful work MetaLab was producing, but I didn’t know much about the company, and they were 3,000 miles away from where I lived in Washington, DC. I didn’t even expect a reply, but as it turned out, a reply was the first of a few surprises: not long after, I joined the company.

Looking back, I’m amazed by how much we’ve done in that short time. I’m singing our own praises, sure, but it’s true: we built a collaboration tool that has changed the way we and a lot of other people work, we created a new digital goods business, and we continued to grow our consulting business. And we did it all with a small team. More than once recently I’ve found myself wondering: what (besides the great people) makes MetaLab such a productive company?

Now, I’ll be the first to admit that we’re not perfect. But I think that’s actually been key to our success: we don’t spend our time trying to be the perfect company. We focus on products instead: we want to make great things that our clients (and the world) can use and enjoy. That might sound facile or even obvious, but I think it’s the reason we’re so productive. It’s why we enjoy sane work hours and autonomy, and it’s what sets us apart.

As you might imagine, we’re constantly examining and improving both what we make and how we make it. As part of that process, we’ve decided to share some of our behind-the-scenes thinking here at MetaLab in a series we’re calling “How We Work.” Over the course of the next few months, we’ll talk about topics like some of the challenges we face as a quickly growing company, the philosophies that guide what we do, and how we manage everything from coding practices to design decisions. With several people contributing from different parts of the company, there should be a pretty diverse range of perspectives and insights, so make sure to stay tuned!

Happy Holidays from MetaLab

Taken by Antonio at our wonderful office party last weekend. This isn’t even everyone: we’re missing Chris, Geordie, Jake, Jason, Jeff, and Oliver. We’ve posted the rest of the photos on our Facebook page.

Our friend Amit Gupta, founder of Photojojo, has been diagnosed with leukemia and needs to find a bone marrow donor ASAP. He’s of South Asian descent, so finding marrow is particularly difficult (1 in 20,000 people are a match). We’ll be matching Seth Godin’s offer to donate $10,000 to charity on behalf of the successful donor, alongside Jake Lodwick and others. Let’s get swabbing, people!

superamit:

Two weeks ago I got a call from my doctor, who I’d gone to see the day before because I’d been feeling worn out and was losing weight, and wasn’t sure why.

He was brief: “Amit, you’ve got Acute Leukemia. You need to enter treatment right away.”

I was terrified. I packed a backpack full of clothes, went to the hospital as he’d instructed, and had transfusions through the night to allow me to take a flight home at 7am the next day. I Googled acute leukemia as I lay in my hospital bed, learning that if it hadn’t been caught, I’d have died within weeks.

—

I have a couple more months of chemo to go, then the next step is a bone marrow transplant. As Jay and Tony describe below, minorities are severely underrepresented in the bone marrow pool, and I need help.

A few ways to help:

1. If you’re South Asian, get a free test by mail. You rub your cheeks with a cotton swab and mail it back. It’s easy.
2. If you’re in NYC, you can go to this event my friends are putting on.
3. If you know any South Asians (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Maldives, or Sri Lanka), please point ‘em to the links above.

*UPDATE 1* Organize a donor drive near you (the most helpful thing you could possibly do!) email 100kcheeks@gmail.com. They’ll send you kits, flyers, tell you what to say, and make the whole process easy cheesy.

*UPDATE 2* Want to get a free test, but not in the US. Here’s a list of international donor registries that are globally searchable.

jayparkinsonmd:

My friend Amit Gupta founded my favorite photography site Photojojo. A few weeks ago, he was diagnosed with leukemia. Amit is one of the nicest, most genuine, most creative people you could ever meet. Prior to founding the awesome Photojojo, he also co-founded Jelly in 2006 in NYC, a coworking community, that’s now spread to 60 cities across the world and helped spark the coworking revolution. It looks like Amit will need a bone marrow transplant quite soon. We can help him with that.

tony b:

Unlike blood transfusions, finding a genetic match for bone marrow that his body will accept is no easy task. The national bone marrow registry has 9.5 million records on file, yet the chances of someone from South Asian descent of finding a match are only 1 in 20,000.

This is where we come in. We’re going to destroy those odds.

How? By finding and registering as many people of South Asian descent as we possibly can.

Tests are easy– a simple swab of the cheek. If you’re a match, the donation involves an outpatient procedure. It’s not fun, but it’s not dangerous either. And doing it could save a life.

We are encouraging anyone of South Asian descent to take a test to see if you’re a match. 

You can get a free test by mail, or, if you’re in New York, you can join us Friday, October 14th for a special party to rally support.

We’ll have test kits on hand at the party, as well as music, booze, and maybe even a photo booth. It will, for the first time, combine a House 2.0-style party with a New Work City-style party, and if you’ve ever been to either, you know they are always something special.

Please spread the word and please do everything you can to help Amit beat leukemia. He’s a superstar.

Much thanks to Tony and pals for organizing this event, and EVERYONE who’s been tweeting and reblogging.

Please help get the word out any way you can. My life quite literally depends on it.