Some frequently asked questions

I don't have an FAQ page per se, but I've written a few blog posts where I answer some questions, and here I'll answer a few more.

Should I get a PhD?

See my answer here and take a look at some of the other answers on the same site.

Do you have any advice for people going out on their own?

Yes. See my post Advice for going solo.

Shortly after I went out on my own, I wrote this post responding to questions people had about my particular situation. My answers there remain valid, except one. I said that planned to do anything I can do well that also pays well. That was true at the time, but I've gotten a little more selective since then.

Can you say more about the work you've been doing?

Only in general terms. For example, I did some work with psychoacoustics earlier this year, and lately I've been working with medical device startups and giving expert testimony.

Nearly all the work I do is covered under NDA (non-disclosure agreement). Occasionally a project will be public, such as the white paper I wrote for Hitachi Data Systems comparing replication and erasure coding. But usually a project is confidential, though I hope to be able to say more about some projects after they come to market.

Miscellaneous other questions

I wrote an FAQ post of sorts a few years ago. Here are the questions from that post that people still ask fairly often.

• Can you recommend an introductory statistics book?
• Why do you prefer Python to R?
• How do you run your Twitter accounts?
• Why don't use you XeTeX?
• Can I use your code?
• How can you test a random number generator?
• How do you type math characters in HTML?

Any more questions?

You can use this page to send me a question and see my various contact information. The page also has a link to a vCard you could import into your contact manager.