Bigstep Reunion

Bigstep Employees

See the full Employee Directory
(circa 2001)
 
Alicia Dougherty
Position: The Voice/Director of Content & Production
Employeed: Jan 1999 - Oct 2001
Favorite Donut: Glazed Old Fashioned
Now:
Married, now Alicia Dougherty-Wold, with a sweet baby girl. Ran my own content business for years and went back to school for an MS in Psychology. Now working part-time as Director of Communications for Engage and keeping a small psychotherapy practice to collect hours towards my Marriage & Family Therapy license.
Andrew Beebe
Position: Co-Founder, CEO, etc
Employeed: the whole way
Favorite Donut: French Cruller
Now:
Jessica and I are living with our gaggle of children (three under the age of 5) in South Pasadena. I pine for the bay area, and am slowly plotting my return.
I'm running EI Solutions (www.eispv.com) building large scale solar installations for great customers around the country.
Angus Durocher
Position: Miscreant
Employeed: December 1998 - October 2001
Favorite Donut: apple fritter
Now:
Lead webdev at YouTube
Anna Miller (Christol)
Position: Software Engineer
Employeed: Nov 1999 - Nov 2004
Favorite Donut: n/a
Now:
Married to the good dr. form and living in oakland with a beautiful baby boy. Working part-time as an Engineering Manger at EVault.
Anna O'Neil
Position: PR Manager
Employeed: Oct. 2000 -- Sept. 2001
Favorite Donut: beignet
Now:
PR for renewable energy and energy efficiency technology companies.
Baruch Goldwasser
Position: Product Manager
Employeed: 1999 - 2001
Favorite Donut: apple fritter
Now:
Married and living in SF. Still working at NetSuite six years later.
Bernard Fraenkel
Position: VP Engineering
Employeed: May 2001 - August 2002
Favorite Donut: Croissant
Now:
VP Engineering @ ClairMail - mobile banking
Brian Vowell
Position: Senior Systems Administrator
Employeed: 2000
Favorite Donut: I hate donuts
Now:
Spent a few years running a residential broadband service company in San Francisco, then hooked up with HP and ended up in Iraq. Worked on a whole bunch of projects over there, and then settled back here on data center projects. Joined the Screen Actor's Guild and started acting. Moved to San Diego part-time to be closer to Hollywood without having to actually live in LA.
Bud Rosenthal
Position: VP, BizDev
Employeed: July 1998 - August 2001
Favorite Donut: glazed old fashion
Now:
Still living in SF and now married to Teresa (we are dating during Bigstep) and now have a 11 month old munchkin (Jackson). Just wrapped up a gig in January and looking for the next thing...meanwhile enjoying the time with the little guy!
Chad Givens
Position: Bud's sidekick
Employeed: Nov 1999 - Nov 2001
Favorite Donut: apple fritter
Now:
Married with twin boys now 2 yrs old and living in Oakland hills.
Director at Thomson Reuters.
Free time: see line 1
Chad Schott
Position: Director, Strategic Partnerships
Employeed: 5/99 (right before launch) to 12/01
Favorite Donut: Cinnamon roll or blueberry cake
Now:
Living in Denver with lovely wife Leslie. Stopped at two kids... Chapin just turned 8, Libby almost 6. Currently running business development for Marchex, Inc. Still chasing the dream of empowering SMBs online ;-)
Cheryl Downes
Position: Executive Producer
Employeed: umm, 1998ish -2001ish
Favorite Donut: dunkin donuts chocolate glazed
Now:
I am an Exhibit Developer for an exhibition design firm in Oakland (www.woed.com). Having fun designing exhibits for science and history museums all over.
Living near Lake Merrit in Oakland with my husband Tim McCoy and our super daughter, Bella.
Christine McCarthy Rimer
Position: Data Warehousing Leader
Employeed: March 1999 - November 2001
Favorite Donut: Cinamon Roll
Now:
Married with two kids (Thomas who is 3 and Rebecca will be 2 in June). Living in San Carlos and working 4 days / week at Intuit in the Quicken Health division managing our strategic accounts. I had a great web site www.chrisnchristine.com until today when sadly, all Bigstep web sites were killed. If anyone has a great replacement, I would welcome suggestions at mcrimer@pacbell.net
Coreen Kaplan
Position: Marketing
Employeed: n/a
Favorite Donut: glazed old fashioned
Now:
Speech Language pathologist at a rehab hospital
corinna lee
Position: junior UI designer.. something like that
Employeed: 99 - 01?
