Who is Clint?
Hi there! My name is Clint Ecker and I’m currently splitting my time between Chicago and Denver, Colorado.
I’m a software developer by trade (work history) but I went to school in West Lafayette, Indiana at Purdue University. While there I majored in Computer Engineering with a focus on Electrical Engineering.
I was born in Wichita, Kansas and lived there until I went to university. After Purdue I lived in Cincinnati, Ohio for a while, then spent a good decade of my life living in Chicago, Illinois.
Chicago was the place where I really blossomed into the engineer I am today. For many of my years in Chicago I worked remotely for Ars Technica which had just been purchased by Conde Nast.
In 2011 I took a job working for Barack Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign. It was quite a stressful time but I met a lot of really amazing people and worked on a lot of really cool projects.
After re-electing the president I started a company with three friends called Modest. We worked on some online-commerce tools for a couple years and ended up being bought by PayPal in 2015.
The next year I spent working at BrainTree (a Paypal subsidiary) in Chicago and then in 2017 we moved to New York City and I transferred to Venmo (another Paypal subsidiary) as a Senior Engineer. I eventually helped to found the Software Architecture department and did a significant amount of work as a Senior Systems Architect responsible for the entire API and Identity platforms. In late 2019 I resigned and continue to be purposefully and became happily unemployed!
In 2020 we escaped COVID-19 and NYC and spent the next 18 months living in rural Colorado. In 2021 we bought a condo in Chicago and relocated our New York life back to a city we absolutely loved. Now we’re splitting our time re-charging in Colorado and enjoying everything Chicago has to offer. With 2022 around the bend we’re beginning to think about traveling again.
Interests
- Programming Computers
- Fashion & Clothing
- Sneakers
- Woodworking
- Electronics / Microprocessors
- Hiking, kayaking, camping
- Old Computers
- Cooking
- Gardening & Permaculture
Professional Life
- September 2021 (General Galactic): Galactic starts a number of new experiment building tools and fun things in the Crypto space
- October 2020 (General Galactic): Started a job with friends working a product that came to be called Galactic Camera.
- October 2019 (Venmo/NYC): Left PayPal/Venmo!
- January 2019 (Venmo/NYC): Helped to found the Software Architecture organization at Venmo. Started as Senior Systems Engineer. Worked on a broad range of problems, primarily focusing on its main API product. Topics included refactoring inefficient sub-systems to scale with Venmo’s current and future growth, migrating flagging data stores full of product-critical data without impact to availability, shepherding massive architecture projects focused on several key areas of the product that helped the organization launch a wide-array of new products.
- January 2017 (Venmo/NYC): Transferred to a position at Venmo in New York City in a position as a Senior Software Engineer.
- August 2015 (Braintree/CHI): Startup acquired by PayPal. Took a position as a Senior Software Engineer in the Braintree organization working on an e-commerce integration product.
- December 2012 (Modest/CHI): Helped found an e-commerce startup in Chicago, IL. We built an e-commerce platform that attempted to simplify the lives of online merchants and facilitate their transition from the mobile web to native e-commerce applications. I personally worked on the implementation of our API layer and guided the development of almost all other backend systems.
- November 2012 (Obama For America/CHI): Re-elected President Barack Obama.
- October 2011 (Obama for America/CHI): Took a position as a Senior Engineer on the re-election campaign for President Barack Obama. Worked on several teams including our Narwhal API layer and was the engineering lead for the Identity application that facilitated accounts, logins, authentication, and authorization for every Barack Obama application and donation platform.
- January 2010 (Ars Technica/CHI): Promoted to Director of Technology.
- September 2008 (Ars Technica/CHI): Hired as a Software Developer and Project Manager at the newly acquired—by Condé Nast—Ars Technica.
In addition to the above professional positions, I have also worked in the advertising industry as a software developer, as an RF Engineer for a major American cell phone network, an Editor, Journalist, Photographer, Party Planner, Dishwasher, Security Guard, Cashier, and Garden Shop employee.
Writing
Latest Posts
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Nov 27, 2022 Gobble Gobble!
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Jan 1, 2022 Happy New Year!
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Nov 14, 2021 Buying a Condo in Chicago
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Nov 14, 2021 Dance Mix: Winter In Miami
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Nov 14, 2021 Life Update: Unescaping From New York City
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Nov 13, 2021 Life Update: January 2021 -> June 2021
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Jan 2, 2021 Happy New Year : 2021
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Mar 23, 2020 Escape from New York
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Mar 18, 2020 More of the same with no end in sight.
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Mar 17, 2020 Saint Patrick’s Day in the Age of Quarantine