Re/code Writers Share Their New Year's Re/solutions

The calendar has been changed, the confetti has been mostly cleaned up and the hangover is starting to subside. Ready or not, 2015 is here.

As Re/code enters its second year, I asked our staff for their New Year’s resolutions, which I called “re/solutions” because I’m insufferable like that. (Not changing, deal with it.) Here’s what’s on their minds:

Nellie Bowles

Associate Editor, Tech Culture

Karen Roach / Shutterstock

Eric, I can’t tell if this little New Years piece of yours is serious or a joke and so I will be serious, as is my wont. My resolutions: Stop Tindering as a pastime. Achieve inbox zero every Sunday night for sense of well-being. Write about tech culture outside of downtown San Francisco walking distance, despite how much I like walking to interviews and fear Palo Alto. Actually use the apps that are most popular in the App Store as immersion anthropology. Only text and drive at red lights, no exceptions.

Ina Fried

Senior Editor, Mobile

Well, since I already am close to fulfilling last year’s resolution — topping 100,000 unread emails — I’m clearly already pretty organized. That said, I wouldn’t mind if my hundreds of thousands of photos weren’t in the digital equivalent of a shoebox. I’ve started to be better about backing them up to multiple locations, but that isn’t the same as making them easy to find with tags or keywords or whatever.

If you have tips, please email me. I probably won’t read it, but it could help me reach last year’s goal.

Lauren Goode

Senior Reviewer

I resolve to take vacations that are completely tech-free, with the exception of my mobile phone (maps, selfies), DSLR (non-selfie pics), laptop (in case I need to write a story), Kindle (great for long flights!) and activity-tracking watch (for those long walks on the beach). Aside from those few items, my time off will be completely gadget-and-distraction free, and — hold on, Eric, I need to answer this IM. More later.

Eric Johnson

Associate Editor, Gaming

My resolution is to play more, and with a more open mind. Last year, Gamergate laid bare the ugliest facets of videogame culture: Players who can’t deal with criticism, and cowardly game companies that won’t directly address issues of gender in their products and fandoms. I want no part of any of that. Rather than disclaiming responsibility for that culture, I’m going to try to be part of the solution, playing a greater variety of games than I otherwise might, and thinking about those games more critically.

Also, I resolve to eventually change my byline picture and all my social media profile pictures to reflect my now month-old lack of beard. It might take me a month or three to get around to that.

Peter Kafka

Senior Editor, Media

David Becker / Getty Images

My resolution is better than your resolution, because I’m going to keep it: I’m going to CES next week, and I’m not going to gripe about it once. Not on Twitter, at least. If you like people — and you like the fact that you have a job whose main requirement is that you meet people and talk to them and then tell other people what you’ve heard — then CES is pretty great!

I do acknowledge that CES is very, very bad for some people. Particularly the ones who have to do things like stand in booths and deal with masses of unpleasant people. Or even worse: Stand in booths and deal with no one. Ugh. But those aren’t the people you usually hear complaining about CES, especially on Twitter. And you know who the Twitter complainers are.

So there you go. Enjoy Positive Peter, Coming to You Live From Las Vegas next week. We’ll return to our regularly scheduled programming starting January 9.

Noah Kulwin

Editorial Project Manager

bibiphoto/Shutterstock

My New Year’s resolution is to spread the gospel of password and credit card info managers. 2013 and 2014 were banner years for personal data theft, with major security screw-ups at places like Target, Home Depot and Chick-fil-A. That’s why I advocate using tools like 1Password or Dashlane. These services can generate secure passwords, keep track of them for you and heavily encrypt them. It might seem like a pain at first, but once you get it set up, I promise you’ll never look back.

Kenneth Li

Editor-in-Chief

Kenneth Li

Since joining Re/code in January, I’ve been the butt of jokes for using something other than an iPhone. I even held court at a Code/Mobile luncheon, where not one person, not even the former Google employees, used anything other than an iPhone. The theme at my table: “Android Support Group.” I finally gave in to pressure when Apple released its latest batch of phones. In 2015, my resolution is to once again spend more time using something other than an iPhone. I may very well be the other weirdo in New York with a Windows OS phone.

Also, I will try not to hire any more employees whose name rhymes with mine.

John Paczkowski

Deputy Managing Editor, Events, Video and Special Projects

Resolution: Find a phrase other than “dilapidated smartphone pioneer” with which to diplomatically disparage BlackBerry — like doddering mobile device buffoon.

Kara Swisher

Co-CEO, Co-Executive Editor

I am resolved to do more of what made me successful in the first place: Scooping tech news. It would be nice, since this first year of Re/code has been less about that than other things that have become much more critical. What’s clear about doing a startup is that it is both challenging in the best of ways and exhausting in the worst of them.

I spend a lot of time on what I like to call “Bidnizz thingies.” That can mean everything from recruiting talent to working with the ad sales people on creative ideas to trying to figure out our SEO strategy to making sure the snacks and drinks for our staff are tasty. Being CEO is like being pecked to death all day long, but in the most bracing way possible. After 365 days, I think I would not have had it any other way. That said: Back to trolling the heating ducts of Yahoo — and keeping my eye on everyone else in Silicon Valley — in 2015.

Walt Mossberg

Co-CEO, Co-Executive Editor

My resolution: To limit myself to one Starbucks Trenta decaf sugar-free iced coffee a day.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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