Favorite Donut: apple fritter
Now:
living next to snoop dog in the LBC.
Dan Platt
Position: Product Manager
Employeed: June 2000 - November 2001
Favorite Donut: Chocolate old fashioned, fresh at 3 AM from donut shop at 24th + Church
Now:
Happily married to a lovely Hawaiian girl. Recently moved to Chicago after 3 years in New York. Now running the family business with my Dad after years in software. I love Chicago, but I could really use some California sunshine right about now.
David Pon
Position: Didn't we invent our own titles?
Employeed: God knows
Favorite Donut: bagel
Now:
unfortunately working
David Spitzler
Position: VP, String Cheese for Everyone
Employeed: Jan. 1999 - Jan. 2001
Favorite Donut: buttermilk bar or glazed old fashioned
Now:
Despite popular opinion, sprinkle donuts are not my fav and are a bit nauseating. I traded in my high tech career temporarily to be director of development (fundraising) for a SF-based nonprofit that provides free legal services to state and local gov'ts trying to enact tougher gun laws.
Denise (Alvidrez) Burchell
Position: Creative Designer
Employeed: Jan 1999 - Sept 1999
Favorite Donut: maple bar
Now:
Happily married and back in San Francisco after spending almost a year living and working in New Zealand. I'm now a Sr. Interaction Designer at AKQA.
Diane Whitmer
Position: Information Architect in UE
Employeed: Jan 2000- July 2001
Favorite Donut: chocolate glazed
Now:
Finishing up a PhD in neuroscience at UC San Diego (it's been a long haul!) and salsa dancing as much as possible in my free time. Planning my next career move... does anyone have contacts in the neurological device niche of biotech?
Eli Cochran
Position: Manager, User Experience and Interface Engineering
Employeed: May 1999 - July 2001
Favorite Donut: chocolate old-fashioned
Now:
Living and working in Berkeley. User experience developer for UC Berkeley. LIfe is good.
elke Peterson
Position: Editor
Employeed: October 1999-November 2001
Favorite Donut: Chocolate cake donut with chocolate frosting
Now:
Freelance writer at my one-woman LLC: Lowercase e
Erin Wright
Position: Marketing
Employeed: September 2000 - Oct 2002
Favorite Donut: n/a
Now:
I worked at Intuit for 4.5 years, had two kids, and then started BallHype with my husband. We're still married.
Eytan Faverman
Position: QA
Employeed: 1999-ish
Favorite Donut: Nice juicy steak
Now:
QA Manager @ IDT. Living in Jerusalem, Israel with wife, kids, dog, cats, fish, etc
freeform
Position: Senior Scientist (UI Des/Dev)
Employeed: November 1998 - October 2001
Favorite Donut: Krispy Kreme original glazed (heated)
Now:
Husband, Father, Lead UI at YouTube. Living a lovely life in oakTown.
George Peterson
Position: VP Ops
Employeed: October 1999- Sept. 2001
Favorite Donut: plain cake
Now:
Still living in Walnut Creek, daughter is 20 (U of O), son is 16, Kim and I are enjoying more startups. I am at Immi in San Mateo.
Gordon Shettle
Position: CS baby
Employeed: June 1999- June 2000
Favorite Donut: low fat
Now:
Just moved back to SF from DC with fiance working for Wachovia, going to Afghanistan for 3 months with Equal Access and plan to be back early July for Bigstep party!
Gunthar Hartwig
Position: User Experience Designer
Employeed: February 1999 - August 2001
Favorite Donut: Buttermilk
Now:
Married with two kids. Doing UE design at YouTube with Form and Angus. Got a little bungalow in San Jose that we are quickly outgrowing!
Hannibal Odisho
Position: CS
Employeed: November 1999-August 2000
Favorite Donut: the plainest donut there is
Now:
Worked for DreamWorks in production management for 5-6 years (Shrek, Shrek 2, Madagascar) and then went to law school at Ohio State University - just graduated and currently studying for the CA bar exam.
