Phil Crumm

Who I Am

I’ve always been fascinated with how things work. I was the child who knew only one word–“Why?”–and the student that was never satisfied until he knew the principles behind the concepts. For years, I’ve been entranced by taking things apart, putting them back together, and understanding how they work.

At the age of 10, this fascination led me to computers. My father intro ducted me to the concept of computer programming; he gave me a book on C++ and wrote a few sample programs out of it to spark my interest. At the time, I didn’t do much with it: it all seemed so foreign and complicated. I was just a kid–what was I going to do with this?

Shortly there after, I was introduced to Abyss Web Server as a way to setup my own personal homepage for my Playstation Portable. After setting up my own web server, I began to play around with developing my own webpages. I first created my own personal homepage with nothing on it; it was a simple experiment in HTML.

At that point, I decided I wanted to create a tutorials website. So I set to work, learning about PHP and MySQL, and before long I had created a (very insecure) website that allowed myself and other users to submit their own PHP and Photoshop tutorials.

I then opted to add a forum to my website. I found phpBB, and installed it. I began to answer support topics on phpBB’s forum shortly thereafter, and continued this hobby for the next few years.

As time went on, I continued developing numerous personal projects in order to hone my skills. I made a MySpace ripoff (lovingly named Astrospaces), more tutorials sites, an Abyss hosting control panel, and more. These were all, to be frank, crap, but I learned a lot.

After several years answering support topics on phpBB.com for several years, I was invited to join phpBB’s Support Team. As a Support Team Member, I developed several internal tools for phpBB, and released a few phpBB Modifications. This is where my freelance career started. Since then, I’ve been hired by dozens of independent forum owners to maintain their forums, write custom code, tweak their designs, and help them solve their problems.

In 2011, I transferred to phpBB’s Website Team. There, I was responsible for maintaining phpBB’s current website and developing the future iteration of the website.

Where I’m At Now

I’m now an undergraduate Computer Science & Engineering Student at the University of California, Los Angeles. In my free time, I maintain the server deployment for Wolfire, and write PHP for MacGameStore.

In July 2012, I started as a Happiness Engineer for Automattic, the creators of WordPress.com. I’m excited to begin this new chapter of myself. Automattic is filled with wonderful and brilliant people, and it’s my honor to work with them.