Big changes at Redfin

We did it! My team (I’m the product manager of Redfin’s Map Team) just launched a new version of the Redfin site. You can read more about the features of the release in my post on the Redfin Blog, Twice the size, Virtual Earth and Meebo. The funny thing is that in the Pacific Northwest you cannot escape Microsoft and so while I may have quit Microsoft I’m now very dependent on Microsoft technology as our new map is built using Microsoft’s Virtual Earth.

This of course has been a lot of work because needless to say, if your core business is mapping real estate listings and you switch out your map, it is going to be an epic endeavor. I likely worked about 145 hours already this new year to get us ready for release last night (24 hours ahead of schedule!) and I wasn’t even responsible for writing a single line of code. So, a big thanks to my team for kicking ass. I have never worked with people with such a huge amount of commitment and dedication to perfection. Jane, Jeff, Michael and Sasha thank you. We also had two new testers start in the last two weeks and it feels like they’ve been with us for months. Llewellyn and Mose, you’re part of the Redfin trial by fire family now :) .

Hopefully we can all take a few days off and recover (before we release a dot release to fix all the bugs we triaged out to make the date as well as the new ones you find and e-mail me about.) I for one, have no idea what I’m going to do with myself, though I know the first thing I have to do is sleep. We pushed the button on the release last night but I still can’t sleep! And of course, I’ve found out that a release isn’t really done until the blog posts are up and the press embargo has been lifted. The next thing I’ll do is take care of the birthday present and Christmas present I still owe a friend and then laundry.

For more details on work related stuff I’ll likely be updating my real estate blog much more regularly now realestate.mattgoyer.com.