Harley Milne
Position: User Experience Engineer
Employeed: March 1999 - August 2000
Favorite Donut: Custard Donut
Now:
Sun Microsystems - Technical Marketing Manager
Irina Graham (Farberova)
Position: QA Engineer
Employeed: January 2000 - February 2001
Favorite Donut: n/a
Now:
Happily married with a wonderful 3 month old girl and living in San Jose. Currently on maternity leave, however, will be going back to Verisign (QA Manager) at the end of April.
James Preston
Position: Technical Support
Employeed: Jan 2000 - Aug 2001
Favorite Donut: glazed w/ maple icing
Now:
still googling as a sysadmin, still raising stacey (she will be 16 in less than 3 mos), coming up on 2 yr anniv with darren this weekend, and playing tennis for about a year; oh, and after a wild ride on the back of tsaccos bike ive had my very own bmw f650cs for a couple of years
Jane Peacock
Position: Sous Chef
Employeed: May 1999 - October 2001
Favorite Donut: Chocolate cake
Now:
I went to business school eventually and met my husband there. We have a kid and we're expecting another one this fall. Good thing I got that MBA, really helps me as a stay at home mom these days...
Janice Broucaret
Position: Customer Service Manager
Employeed: December 1999 - August 2001
Favorite Donut: Chocolate Glazed with Sprinkles
Now:
Working as a Registered Nurse (my college degree was a BS in Nursing) at California Pacific Medical Center. I work in Inpatient Psychiatry as the Charge Nurse (No, I'm not Nurse Ratched). Looking for a house to buy in Sonoma County keeps me busy at the moment. Owner of 2 award winning Pomeranian dogs.
Jason Alcock
Position: QA Manager
Employeed: October 2000 - October 2001
Favorite Donut: Chocolate Old Fashioned
Now:
Living with my wonderful fiance and our cats in Seattle. I've been the QA Manager at Wetpaint since March of 2007.
Jay
Position: Microsoft Infrastructure Engineer
Employeed: April 2000- Mass Layoff number 3
Favorite Donut: Jam or Jelly as you call it
Now:
Divorced with one tall, beautiful 9 year old daughter. Working as a full time Microsoft Consultant for a consultant co in San Jose implementing new MS technologies (sounding like a true consultant there). Moved from Evault (hi there Anna) to EMC to Allin where I am now.
Jen Moyse
Position: Copy Chief
Employeed: Spring 2000-Nov 2001
Favorite Donut: Krispy Kreme glazed
Now:
Working at Yahoo!, living in SF.
Jennifer Romero (Eng)
Position: Membership Marketing
Employeed: April 2000 - November 2001
Favorite Donut: chocolate old fashion
Now:
Living in SF with husband Michael, and son Adrian (born March 2008). Currently on maternity leave from Sephora.
John Magdziarz
Position: Señor Software Engineer
Employeed: January 1999 - October 2001
Favorite Donut: "powdered"
Now:
Living in SF.
Pared down from two beautiful wives to one.
Engineering consulting for mobile software startup company. Still enjoy long walks on the beach with my imaginary dog, Wainwright.
John Shiple
Position: VP of User Experience
Employeed: beginning to December 2000
Favorite Donut: krispy kreme chocalate cream filled
Now:
CTO of www.mota.net (we help people buy and sell cars). living a relaxed life in Venice, CA with my black lab Bailey.
Jonas Edgeworth
Position: Senior Software Engineer
Employeed: 1/2001 till the bitter end (or close to it)
Favorite Donut: Chocolate glaze
Now:
Married to my wonderful wife and fellow Bigstepper Melissa Morales in NYC. Working at a large investment bank
Joolee Carneiro
Position: Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix 01
Employeed: September 98 - January 02
Favorite Donut: maple old fashioned
Now:
I'm doing a few things here and there - refurbishing my apartment after some junkies lived here for about 15 years. eeeesh. At least I get to pick whatever fixtures, paint, etc. that I want! volunteering for a no-kill cat shelter or two. Fostering kittens(aww!). About to be a first-time aunt. Tech support and tech writing.
