Technical Definitions: A conversation with Wordnik’s founder Erin McKean

Published: May 28, 2019, 4:30 a.m.

Improworsement: is an improvement that makes things worse, and Erin McKean knows all about that. She's wanted to create dictionaries since the age of eight and this year she is celebrating the 10th anniversary of Wordnik, an online dictionary she helped create that has grown to 10 times the size of the Oxford English Dictionary. This week Paul and Rich sit down with Erin to discuss the evolution of Wordnik, from its humble beginnings in PHP to developing a full scalable API. Erin shares the challenges she’s faced, both technical and financial, and gives us tips on how to deal with failure. She also helps us expand our vocabulary and answers the difficult question: what is the best word?

 

Links:

Wordnik

TED Talk - Erin McKean: Go ahead, make up new words!

Wordnik on Twitter