Erik Hanberg

Erik Hanberg

On November 9^th of 2015 our Information Technology class had the privilege of guest speaker Erik Hanberg. Erik was born and raised in Tacoma, he attended Bellarmine Prep high school and then he proceeded into his collegiate career at Carleton College in Northfield Minnesota where he graduated with a degree in English.

Erik is an elected official of Tacoma Washington, web developer, and an accomplished publisher and author. He is also the former Managing Director of the Grand Cinema and founder of the The Horatio Theater project.

During his visit Erik spoke on numerous topics on of topics was about the pros and cons of working online. It seems like the risk of working online definitely is worth the reward. For instance, he drew a graph on the board and I noticed that the potential of making a robust income is very feasible.

He spoke of when working online there is “no physical labor” however, this working online can lead to some people becoming lethargic, so he stressed the fact that it is imperative that you love what you do for a living. Another aspect that Erik mentioned about working online is that some of the things that you say may be taken out of context and him especially as an elected official he has to watch what he says. I like the quote that he used about working online “The amount of privacy you have right now might be the most privacy that you will ever have”. This is true and very disturbing in my opinion. Furthermore, he explained how 90% of your waking day is spent looking at rectangles. That is comical it seems like I am at about 60% already.

Overall I enjoyed our guest speaker. I have found that college has numerous avenues for education and this was a good example of that. The aspects of self-publication of writing materials, web development, and entrepreneurship are just a few prosperous attributes that you can pick up on while in college.