Josh Engel
Position: Corporate Counsel
Employeed: Jan 1999-Jan 2002
Favorite Donut: glazed
Now:
6+ years as in-house counsel at Roxio/Napster/Sonic Solutions (worked with Gunthar here!) Married, 2 Kids -Jordan (4.5 year old girl going on 16) and Harrison (2.5 years - likes playing rugby). Living in Washington DC, telecommuting...
Josh Jacobs
Position: lead bug introducer
Employeed: forever
Favorite Donut: Beebe's
Now:
Living in LA, married to the beautiful Pi, working on big, top secret, things at Yahoo (that I can't talk about because of all you damn googlers!)
Josh Polsky
Position: Product Manager
Employeed: Dec. 1998 - Jan. 2001
Favorite Donut: Chocolate Honey Glazed
Now:
Project Portfolio Management for online IT at the Gap, Inc. Living in Bernal heights. Had a daughter last year and expecting another in late august. Not mountain biking or snowboarding nearly as much as I used to. See outdated blog:
Julie Bak
Position: Snr. HR Generalist
Employeed: Jan 2000 - Aug 2001
Favorite Donut: Custard Filled Chocolate Bars
Now:
Married with 2 beautiful baby boys and living in Oakland (really close to Form and Anna). Taking maternity leave from self owned baby clothing business (looking for parter to restart).
Karen Jacke
Position: Consultant and VP People and Culture
Employeed: Feb 2000- June 2002
Favorite Donut: Cinnamon
Now:
Still doing strategic planning, leadership development and coaching with a variety of large and small companies around the Bay Area. I have gotten enamored of the Enneagram and am teaching workshops to parents, coaches and leaders re: how to use it as a tool for personal development. Both kids have graduated from college and are off my "payroll" so I have more time and energy for fun.
kasey asberry
Position: experience architect
Employeed: dec1999 - jan2001
Favorite Donut: buttermilk
Now:
1st year grad student Natural Resources Planning & Mgt & arabic; chief IA for Fullsuite/ITRize; living in Outer Mission SF with Joseph and my marshmallow terrier. Our kids are all officially adults- with their own websites and cheerios.
Keith Beattie
Position: Gestalt Engineer
Employeed: January 1999 - October 2001
Favorite Donut: Old Fashioned
Now:
Comp. Sci. research and Software Dev for various science projects at The Berkeley Lab. Shelli and I now have a wonderful daughter!
Kirt Johnson
Position: Dir of Eng
Employeed: Jan 1999 - May 2004
Favorite Donut: the one at hand
Now:
Living in rural Vermont, with two kids, two horses, a dog, a cat, and a rabbit. Playing lots of hockey and working as Director of Software Engineering at a small software company.
Kord Hamilton
Position: Customer Support
Employeed: August 2000-October 2001(?)
Favorite Donut: Boston Creme
Now:
Working for the past 7+ as Customer Experience Manager for SquareTrade, Inc. where I co-manage a team of 16 Customer Support Agents, maintain the Culture Book, and represent the company at events like eBay Live.

My Partner Tom and I have been together for 12 years...and we're mullling over a 13th.
Mari Tamburo
Position: Customer Service-E Commerce
Employeed: Feb - 2000 - Jan 2001?
Favorite Donut: Boston Creme
Now:
Married, 2 grown stepkids, a dog, 2 cats, all rescued. Living in Mill Valley, singing in a funk/jazz band.
Founded a non-profit http://www.av4c.org
Matt Raines
Position: Dir of Site Ops
Employeed: Dec 98 - May 02
Favorite Donut: chocolate iced creme-filled (not custard)
Now:
Married with 3 rambunctious boys - Jackson (7), Sammy (4) and Quinn (2). Still working at Bluefly as vp of technology in NYC, commuting in from Maplewood, New Jersey.
Melissa Hearne
Position: Customer Support Specialist
Employeed: 2000-2001?
Favorite Donut: Old Fashioned Glazed
Now:
Implementation Project Manager at Cytiva, Inc. in Emeryville, CA. Married with 1 beautiful 2 year old son. No more on the way; I have to leave some time for fun things like partner acrobatics and voice acting.
