034: Interview with Jason Snell

Jason Snell was lead editor at Macworld for a decade, and recently left that job to start Six Colors, an independent web site about Apple and other technology companies. He's also the host of numerous podcasts on the Relay FM network as well as his own The Incomparable network.

He left his company to take on a new challenge because he didn’t like his previous job, it was too much management and not enough creativity. Plus, the company was showing signs of sliding downhill. Jason and his former employer parted ways mutually right around the time that the company was going through layoffs.

Luckily, Jason was planning ahead and was actively setting up the foundation of his entrepreneurial path.

Jason has a great office set up in his garage and has worked with his family to create separation.

Jason feels close to being in his Utopia. With his Utopia, he’s not looking for complete security but more challenges, freedom to make creative decisions, and a focus on content and web publishing. He also likes putting the decisions on his shoulders and then not having barriers to having decisions implemented, unlike corporate settings. This is why he loves what he's doing with Six Colors.

He has never had much of a work-life balance, whether it was in his previous media position or his current company. The challenge has been being aware of a dividing line of respect with time for work and time for family. It has been an on-going challenge for him.. sound familiar?

Jason's 3 Value Bombs:

• Be open to new things
• Nobody is better than you and nobody is worse than you
• Find the things that you love and try to integrate them into what you do as much as possible
• BONUS Love your parents, pay off your student loans

You can find Jason at The Incomparable, at Six Colors, Relay.fm, and on Twitter.

As always, a special thank you to The Strand for our intro and outro music!