photo credit: Eric Rowley/Juice
Jake Kerber
CEO, Locusic
President, KerberTech
Who are you, and what do you do?
I'm Jake and I'm the founder and CEO of Locusic, a local music streaming service. Our purpose is to give free exposure to local bands, encourage attendance at live shows, and support local businesses. You open the app, pick a genre, it detects your location, and music plays from the local scene.
I'm also the president of KerberTech, a custom software development company - focused on B2B. I design and build web-based (and other) applications to solve complex problems.
I live in Ankeny with my wife and our twin baby girl and boy.
What hardware are you using?
For most tech work, I use an HP Pavilion dv7 laptop with a huge screen.
When working at a client's site, I use whatever hardware they have for me to use.
I have a Mac Pro that I got a couple years back. It was pretty high-end at the time (dual quad core Xeons if I remember right). I was going to use it for a lot of audio and video production, but that never really happened. Now I just use it as a test machine and to play movies during late night coding sessions.
For a mobile phone, I'm using my original Motorola Droid. I'll probably upgrade soon.
For mobile entertainment, I use a Zune. I also have an iPod touch, but I mainly just use that for testing.
I also use a ton of paper (sorry trees). I take a bunch of notes and do a lot of thinking and design on paper. I'll use about any non-spiral 8.5x11 notebook that's available. I think I've filled up about 6 while working on Locusic so far. I use mechanical pencils. I can't stand using pens. Lately I really like the Pentel Forte .5 mm - they're cheap so I can keep several at my desk at home and a few in my Targus laptop bag that I take with me everywhere.
And what software?
I use Google apps pretty heavily - specifically gmail.
Chrome is my browser of choice.
I use an old version of Photoshop for image editing.
I mainly develop with the Microsoft stack, so when writing code, my Integrated Development Environment (IDE) is Microsoft Visual Studio 2010. I use SQL Server Management Studio for database work.
I use the standard MS Office suite for docs and spreadsheets. For shared documents that other members of my team are collaborating on I use Google docs.
What would be your dream setup?
My dream setup would be more about people than devices. I'd love a PA that could file all my paperwork and keep my office de-cluttered. And I'd love more smart people who are passionate about local music (and tech) to join the Locusic team.
For tech, I guess in a dream world, I'd like everything to be always on, always connected, with super fast access, and no concerns about privacy or malware.
Also, I wish the iTunes interface was more like the old Musicmatch. I don't like the UI of iTunes so I don't use it. And I know I'm missing out on all kinds of inter-connected-ness because of it. I also wish mainstream portable entertainment devices would just let you drag/drop files to them just like any other external hard drive - like I used to do with my ancient Archos Jukebox - circa 2001. Geez, I sound like a grumpy old man! "I don't like things now compared to the way they used to be!" So my dream setup would perhaps include more open standards and platforms.
I'd also like more time. Lot's more time - to do all the projects I'd like to get to "some day".