Web

But code requires so much assembly
And such strings of perls I sweat for its sake,
It's Basic, but errors are all I C,
With only java to keep me awake.
--Henry Tam

Web Portfolio

I've been doing web sites a while now but I no longer run most of these. At least one of my former domain names has been picked up by a porn company.

Biggies

  • Spock -- I'm currently working at Spock, which is a people search engine helping you find and discover people from dentists, to celebrities, to your social network friends.
  • I Hate Jen! -- Everyone hates the villainous character Jen Lindley on the TV show Dawson's Creek so visit the only site set on her destruction. The most popular Dawson's Creek fan site, it offers comprehensive episode guides, show transcripts, an interactive fan-written story, active message forums, polls, character descriptions, song-writing tools, games, and cards as well. Featured in Twist, and mentioned in TV Guide, People Weekly, B! Zine, and other publications in New York and the United Kingdom. Maintained by a staff of 15 and received over two million monthly visits. Closed December 2000. I've left part of the season one episode guide online to celebrate the DVD's release.
  • PhatGirls.com -- Started as just a big message board but became a full-blown teen girl discussion community. Frequently-updated girl news and active discussions about movies, television, music, relationships, and more serious topics. Made Netweek's Best of Web list.
  • MSN Encarta World Atlas -- Co-created this during my summer internship at Microsoft summer 2002. It was a fun project with ASP.NET, C#, web services, JavaScript, DHTML, IIS.
  • TogaLD -- My first major web site, TogaLD is dedicated to high school Lincoln Douglas values debate with topic analysis, skills library, links, debater and coach directory, humor publications, information, message board, a card shop, chat, calendars, a debate webring, and much more. Since 1996, this definitive source is even quoted by competitors at state and national-level tournaments. New articles written by a staff of ten are added monthly. Winner of many awards and compliments and visited by 5,000 monthly. Closed June 1999.
  • Wayne Kao -- You're staring at it. This is probably the least impressive of my sites and hasn't been majorly revamped since its inception years ago. The original Wayne's Spiffy World of early 1996 was hosted by Pacific Exchange, a small local BBS, and got fifty vistors. Next it moved to GeoCities (well before the Yahoo acquisition), did a stint at the Open Computing Facility (OFC) while I was at Berkeley, and is now at its current location hosted by A Small Orange. It was the first page I built.

Facebook Applications

  • Cartoon You -- See a cartoon version of you and your Facebook friends.
  • Story -- Mad Libs, only on Facebook, so it's better. Enter words describing your friends and it'll generate a funny story about them and put it on their profile.

Others

  • The Daily Californian -- Spent a few months maintaining the site for the school newspaper, tightening security, and working on their now-defunct webmail app and Best Of Berkeley site.
  • Poetry -- A quick page I threw together with poetry written by me and three friends. If you're just interested in my stuff, it's on the poetry page.
  • Microsoft Anti-Trust -- So is Microsoft truly a monopoly? Get the facts at a site I created with a friend for our high school economics class. It looks at the anti-trust trial from both Microsoft and the government's points of view. (Never thought I'd end up working for Microsoft).
  • Another Opposite Sex Page -- A small site I whipped up about the summer 2000 show Opposite Sex. Pretty bland design with some episode reviews, show news, and links. The show got cancelled even before its scheduled run had finished, so this site's pretty much dead.

Silly Games

Background

I got online in junior high through various local FirstClass online services and some text-based MajorBBS systems, spending some serious time playing online games such as Swords of Chaos, Legend of the Red Dragon, and Tradewars 2002. I briefly ran my own PCBoard bulletin board service, Wayne's Computer. I hooked into the net early in 1996 and I've been doing crazy stuff online since.
(No, that's not my picture. That's Willow from Buffy, The Vampire Slayer)
Wayne Kao