Andrew C. Stone

Andrew Stone (born Cincinnati, Ohio in 1956) is an American computer programmer who is best known for his iOS app Twittelator, which to date has sold over a million units for the iPhone and the iPad. The founder, director, and principle programmer for Stone Design Corporation, Stone lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico with his wife Katie Stone. Together, they have four children. In his 20 plus year career as a programmer, he has written software for Hypercard, the NeXT workstation, the Mac OS X, and currently for the iOS mobile development platform for iPhones and iPads.

Hypercard
Originally from Cincinnati, Ohio, Stone moved to New Mexico in 1974 to pursue a degree in Architecture and Urban Planning from the University of New Mexico, with an emphasis on solar adobe architecture, sustainable agriculture and organic farming.

He began using a TRS-80 computer in 1980 for heat loss calculations for his homes, but in 1985 discovered the Macintosh and began to learn how to program for Hypercard. Within two years he was writing in HyperTalk and returned to school for a Master’s degree in Computer Science. He was a contributing author to the Waite Group’s Tricks of the HyperTalk Masters

He developed software for Sandia National Laboratory called ProtoTimer which allowed physical interfaces to be trial tested in a software version.

NeXT
Fascinated by Steve Jobs’ vision for the personal computer, Stone moved towards programming for the NeXT before he finished graduate school and in October 1989 became one of the first independent developers for the NeXT Computer to ship a shrink-wrap product. TextArt allowed designers to manipulate PostScript text with virtual knobs, dials and sliders. By 1990, TextArt had evolved into Create, a drawing program which shipped in 1991. At the same time, Stone Design developed a multimedia database manager called DataPhile.

Besides Stone's notoriety in the NeXT World as the first independent software developer to ship shrinkwrap product for the NeXT Computer, were the legendary raves he and John Perry Barlow threw over 3 years, the first being held at the Exploratorium in October 1992. These parties are still being discussed today because of the mixing of LSD and the NSA together in the same space.

Stone's participation with the first government sanctioned Dimethyltryptamine research with Dr. Rick Strassman in Albuquerque in the early '90's led to a collaboration in the underwriting of DMT: The Spirit Molecule: A Doctor's Revolutionary Research into the Biology of Near-Death and Mystical Experiences, documenting the research. Andrew Stone was a featured DMT volunteer in the documentary film DMT - The Spirit Molecule. Andrew Stone serves on the board of the Cottonwood Research Foundation with Dr. Strassman, which provides scientific research into the nature of consciousness.

Between that time and Apple’s purchase of the NeXT Corporation in December 1996, Stone Design developed a number of other products for the NeXT, including 3DReality, a 3D modeling and rendering package and CheckSum, a personal finance application.

Macintosh OS X
When NeXT became part of Apple on December 20th, 1996, Andrew Stone was asked to help introduce NeXTStep to Mac users and developers. He demoed Create in the keynote presentations at both MacWorld Boston and WWDC in 1997. He was a contributing editor for Mactech for several years Arise Aqua!.

Stone Design began to develop for the pre-OS X Macintosh, turning out a healthy number of products for a small independent company, including PhotoToWeb, a slideshow & photo application for the Web; SliceAndDice, a tool for making javascript navigation bars; PStill, a conversion utility for turning Post Script and EPS files into .PDF files; TimeEqualsMoney, a time/expense tracking and invoicing applcication; PackUpAndGo, a cross-platofrm archiving tool; and GIFfun for making animated .gif files. All of these applications were eventually bundled together as Stone Studio, but the company continued to develop software, 16 applications in all, which eventually found their way into a single package called Stone Works, which included all the titles above plus eight additional applications including: FontSight, GlobalWarmth, iMaginator, Stone Studio widget, PreferenceCommander, VideationNation, StarMores, and Xaos – Videator Enabled.

iPhone & iPad
In 2008, Stone began to release apps for the iPhone. His first product, Twittelator, became one of the best selling apps for the micro-blogging service Twitter. Other products included iGraffiti, TalkingPics, Gesture, MobileMix, Soundbite, Pulsar,iCreated, TweetTV and Intentionizer.

When he’s not programming, Stone spends his time on his organic garden, doing yoga and riding his bicycle. He’s written an extensive number of articles on programming with the Cocoa code base and until recently was on the board of his local food cooperative. He also spearheads a group called “the Cocoa Conspiracy,” a loose knit ad hoc professional organization for iOS app developers based in New Mexico.

Interviews with the Press

 * Erik Davis Interviews Andrew Stone on Expanding Mind http://prn.fm/2012/08/23/expanding-mind-cyberdelic-continuum-082312/#axzz24w8H1CHu
 * Mac Observer Interviews Andrew Stone http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/andrew_stone_app_developers_obi_wan/
 * Wired UK Interviews Andrew Stone http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2011-03/14/twitter-on-third-party-clients
 * Business Week article features Andrew Stone http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_25/b4233039336374.htm
 * Software Design Magazine Interviews Andrew Stone http://gihyo.jp/dev/serial/01/software_designers/0007
 * arsTechnica Video + Transcript Interview with Andrew Stone http://arstechnica.com/apple/2007/06/ars-at-wwdc-video-interview-with-andrew-stone-of-stone-design/
 * MacVoices audio Interview with Andrew Stone http://www.macvoices.com/wordpress/macvoices-981-andrew-stone-of-stone-design-on-the-power-of-twittelator-pro-and-more/
 * TUAW Video Interview with Andrew Stone http://www.tuaw.com/2009/06/13/wwdc-live-andrew-stone-twittelator-pro/
 * AppCraver Interviews Andrew Stone http://www.appcraver.com/interview-with-andrew-stone-of-bigstonephone/
 * macNN reviews Videator http://arstechnica.com/apple/2007/06/ars-at-wwdc-video-interview-with-andrew-stone-of-stone-design/