Bryan Andrews

I have been asked if I want to speak at the memorial for a good friend Bryan Andrews. My first instinct is to say NO, that I can’t hold it together long enough to let his friends, and mine, know how much he meant to me. How he changed my life. How I am better today because I knew him. This made me realize I have to do it, and if the shoe was on the other foot you can be sure I would expect no less from him.

I started by remembering all the times we spent together, going out, partying with friends, chasing girls. All very superficial at first. The more time we spent together the more we realized we had in common. In 94 we started a little company called @lanta web resources that built websites. It was a mess, we were learning as we went, not just how to design and program websites, but also how to build a business, and how to work as partners. I remember vividly our first ecommerce sites. Bryan built a subscription photo service, and I built a site that sold a cd for Mary Schneider yodels the classics . We spent a week connecting a credit card machine to a Mac at Ron’s warehouse. The first order didn’t come in until late in the day, after the sun had set. We heard the buzz of the dial-up connection, and the order process. We were sure it would be for Bryan’s service, but the yodeler got the first order, then the second and after 15 orders the record label had us pull the site because they weren’t set up to handle the orders.

Looking back on that time, i see that my passion to create things and be challenged was reinvigorated through our short-lived business. I can thank Bryan for getting me back on track, giving me a future. He was my friend, and I will miss him.