The Human

I’m Nikki. For most of my twenty-five year career in technology, I’ve written software or managed those that did. I have worked at a number of early-stage start-ups that you have never heard of (employee #7 at Aereo), including CTO of The Financial Gym¹. I wrote my first program in 1986 at the age of eight in BASIC. I built my first website in 1997. I am a self-taught programmer.

The technology industry is changing. AI is ubiquitous. I am both enamored with this new technology and slightly repulsed by it. Extremes aren’t useful here but adaptation and resiliency are; they are key to all hardships or upheavals. It certainly is an interesting time to experience, especially considering the state of the world in mid-2026.

This site is a limited and somewhat curated view into my mind and who I am. Often, that means something recently written may contradict something previously written. I am okay with that. As Walt Whitman so perfectly puts it in Song of Myself, 51:

Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes.) Walt Whitman

I’ve given myself the grace to show up imperfectly. I extend the same to you, dear Reader.

Why .LOL?

Because it’s truly all a gas, as they say. Each person is born with a unique view into the world and how they approach it. I choose to view the world with lots of love, laughing out loud (double LOLs). It does not mean naivety or a lack of seriousness. It does mean meeting each challenge—whether that’s individual thoughts or collective troubles—with collaboration, kindness, and a huge smile.

Colophon

All words on this site are written by me, a real, live human. No AI/LLM was used for the prose on this site, whether that’s a note, an essay, or a piece of fiction. The site is built in Hugo, a static site generator. I’ve used Kagi Assistant to answer questions I had while building, though no AI was used to touch code..

A note on the use of em dashes (—)

One of the tells of AI-written prose/content is the use of em dashes (—). You, dear Reader, may notice quite a few em dashes throughout this site. To be clear, all prose (essays, fiction, notes, pages) on this site is 100% human written and made. I enjoy using em dashes as it is indicative of how my mind thinks; often starting with one thought, which is interrupted by another—the beuatiful em dash allows me to relate a thought to the previous one while, at the same time, marking it as a thought that can stand on its own. I like my voice too much to use AI in my writing process; doing so just makes it sound so generic.

Get in touch

I love people and I love hearing their stories. Want to chat? Email me at hey@nikki.lol. I will respond!