Melissa Morales
Position: Senior Accountant
Employeed: Feb 2000 - April 2002
Favorite Donut: Chocolate Glaze
Now:
Living in NY and working in real estate finance. Jonas and I were married last September.
Mike Borges
Position: customer support
Employeed: June 2000-Dec2000
Favorite Donut: old fashioned
Now:
Director of Business Services and Records Czaar for Western Career College's San Leandro campus, still stuck with the same man for almost 9 years now, bicycling to work and back to keep the girlish figure, and working on buying our house that we are renting.
Mike Lindsey
Position: Senior Systems Admin
Employeed: n/a
Favorite Donut: Maple Glaze
Now:
Married, living in Oakland, working for IronPort
Natalie Musick
Position: uber producer
Employeed: Jan 1999 - Jan 2000
Favorite Donut: chocolate old-fashioned
Now:
Product Management consultant for the last 7+ years. Living in Berkeley with the love of my life. Actively trying to re-focus my career towards making a positive impact on the environmental problems we face.
Nora Gause
Position: Answergrrrl
Employeed: Feb 2000 - Sept 2001
Favorite Donut: apple fritter
Now:
Trying to fix the health care crisis. Data analyst at Group Health Cooperative in Seattle. Learning SAS (proc whee!). Married to a fellow health care crusader (Chad; he's at Children's). 2 cats, one organic garden. Sadly, I no longer have pink hair.
Paul Mickelsen
Position: Project Management
Employeed: April 2000 – Dec 2001
Favorite Donut: The one not touched by Angus
Now:
Project Management at Wells Fargo, still in San Francisco living in North Beach.
Phil Garrett
Position: Director of Customer Support
Employeed: March 1999 - April 2000
Favorite Donut: Chocolate cream-filled, what else?
Now:
Living in Ohio with Michelle, and our two awesome kids, Hayden (6) and Kate (14 months). Left Bigstep in 2000 for the movie biz, spent 4 years at DreamWorks before making the move back to Ohio in 2004 to be near family, etc. Freelancing in film, video, and animation production as producer, editor, writer, UPM, AD, etc. Also a visiting artist/instructor at Ohio State University in the Department of Theatre and ACCAD (The Advanced Computing Center for the Arts and Design). Start work in July on my 17th feature film. It's been a crazy 8 years.
Ray Duong
Position: Data Warehouse Architect
Employeed: Oct. 1999 - Aug. 2002
Favorite Donut: Blueberry glaze
Now:
Working at YouTube with the other ex-bigstep.
Samia van Hattum
Position: Facilities / Accounts Payable Associate & Executive Assistant to the CEO
Employeed: June 1999 - December 2000
Favorite Donut: old fashioned with chocolate glaze
Now:
Finally went back to school! Full time student at Saint Louis University getting my degree in social work. Living in St Louis, MO?!?!! Still adventuring to random places on the globe and still doing disaster work with the local and national Red Cross.
Tim Roberts
Position: VP, of something or other
Employeed: July 1998 - Jan 2000
Favorite Donut: n/a
Now:
Living in Bernal Heights SF with my girlfriend Anne and our dog Roscoe. CEO of a pre-launch startup in SF called Infectious. BUT I CAN"T TELL YOU WHAT WE DO CAUSE WE ARE A TOP SECRET PROJECT...SHHHHH!
Tony Mahdavi
Position: Customer Support
Employeed: March 2000 - Nov 2004
Favorite Donut: All
Now:
Living in Walnut creek with wife and daughter Meena (4). Work at At&t in San Ramon.
Traci Boyle
Position: Dir. Project Management
Employeed: March 1998 - October 2001
Favorite Donut: old fashion
Now:
Doing program management at VMware in Palo Alto. Living in the city.
Virginia Wang
Position: of Bigstep Customer Support fame
Employeed: June 1999 - August 2000
Favorite Donut: munchkins. any kind!
Now:
Product Manager, YouTube. Still single, no babies (that I know of), living in SF (Treasure Island was a l-o-n-g time ago). Still dunno what I want to be when I grow up... :)
See the full Employee Directory
(circa 2001)