Say hello to Gavin, our new senior developer

It’s our pleasure to introduce Gavin, a new team member who joined our research and development gang at the beginning of April.

Gavin in one of his favorite habitats

As our senior developer, Gavin is responsible for the development of the search aspects of our back-end technologies, including our search robots. In particular, Gavin programs in the D language to develop what we call our “dive” library, which harvests all the data we collect from the net.

Originally hailing from Sussex, UK (where he mostly lived in the town of Brighton), Gavin comes to us with many years of experience in programming. Prior to working for sociomantic, Gavin received his Master’s degree in computer science from University in Essex (where he earlier received his Bachelor of Science degree in computer science & artificial intelligence). For his Master’s thesis, Gavin created a generative rhythm synthesizer for creating beats in the style of Autechre & Aphex Twin. “It worked with a genetic algorithm to create random beats using granular synthesis, which the human user could then selectively breed to hone,” explains Gavin. (Check out one of his later musical productions below)

In the past, he’s worked for six years as a C++ programmer in the games industry, making Xbox, Windows & Playstation2 games. Since moving to Berlin in July 2009 to be with his girlfriend, he’s worked with KS12 Creative Studio on the project postcardsfromberlin.com, working on extensive customization of the Wordpress engine in php & jquery.

But now, he’s ours. “I’m excited to be working on the cutting edge of new web technology,” says Gavin of his new position at the labs.

The Fun Facts

Outside of the labs, Gavin likes to be… well, outside: hiking, picnicking, lake swimming – you name it. He’s a nature guy — passionate about environmental issues, buying organic (in Germany it’s called “bio”), and permaculture. When it comes to music, his listening tastes fall into the categories of “experimental and unusual,” with favourites running the avant-garde gamut: Current 93, David Bowie, Lustmord, Aphex Twin, Zoviet*France, Fennesz, Biosphere, and his old fave, Kate Bush. As you can hear above, he even makes some music, too (although we don’t foresee “abstract dronescapes” having much commercial potential anytime soon).

When it comes to movies, David Lynch is his man. Though Gavin is certainly a fan of Lynch’s films, his true fanhood falls behind the director’s acclaimed 1990s television series Twin Peaks, which Gavin says to be “without a doubt, my favorite TV or film ever.” (He so loves it, in fact, that once he and his girlfriend were inspired to learn how to make plum pie in homage to Twin Peak’s “Double R Diner,” which was known in the series for its delicious pies).

Amidst his love for nature and culture, at the end of a long day of programming, you might find Gavin playing RPGs – but not the online ones. He only plays the “old school ones with pencils, paper, odd dice and weird imagined stories.” He’s currently running a game using the Savage Worlds rules system.

Welcome to the team, Gavin!