Six years ago I released a publishing system called pMachine, the predecessor to ExpressionEngine. In the very early days the company consisted of me alone; I wrote the code, provided tech support, and answered sales questions. My user base was so small initially that I could count them on a hand or two.
One benefit of having few customers was that I was able to develop relationships, close ones even, with many of my users. One of those users was G.K. Nelson, a brilliantly creative writer and web publisher who pushed pMachine to the limit and was influential in its early development.
For about two years G.K. and I exchanged frequent emails, and although we tended to butt heads politically, I admired his passion, intellect, and elegantly unconventional approach to the web. It was G.K., in fact, who helped me develop the typographic rules which became the basis of pMachine’s Auto-typography feature, now used by ExpressionEngine. His input helped shape more then a few of pMachine’s early features.
G.K., as is not uncommon of creative types, is restless by nature. His various sites have gone through endless design permutations since the mid 90’s, and along the way he has used many different publishing systems. I lost contact with G.K. several years ago; I assumed his creative impulses took him elsewhere.
About a week ago I heard from G.K again. He’s been away from the web for a while, but with renewed enthusiasm has recently launched a new site in which he recounts his rediscovery of ExpressionEngine. Welcome back, G.K.!
