David Drucker
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| How did you personally get into using the Macintosh family of computers? |
Got my first Mac in college as a way of doing Music Notation, but then discovered that it empowered me to do many other things, like write, draw, design, and communicate. Through the Boston Computer Society, I got further into the center of Macintosh activities of user groups, and led the Mac Group as Executive director from 1992 to 1994. | |
| Status: | Regular Speaker at Macworld for about 12 years, Evangelist, Visionary (one hopes). I've been called 'a geek's geek', meaning the tech-head that techies go to in order to find out what 'the next big thing' is going to be. | |
First Mac:
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512K Fat Mac | |
Current Mac:
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G3 266 Minitower | |
| When did you get your first modem? | 1985 - it was 1200 Baud! | |
| Who did you call first? | Rochester local BBS running the Red Ryder bulletin board system. | |
| Present Occupation: | Internet Strategy Consultant; Principal, The Kendall Group | |
| Claim to Fame: | Wrote a couple of books on the Mac, Cool Mac Stacks on HyperCard, and co-wrote with Michael Murie the first authoritative book on QuickTime, The QuickTime Handbook. I've been interviewed by local TV on various technological issues (like the introduction and details of Windows 95), and was a fixture at Macworld Expo, doing presentations alone and as the main side-kick to David Pogue. | |
| Dream Job: | CEO of my Company, bought out by Microsoft, moved to Vermont and writing String Quartets, Connected by high-speed (T1 or higher) to the Net. |
| Not So Random Thoughts... | |||
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| Was there ever a time in your life that you had to "Think Differently?" What was the situation and what did you do? | |||
| At the end of my work on my Doctorate in Music, I decided that trying to make a living in Contemporary Classical Music, and living where the teaching job was (probably teaching Music Theory in some backwater liberal arts school in the middle of nowhere) was not for me. I decided that my skills might be applicable elsewhere. I moved to Boston, where my brother was going to school. Lived out of a suitcase and on his sofa. Learned how the Mac could help others, and teaching them how to do so was also something that I was capable of. |
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| How has using the Macintosh computer changed your life? | |||
| If it weren't for the Mac, I'd be living in a different state, doing a different job, married to a different person. I'd be a lot less happy, and probably a lot poorer in money and experiences. | |||
| What is the weirdest thing in your office right now? | |||
| A little doll that is Dilbert's Pointy-haired boss. A gift from a former co-worker. I keep it around to remind me what it was like to work in a large corporation. | |||
| My Passions are: | |||
| 20th Century Classical Music, Vietnamese Food, Modern Art (particularly Mondrian, Tanguy Calder, Moore and Vassarely), Venice, Frank Lloyd Wright, and the next great exciting technology. | |||
| Do you play a musical instrument and/or are you in a band? | |||
| Used to be a classically-trained pianist and conductor. Conducted many student groups in college but no longer perform. | |||
| If you could have dinner with one person dead or alive who would that person be and what would you ask them? | |||
| Beethoven (with a hearing aid) I feel like I know him already, and he's such a rowdy, fun-loving fellow with a really great mind, that he'd be great company. I'd ask him for composition lessons. | |||
| When I grow up I want to be: | |||
| A child. They have more fun. | |||
| The question never asked: | |||
| After we run out of oil, how are we going to fly planes? There's no electrical replacement for jet fuel, is there? |
| Just The Facts, Please... | ||||
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| Biographical Tidbits: | Son of Arno and Ruth Drucker, Pianist and Singer in the Baltimore/Washington DC area. Brother works for Microsoft in Redmond. Cousin of Nancy Spungen (the Nancy of Sid and Nancy - killed by Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols). | Education: | Bachelor of Music, University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, Master of Philosophy of Music, Cambridge University, Doctorate of Musical Arts (all but Dissertation), Eastman School of Music of the University of Rochester. | |
| Location at Birth: | Morgantown, West Virginia | Current Location: | Cambridge, MA | |
| Where you've been in between: |
Baltimore, MD, Cincinnati, OH, Cambridge, England, Rochester, NY | Astrological Sign: | Virgo, the virgin. (yeah, right) | |
| Available? | Nope (Married) | Chat Nick: | ddrucker | |
| Favorite Books: | Camp Concentration by Thomas Disch, Invisible Cities and Cosmicomics by Italo Calvino | Favorite Music or Band: | Classical Music - Favorite Composers: Ravel, Scriabin, and Messiaen. | |
| Favorite Food: | Goi Cuon (Vietnamese salad rolls). | Cat or Dog Person: | Cat person, emphatically. Don't like pets that act like they are your slave. Cats decide that they like you, which makes their friendship all the more valuable. Besides, you don't have to wash you hands to get the smell off of them whenever you pet them, as is the case with dogs. | |
| David's Personal Web Site | |
| David's Professional Web Site - (currently under development) | |
| Favorite Web Site: | Salon |
| "If the world were merely seductive, that would be easy. If it were merely challenging, that would be no problem. But I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world, and a desire to enjoy the world.
This makes it hard to plan the day." - E. B. White |
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Created Tuesday, September 8, 1998; Edited: 2/21/99