About me
Hi! My name is Cory and I love using computers to create experiences. Today, I am dividing my time between the Bay Area and Tokyo as the CTO of SmartNews, reinventing the news experience for a world where our attention has been hijacked by outrage and polarization.
Until recently, I was Sundar Pichai’s tech advisor and ran Core Experience at Google, responsible for keeping Google experiences Googlely. Prior to that, I created Second Life with Philip, was “the engineer who saved Facebook” by leading the mobile transition, got called out for violence in video games for Road Rash on the Nintendo 64 (lol), and along with a group of serious rebels, accidentally invented the RTS (in a way nobody would ever notice) in the twilight of the arcade era with Magic the Gathering: Armageddon.
I discovered I was a class clown while graduating from the United States Naval Academy, drove submarines during the cold war, and started my civilian career at Lockheed Sanders learning DOD-STD-2167A was maybe the dumbest possible way to build software.
Cooking
I love to cook. Sharing food with friends and family is one of the great joys in life. Fanboying great restaurants and chefs has led to some truly epic experiences. I am by no means a professional cook or chef, nor am I claiming to be particularly great at it. I just love that I can infinitely nerd out and keep learning. At various times, I’ve gone deep on bread (duh, covid), pizza, koji, and tortillas. More posts to come.
Surfing
Ever since seeing Point Break (thank goodness they’ve only made one and never tried to reboot it), the idea of surfing had been somewhere in that category of things that remarkably cool people did. Then, thanks to Mark’s Year of Running and no commute, I entered 2017 fitter than I had been in a long time. Living in the South Bay meant Santa Cruz — and some of the best beginner breaks in the world — were just a mountain pass away. Almost a decade later, I’ve discovered Cabo Surf Hotel and the joy of warm water surfing.
Free diving
Thanks to my friend Fred, I’m 5 years into a deep love of free diving. There’s really nothing like its combination of meditation, presence, and connection to the ocean, plus spearfishing and the incredible bounty of Big Sur means plenty of fresh fish to cook.
Connections, friends, and affiliations
I am a senior fellow at the Burnes Center for Social Change, run by the incredible Beth Simone Noveck (also a central character in early Second Life adventures)
I’m on Badge’s CISO Council, helping their incredibly talented team look around corners.
I’m on the board of a stealth startup. It’s sooo awesome. And a secret.
I am an early investor in Celmatix. Medical research has long neglected women’s health, so it’s hard to overstate how important the work of Dr. Piraye Yurttas Beim and her team is.
I’m also an early investory in Take Back the Mic, who are on a mission to create viable, sustainable platforms for creators worldwide. Derrick, Lucia, and the entire team are some of the most talented, creative, and driven people you’ll ever meet.
Publications and Such
The State of Play: Law, Games, and Virtual Worlds
The Official Guide to Second Life
A pretty broad selection of patents from Linden and Facebook — Facebook in particular had this process wired back in the day.
Contact
I have an internet unique name, so I’m pretty easy to find: cory dot ondrejka at gmail dot com.
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