Regeneration

After four fun-packed years of Digital Disruption, it's time for me to move on from The Lab at O2.

I've had an amazing time, building 3D printers, charging phones from lemons, building paper-prototypes with unemployed people, finding all sorts of interesting security bugs, teaching kids to code, redesigning the nation's gas bills, creating holographic iPhone displays, speaking all over the country, and building some amazing software. Best of all, working with a team of talented, funny, supportive geeks.

But four years is a long time - especially for me. I hear the future beckoning. A future which, for all its beauty, does not include regular travel to Slough.

I've been told that People Leave Managers, Not Companies - frankly nothing could be further from the truth. Andy, Stephen, and Dion have been great managers. Encouraging me in my madness and bringing me down to earth when necessary.

I've spent the last 15 years working in the mobile industry and, in truth, I think it is the industry that I'm leaving.

When I started out, I was the weirdo for having a touchscreen smartphone (Treo 180 represent!) - now everyone has them. When I first began doing mobile websites, people thought it was a fad - I ended up running mobile websites with millions of users generating billions of Euros. They told me that no one wanted to wear Google Glass and... OK... I might have missed the ball on that one!

What I'm getting at is that mobile is saturated. I'm not naive enough to say Everything that can be Invented has been Invented - but we're definitely in the "incremental improvement" stage of the industry. Short of a massive leap in power-delivery technology, the public acceptance of face-worn computers, or neural interfaces - I think the future might be *whispers* kinda dull.

Time to shake things up. Time to get out of a 15 year comfort zone. Time to change the world.

I've regenerated before, I dare say I'll do so again.

Onwards!