What have you been reading/watching/listening to lately? Chris Messina Product designer, technologist, and inventor of the #hashtag.  What gives you the most satisfaction in what you do? #1 Product Hunter! In our race to make the world more logical and programmable — including our social connections — we've reduced the rich tapestry of human experience beyond recognition.We're now forced to cope a crisis of unintended consequences thanks to the swift rise of attention-depleting social media that prays on legacy human psychological vulnerabilities. My homescreen still has vestiges of a pre-pandemic era when I would bike and walk around using, I keep in touch with international friends primarily on. Chris Messina is Tech Twitter’s Most Inventive #Designer. Design is about manifesting the intention of a creative force, not too dissimilar from the purpose of communication, which is about transmitting information with clarity and fidelity. Thanks! You have been added to our list.Â, Oops! (newsletters welcome)? It goes without saying, Chris’s most popular tweet is the literal tweet that birthed the hashtag. The Twitter identity is quite useful and powerful, but clearly not as robust or rich with metadata as Facebook’s. Chris is also a designer and product consultant with past experience working on products at Google, Uber, and a few startups of his own. In fact, Chris used to have a pseudonymous twitter account: Factory Joe. Yo! Chris Messina is the man that turned that little character your mom still calls “pound” into one of the most powerful forces in human communication since Twitter itself. The vast majority of software is now social or supports sharing, but not all sharing is created equally. We must adapt the way that we build and conceive of social technologies, or we'll be much worse off once the Alexas and Siris of the future ecliopse today's primitive social products.We therefore must set ourselves upon creating the technology of better humans — that is, of investing in and creating better versions of ourselves. What would you say to someone deciding whether or not to start a company? I am a founder and former Cognitive Science researcher. Chris Messina is the man that turned that little character your mom still calls “pound” into one of the most powerful forces in human communication since Twitter itself. He lead developer experience at Uber and co-founded Molly (YC W’18), a conversational social AI. He also opened one of the first coworking spaces and held one of the first unconferences (which is the aforementioned ‘#BarCamp’ in that fateful tweet). Starting a company isn’t the same thing as registering a domain name (although it’s become nearly as easy). Chris Messina is Tech Twitter’s Most Inventive #Designer.. In 2006, he opened the first coworking spaces in the world, giving rise to a global movement. Chris has created movements online and off, and acted as catalyst for change in large and small organizations. This site uses cookies to personalize content and make our site easier for you to use. To get a good sense for what I’m reading though, I share a lot of good links on Refind. His skillset is broad, anchored in product and user experience design. 1 talking about this. He has spoken at conferences like TEDx, SXSW, Google I/O, and Microsoft’s Future Decoded, and is frequently quoted in media outlets like The New York Times, Business Week, LA Times, Washington Post, and Wired. It’s how I stay connected to the world and try to make sense of my digital world, in public. Read more from Chris Messina More From Medium Invention is a central piece of Chris’s career. Please. Why that one? Yep. It was just this moment where I went through a digital death. Design, of course, isn’t how things look, nor even necessarily how they work. What would you say to someone just starting their career in tech today? Chris hasn’t shared much on this on Twitter, but he has spent considerable time exploring the digital identity space. I had a chance to sit down with Chris to talk about a number of interesting topics. You're on a deserted island and you can only bring one product that you own. One thing that also stands out about Chris is how he thinks about technology. Be sure to check out this video interview with him! I love breakfast and I make coffee, eggs, bacon, avocado, and an English muffin for myself every day (see above!). Which product will you bring and why? A daily news podcast and radio show by the NYT. One huge barrier to social technology that “flows like running water” is stable, cross-platform identifiers. Breaker is an app that makes listening to podcasts more social. Chris Messina is best known for inventing the hashtag, but he's also designed products and experiences for Google and Uber and founded startups. So I changed my username from my previous factoryjoe to Chris Messina and within moments, the factoryjoe handle was registered by someone else! He is best known for one thing. He invented the hashtag. Seek answers and hard-won knowledge from those who came before you. #1 Product Hunter! What do you like about them? I just moved into a more permanent spot in the East Bay and reconstituted my bar, so it’s less “which beverage” and more “which cocktail” am I enjoying? You guys seems