Maria Lourdes C. Capiitan

SysAnal(O0A)

July 22, 2008

Case Study

Philip Greenspun

Cofounder, Ars Digita

Ars Digita was founded by Philip Greenspun in 1997 for consulting projects. I learned that it was being known as start up as embodiment for new model of softwares. I also learned that in a company they should not waste time and reach the expectation of the customers.

The company started when Philip was starting to build internet application. He decided to build something simple user interface but will guarantee to work on any kind of computer that will survive the changes in operating system. They are also known as photo.net. The uniqueness present in Ars Digita is that they help each programmer  develop professional reputation give incentives for doing a good job.

The turning points for their company is having Levi Strauss as a customer. Another turning point was when they published Database Backed Web Sites. Their other business is having tutorial publication, books in bookstores and public lectures. Edward Tufte suggested to have the company a day of seminar.

Ars Digita was different because it is faster than others. They even have different culture because I learned that they hire young hackers. They even have educational sessions, they are strict code reviews. They idea is to grow the company by having apprentices. They decided to take VC money because they have difficulties in hiring business people.

Philip Greenspun like hiring new CEO  but in the end Philip Greenspun became the CEO and change the bylaws of the company. It is being done through letters in their lawyers’ office.

The Ars Digita started to lose money. By the end, in June 2001 the company sold out and tanked by January 2002.

The things that their company would want to change is their growth. Not to worry about the competition that they should concentrate on getting really good people.

There was times that people misunderstood to Ars Digita specially when they say “This Greenspun guy sued the venture capitalists”. Which is not true.