Hey there 👋🏻. I’m Maxwell, and I’m on a mission to build a better web by building a smaller and simpler one.

I think technology works best when humans are active participants, not passive consumers. When it’s designed not for massive scale but for human scale. When beauty, clarity, and care aren’t afterthoughts or nice to haves—they’re the foundation.

I have a pretty varied background, and I’ve just about done it all. I’ve worked as a business analyst, overseen operations, written software, managed products, and been on the front lines selling to customers. In a world of ever-increasing specialization, I’m committed to going in the other direction.

Over the years, I picked up tech skills here and there to get my job done. As an analyst, I learned SQL when Excel wasn’t enough anymore. As a product manager, I learned Rails so I could understand our codebase and avoid being the typical shit-flinging non-technical PM. As a salesperson, I learned about APIs so that I could actually engage with our technical customers rather than fobbing them off to some support ticket system.

Eventually I realized management just isn’t my thing. I enjoy building things more than I do talking about building things. I enjoy working individually more than I do working in large groups.

Rather than condemning myself to a lifetime on the corporate hamster wheel, I decided to throw it all to the wind, and this year I’ve been going all-in on my skills as a developer.

But my goal isn’t just to learn how to code. It’s to find an escape from the performative hell that is the modern workplace. That’s why Ruby and Rails are my tools of choice: the one-person framework is a real thing.

This blog is where I’ll post my thoughts about programming, tech businesses, and other occasional rants. Mostly as a way to synthesize my own ideas, but hopefully some of the posts might prove useful to other people out there on the internet too.

If that’s the case and you want to get in touch, then shoot me a note.