Pictured: Detail of a mural inside the VeganCafe313 Psychedelic Healing Shack in Detroit
HI , my name’s Dave Rotter – My story isn’t remarkable, but it is unique, and it’s all mine. I’ve been putting words and pictures on pages for decades, FOR FOUR decades.
’77 – Apple II
’88 – Illustrator in a silk screen shop
’90s – HTML CSS sites and seo
2000s – Ecommerce, learned about blogging
2010s – WordPress class taught by LeAnne and Laura of ElleEll co, and Girl Develop It – built and sold my first WordPress site – it is still up!
2016 – Grand Circus Front End BootCamp
2017 – Attendee my 1st WordCamp Ann Arbor
2018 – Volunteer WordCamp Detroit
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Long version –
1977 – My brother got a Radio Shack TRS80 computer. After a month he returned it for an Apple II.. Mostly we just played video games on it, but I did learn to do a little basic programming: if , then , goto, and I even built my own “space invaders” style game. I‘ve been lucky enough to witness first hand, the evolution of Apple (and PC) products since then. I used the first mouse on the Lisa in 1984, I used Illustrator in 88, and Photoshop 1, Macromedia Freehand, QuarkXPress, Aldus Pagemager, Adobe InDesign and more programs than i care to remember. We called them Application Programs back then, now we call them Apps. Desktop Publishing led me to web design. I used Front Page, Dreamweaver.
1988 – I worked in a silk screen shop, and built the screens, and created the films for the screens with a vertical stat camera. I worked in print shops doing Pre-Press production, and outputting films, for strippers.
1995 – Then I moved upstream working at Ad Agencies, and eventually as an in house agency for B2B and B2C companies.
2000 – I was doing basic SEO and Ecommerce, but still kicking around print shops, I just couldn’t escape… There were still “files to fix” before they could go to a press. Adobe Acrobat, and pdfs pretty much put the whole “Pre-Press Production” thing obsolete.
2008 – I was aware of WordPress as a blogging tool. We had to hire someone to build our blog. At this point I realized that I should probably learn WordPress.
2014 – I realized that it was time to learn WordPress to build dynamic websites. Static html looks bad on a phone, and google began rewarding the dynamic sites with better SEO.
I googled “how to learn WordPress” , I found ‘Girl Develop It’, and I took a beginner wordpress class. Bam! I made and sold my first WordPress site. It is still live.
I joined the Metro Detroit WordPresss MeetUp group.
2016 I did the JavaScript Front End BootCamp at Grand Circus
2017 – WordCamp Ann Arbor – and At that wordcamp , it really clicked , I decided right then and there that I did want to be a part of the wordpress community , and that I did want to volunteer – and take it up a notch – listening to Speakers like John Jay Jacoby (the guy who made BuddyPress) speak about our responsibility – and listening Organizers like Kyle Maurer – really had a positive effect on me. The9ir stories are inspirational.
This is Open Source. We have an opportunity to learn from each other.