Part professional bio, part other crap that I’d put on my résumé if I had one. Which I don’t. Or at least not one that I’d let you see.
Professional bio
Alex “Skud” Bayley is a social justice activist, software developer, and advocate for open technology and culture beyond the “open source” world. Born and raised in Australia, Skud has also lived in the United States and Canada and has traveled extensively.
With substantial organisational experience as a leader on projects like Geek Feminism, Growstuff, realestate.com.au, and My Name Is Me, Skud’s former employment credentials include experience at Google, Metaweb, Linux gaming company TransGaming Technologies, and distro creator e-smith, Inc., among many other open technology and Internet companies since the mid-90s.
Skud has been giving presentations and tutorials on technology-related subjects for most of her professional career. She has keynoted at O’Reilly’s Open Source Conference (OSCON), GUADEC, and several other technology conferences worldwide. Her outspoken, articulate commentary on subjects like anonymity and pseudonymity, women in geek spaces, and open-source culture has attracted global media attention.
Skud lives the “open” philosophy to such an extent that she crowdsourced this biography. It was written by random people from the internet, several of whom claimed, believably, to be drunk at the time of writing. They described Skud’s hair as “perfectly lethal” and “an asset to any organization”. They also argued, persuasively, that “when the zombie apocalypse happens, you definitely want Skud on your team.” Skud led the Kentish uprising of 1471 and can be played as a 10-point finishing move. She can knit a nifty hat for a gerbil that can defeat Chuck Norris at Trivial Pursuit. Her Perl is so pretty, people mistake it for Python. Skud can enter a nuclear waste site and emerge stronger, faster, and more powerful than ever before, though she is not yet able to leap tall buildings in a single bound; that’s promised for Skud 2.0.
We know Skud. We think you should too.
“I know Skud” buttons. Photo credit: Leigh Honeywell
Projects
A short list of some of the projects I’m responsible for, in order of recency:
- Growstuff (founded 2012). Open source project to build a website for food gardeners to record their gardening activity.
- Written? Kitten! (with Emily Turner.) Popular writing productivity tool. Over 800,000 writers have had their words rewarded with kittens since 2011.
- My Name Is Me (founded 2011). Advocacy site against “real name” policies on social networks.
- Geek Feminism wiki (founded 2008) and blog (founded 2009) addressing feminism from a geek perspective, geek culture from a feminist perspective, and other subjects from a geeky, feminist perspective.
Public speaking
A sample of some of the talks/presentations/keynotes I’ve given. Note that I changed my name in 2011; many of these refer to me by my previous name.
- What’s Next? From Open Source to Open Everything. Keynote, GUADEC (Gnome Users and Developers’ European Conference), Spain, 2012. Transcript forthcoming.
- Standing Out in the Crowd (on women in open source software). Keynote, O’Reilly Open Source Convention (OSCON), USA, 2009. Slides/text, video.
- Test Driven Development. Tutorial, Open Source Developers Conference (OSDC), Australia, 2007. Slides.
Writing
Some of my better or more interesting blog posts.