to show up disproportionately in my “In case you missed it” section, and I kinda like it. Maybe it doesn’t matter that much and people are content to recreate themselves over and over on new and emergent digital platforms, but I’m not so sure. Shout out to Chris for taking the time to talk through his thoughts on everything with me. Google’s is general purpose and highly associated with your work identity (not as much as LinkedIn’s, but Sign in with LinkedIn is nearly non-existent). Something went wrong while submitting the form. I asked Chris what he thought the significance of the hashtag was. Chris Messina is a product designer, writer, avid Twitterer, and speaker who’s known for inventing the hashtag. The hashtag 100x’d our ability to clearly communicate online. Pseudonymous separation allows you to express yourself in ways that maybe you feel like you can't in your everyday lived life. 88 others named Chris Messina are on LinkedIn. He invented the hashtag.Yep. Who is Chris Messina? Ever-curious product designer and technologist. Ever-curious product designer and technologist. Which podcasts are you listening to right now? I just care a lot about making things that people are able to use and to benefit from — anddemystifying technologies that feel overpowering and encumbering. He shared the moment he “killed” Factory Joe in our interview: There was this merger happening between like my online identity and my real life identity that just seemed to becoming cumbersome. — Chris Messina's original Tweet proposing hashtag usage, August 23, 2007 Although Twitter's initial response to Messina's proposed use of hashtags was negative "these things are for nerds" [5] a series of events, including the devastating fire in San Diego County later that year , saw the first widespread use of #sandiegofire to allow users to easily track updates about the fire. We share your data with third party services for analytics. An advanced sleep and power nap system to fall asleep fast, stay asleep, and wake up feeling refreshed. Josh also writes a weekly newsletter called the Moving Product, sharing weekly deep dives on fresh ideas, examples of brilliant new designs, and commentary from top product experts. Chris Messina. San Francisco Bay Area. All rights reserved.Â. If you’re planning a launch, book his time here. It gave me a sense of how important these digital representations are and how much we come to identify ourselves through them. Cherie Hu is an award-winning journalist and researcher who has been covering the intersection of music, technology, and business for over 5 years. Hashtag inventor, speaker, product designer, technologist. :(, DSCONF 2018Clarity 2019Enterprise ExperienceDesignOps Summit, Partner with Joint FuturesSpeaking at Joint FuturesVolunteering at Joint FuturesScholarships at Joint Futures, Code of ConductDiversity, Inclusion, AccessibilityTerms of ServicePrivacy PolicyCookie policy, © 2019 Joint Futures Conference. Social Studies is a semi-weekly newsletter for people building great products for humans. I listen to a ton of podcasts primarily including Techmeme Ridehome, Pivot, The Prof G Show, Exponent, Land of the Giants. He has designed products and experiences for Google and Uber, founded startups, and changed the world by giving away many of his creations, including the hashtag. Picsew can automatically merge multiple screenshots to a long screenshot. Twitter is connected to my central nervous system. It seems like there’s a new Twittergensia forming with you (Brett), @lennysan, @_patriciamou, @lucymort, @gaby_goldberg, @nbashaw and others. Chris Messina Product designer, technologist, and inventor of the #hashtag. Oakland, California, United States 500+ connections You won’t get a lot of the usual thinkboi hot takes on remote work or the latest IPO from Chris. Generally I seem to optimize my time around being “useful”. You’re probably not the first person to try to solve a problem, though your environment and the tools it offers you may lead you to approach solutions in novel ways. It’s fascinating to see his “#hashtagiversary” reflections change over the years now that the hashtag is 13. Since I already shared that earlier, here’s Chris’s second most popular tweet. How so? What does Twitter mean to you? Then in 2007, he championed the idea of the hashtag, eventually changing social media forever and galvanizing popular social revolutions. Marco Marandiz is a co-founder and the Head of Marketing for Elliot, as well as a strategist for high-potential DTC brands. She runs Water & Music, a newsletter exploring innovation in the music business. Every anniversary of the “hashtag tweet” Chris reflects on how the hashtag has changed and what it means for the world. To realize the benefits of starting a company, you should plan to commit to something for 5-7 years, working on it continuously nearly every day. You can listen at the top of this post. What beverage do you most enjoy on a Friday evening? Consider why you want to start a company and whether it’s the right container for your efforts. Chris Messina has spent over 15 years  living on the edge of social technology. In 2004, he helped organize the grassroots movement that propelled Mozilla Firefox to its first 100 million downloads.