The Code Mafia and getting excited about the silicon
Can you tell us who The Code Mafia are and what their role in GITG is?
[Richard]: The Code Mafia is a small focussed company that provides a service to ATI here in Europe. Three of the four members of the European developer relations group are actually Code Mafia staff. We work for ATI every day of every week, and we are every bit as loyal to ATI as their staff. In fact ATI keep asking us to become full time staff - which says that the relationship is a great one. I quite like being a contractor rather than a member of staff, mainly because it keeps me focussed on delivering things to ATI that make ATI think, "Wow, this guy is worth every penny".
In my past employment I've seen too many members of staff at companies get a little lazy after they've been there for a while and they start to think in terms of what the company owes them and how nice it is that their holiday entitlement goes up every now and then. I don't want my work ever to become like that.
I actually like that fact that my job security is based on whether I give my employer exactly what they want and need. That keeps me motivated and productive. And, as a side effect, I don't think I've ever enjoyed my work as much as these last two years with ATI.
In terms of our roles in GITG, there's no difference between us and any other member of ATI's developer support group. We have the same aims and work to define the same objectives, and we use our experience to make sure that ATI succeeds with games developers.
So I guess you must be Code Mafia staff :) Is Code Mafia your baby?
[Richard]: I am strictly speaking Code Mafia staff on long term contract to ATI. As a general rule I describe myself as "ATI" when I represent ATI. I have an ATI email address and access to ATI's internal network etc. For all practical purposes, people who meet me can think of me as ATI staff.
Yes, I am a founder of The Code Mafia. I am also the president and CEO.
It's very important to me that the contract with ATI is almost identical to being on payroll. We have no fixed term, no date on which ATI comes to us and says, "Shall we renew?". Instead, like most people's employment contracts we remain on staff until either we or ATI decide that should change.
I remember seeing you talk at NVIDIA's The Gathering a few years ago, as part of the GeForce 3's launch, and you were very enthusiastic when talking about the hardware. Do you still enjoy that part of the GITG process, speaking to the guys that make the games and getting them excited about using your hardware?
[Richard]: I really enjoy the fact that I get to explain this cool new technology to games developers, and because the technology is constantly evolving, I always have new hardware to evangelise and new things to learn.
I'm one of those rare people who actually really like getting on stage and giving talks in public. Most people are much more sane and avoid it whenever they can!
But for me it's a chance to share valuable information, to enthuse some of the brightest people in the world, and a chance to understand the problems that they face. Because I understand the problems faced by developers I can make sure that ATI doesn't handle things in a way that is counter-productive for them.
For example this year we've introduced the X800 series of VPUs. They're specifically designed and tuned to make sure that standard games writing practices are going to give a great experience. Developers don't need to go away and learn complex new algorithms, and they don't have to work with hardware which is quirky and difficult to get good performance from. In that sense the X800 is the perfect chip for the coming year - it's easy to program for, astonishingly fast and delivers fantastic quality.
