The Prototypes
Founders of Six Apart and creators of Movable Type and Vox blogging platforms.
posted September 13, 2007 10:15AM
Ben and Mena Trott, both now 30, were the kind of NorCal kids—Petaluma high-school sweethearts, to be exact—who were surfing the Web before most of us mastered Word. But the couple didn’t think posting Web content should be for the geek elite alone. So in 2001, after losing their dot-com jobs, they created Movable Type, the platform that launched 18 million blogs.
“We stayed home for a month and worked on it out of our Outer Richmond apartment, and it grew into something bigger,” says Mena. That “something bigger” would be Six Apart, which has since opened offices in SF, Paris and Tokyo, and whose applications, including Vox, TypePad and LiveJournal, have created nearly one-fourth of the publicly available blogs on the planet.
Of course, that kind of success doesn’t come easy. “I work from the time I get up till I go to bed,” says Ben. “ ‘Unplugged’ means my email is still open and I’m checking .” With a client list that includes Oracle, Boeing, Intel, Whole Foods and the Washington Post, that’s probably smart. Always one step ahead of the curve, Six Apart just released Movable Type 4 and is aiming tito finish an open-source version this fall.
While Mena used to rack up more than 100,000 air miles each year, she’s moving at a slower pace these days—as of press time, she was nearly nine months pregnant, after moving to Noe Valley, “getting a dog and drinking the water,” she laughs. “We pretty much fit our 20s and 30s into eight years. I could use a nap!”
WEB EXCLUSIVE: Q&A
Thoughts on blogging culture?
Ben: The visibility of blogging is a great thing. Even if we make fun of its being everywhere, we’re glad it’s everywhere. Where blogging shines most is editorial, opinion, reviews, arts, culture. I’m not getting my news from blogs. They supplement it. You don’t want the facts to come from a blog. You can’t change the way people blog, but you can change the way people think about what they are reading.
What’s hot about SF?
Mena: Having a neighborhood that feels like ours. Yes, Noe Valley is very yuppified, but it’s still pretty much all independent stores there. And the farmers market—we go every weekend. So many people take for granted the great food and fresh produce.
What would you change about SF?
Better public transportation.
Why do you think we picked you for Hot 20?
Mena: Look at this [gesturing to her nine-month-pregnant belly]. This is hot! Seriously, though, we’ve got a lot under our belt, and we’re only 29.
More 2007 Hot 20 Under 40 Picks
“We stayed home for a month and worked on it out of our Outer Richmond apartment, and it grew into something bigger,” says Mena. That “something bigger” would be Six Apart, which has since opened offices in SF, Paris and Tokyo, and whose applications, including Vox, TypePad and LiveJournal, have created nearly one-fourth of the publicly available blogs on the planet.
Of course, that kind of success doesn’t come easy. “I work from the time I get up till I go to bed,” says Ben. “ ‘Unplugged’ means my email is still open and I’m checking .” With a client list that includes Oracle, Boeing, Intel, Whole Foods and the Washington Post, that’s probably smart. Always one step ahead of the curve, Six Apart just released Movable Type 4 and is aiming tito finish an open-source version this fall.
While Mena used to rack up more than 100,000 air miles each year, she’s moving at a slower pace these days—as of press time, she was nearly nine months pregnant, after moving to Noe Valley, “getting a dog and drinking the water,” she laughs. “We pretty much fit our 20s and 30s into eight years. I could use a nap!”
WEB EXCLUSIVE: Q&A
Thoughts on blogging culture?
Ben: The visibility of blogging is a great thing. Even if we make fun of its being everywhere, we’re glad it’s everywhere. Where blogging shines most is editorial, opinion, reviews, arts, culture. I’m not getting my news from blogs. They supplement it. You don’t want the facts to come from a blog. You can’t change the way people blog, but you can change the way people think about what they are reading.
What’s hot about SF?
Mena: Having a neighborhood that feels like ours. Yes, Noe Valley is very yuppified, but it’s still pretty much all independent stores there. And the farmers market—we go every weekend. So many people take for granted the great food and fresh produce.
What would you change about SF?
Better public transportation.
Why do you think we picked you for Hot 20?
Mena: Look at this [gesturing to her nine-month-pregnant belly]. This is hot! Seriously, though, we’ve got a lot under our belt, and we’re only 29.
More 2007 Hot 20 Under 40 Picks
