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I’m a software engineer and entrepreneur focused on modern web technologies and AI.

Here's an ongoing autobiography, which also shares the story of my by-the-bootstraps "unschooling" education: now the subject of a chapter on grit and resilience in the bestselling book Mindshift by Barbara Oakley.

An angel investor once described my core soft skill in the role of founder or early team member as: "The ability to perceive exactly what needs to be done. And then to do it."

My experience working in difficult environments around the world means that I can be trusted to get things done, even when things go wrong.

In the past, I coined the term "Startup Cities" as co-founder of StartupCities.org and a startup spinoff, both of which focused on why startups should build cities. I now write about Startup Cities at StartupCities.com

I've won several awards for economic research and have been published or interviewed in Virgin Entrepreneur, a16z's Future.com, The Atlantic's CityLab, Foreign Policy, and in academic volumes by Routledge and Palgrave MacMillan.

Wait... what is this site?
This is my personal portfolio, inspired by the question: "What would the opposite of the two-color template developer blog look like?"

Have fun exploring!

Click the Start Menu to learn more.

Contact:hello @ zach.dev
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Python-a-thon Projects

In November 2016, I spent a month in a cabin in Culpeper, VA. reading and writing little programs to improve at Python.

These apps are prototypes and were made to learn, not for production.

Academia.edu CV Scraper and Generator

2016 | Solo Project

Generate a PDF CV from any Academia.edu profile

Built with: Python, BeautifulSoup, Pyramid

Theme and Variations

Generate a musical composition in the theme-and-variations style through math

Built with: Python, Pyramid, NumPy, DataSounds

TwoHundredVideos

Find 200 YouTube videos from any search query. Get a CSV ready for embedding

Built with Python, BeautifulSoup, Pyramid

The Happiest Philosopher

NLP sentiment analysis and data visualization of famous works in philosophy. Auto-generates a graph with Plot.ly

Built with Python, TextBlob, Plot.ly, Pyramid

The Bargain Bin

Recreates the experience of the bargain bin at a used book store. Click a button, get a weird book from Abebooks.com

Built with Python, Requests, BeautifulSoup, Pyramid, Bootstrap

Oct 10 2016
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