On Friday night, a bunch of the Googlers on the FeedBurner team went out to have a few drinks to celebrate Eric’s move to New York City to be a part of BuzzFeed. Mucho cervesas were consumed. And many stayed out much, much longer than I did; I heard something about a party in Lincoln Park with a Ouija board and the inevitable late-night burrito binge.
Part of me was glad I went home when I did, but it sure sounds like the night capped off with plenty of fun for everyone involved. We need to get out as a group more.
As for Eric’s departure, we’re all wishing him the best of luck as he moves back East to start helping BuzzFeed’s business grow out of their stealth operation mode. Eric was the first person I talked to at FeedBurner, and he was definitely the helper in getting me and my resume into the right inbox to get my job there. It was when I staying at home full-time to work on Live Music Blog after a nice separation “bonus” from R.R. Donnelley bought me some time before I had to figure out my next move. Eric helped me join the FeedBurner Ad Network as one of their first publishers in the Arts & Entertainment channel.
I remember grilling Eric hard about how much money I was going to make, most notably due to the fact that I didn’t really understand anything about CPM-based advertising. “Wait – so I make money when people click, right?” I was too trained on Google AdSense, but luckily that training was everything that I talked about during my interviews and it got me in the door. If it wasn’t for Eric, I probably never would have gotten the job at FeedBurner or Google, so I’ll always remember that about him. And we’ll definitely be staying in touch on future ventures and social engagements whenever I make it out to New York or whenever he’s back in Chicago. I’m hugely confident of that fact, so while we’re wishing him well and it’s a little sad to see a friend move, I’m sure we’ll keep close.
I got to help him slack nicely on his last day; I think we ended up playing about two hours worth of ping-pong in the office between lunch and before heading out to the bar after work. Raise a glass. Here’s to looking forward to our next rematch! Cheers, man!