Chris Salmon Technologies

I need to remake a formal resume - I haven't really needed one in while.  Until I put a briefer, more formal resume together, this is a (rather informal) narrative of my career thus far.  First the very informal, and less detailed version:

"Brief," informal career narrative:

I'm just a humble oil-patch geologist, not any kind of star in the science world or anything. I was a bit of a kid prodigy in computers in the late 70's and got my first job as a programmer in 78 when I was 16, and entered college a year early as a Computer Science major.  I spent most of the 80's either in college both taking and teaching (taught 7 yrs. of geology labs up to senior level), or pursuing adventures like working at a ski resort, bicycling across the Southwest and playing guitar in rock and jazz bands (and doing a LOT of partying and girl-chasing!). End of 80's/early 90's I redeveloped some old oil leases basically abandoned by Texaco - I still get checks from that. I then did some work for a seismic exploration company and an environmental/water-quality company and took about 18 hours of grad school. I have another education and background in computers and so when oil was crashed I got back into that, first as a techie-consultant for hire, then I started one of the first internet-based companies in Texas in 1995 and took that profession as far as I could, starting with 8 modems and one server and eventually having about 10,000 user accounts across 5 states and 13 employees, plus being paid on retainer as a consultant to larger companies. Then the telecom crash came in 2003, my biggest business partner and consulting contract filed bankruptcy, I had to let most everyone go and we shrank down and entered a long, slow 7 year decline. On that downslope I did contract Internet Protocol engineering for major accounts (like GM) of AT&T's global network, and moved to Vail, CO from Dallas.  When SBC bought AT&T I refused to work for SBC, dumped the engineering contract, and traveled the country developing 52 travel and resort websites where we sold hotels, advertising, etc. Then Google changed a bunch of their algorithms and rules for websites a couple of times and I decided I didn't want to spend my life making Google happy, so I retired from the whole internet business in January of this year.  Two years ago I tried to develop a Wind Farm project in N. Texas, and started working with a young wind engineer, but there were a lot of roadblocks to making that work and for now, it doesn't appear economically viable - largely due to combating weekend "ranchette" owners who didn't want to see windmills, and connection transmission costs levied by an incumbent that has a regional monopoly, I might add.  I was supposed to come in and find acquisition targets, production and reserves to purchase for myself, my Dad and a partner of his, but then the price went back up to over $100 and so for now (mid-2011) nobody wants to sell for any reasonable price and I'm just kind of stuck now, in a kind of semi-retirement limbo, playing with a lot of GIS and computer mapping/modeling stuff, re-developing a geological reputation and contacts, writing for my website, trying to contribute and educate through articles, discussion groups, etc.  This summer of 2011 my currently upcoming project is to travel to Texas for several months, and map and model the petroleum infrastructure and subsurface of two Texas counties, including some field work, and if I get time I have an area in Oklahoma I want to do.  I still do web and internet work for myself and for friends and non-profits I like.

Now if that wasn't wordy enough for you, here's the long form with details of technologies I've worked with and etc:

- I'm a computer expert that got my first programming job in 1978 when I was 16, for the trust departments of banks.
- I built my own computers in the late 70's before you could buy a computer for personal use, before Apple or the IBM PC. Literally built them with a soldering iron, using an 8-bit Zilog Z-80 CPU in one and then the intel 8080 in another. These computers used cassette tape recorders, and then dual floppy disks for permanent storage, and had, as I recall, the full 640k of RAM. I wrote programs on them in BASIC and assembly language.
- I grew up on a cattle ranch and worked in the oil field since I was 13 years old. I'm an experienced outdoorsman and very comfortable being in the field or on the wellsite for extended periods.
- I also won a state medal in ready-writing (extemporaneous writing) during that time, unusual because we were one of the smallest schools in our division in the State of Texas. I enjoy writing.
- When I was in high school, it was a hot time for solar energy in all the pop science magazines and etc.  So, I designed a passive heating solar energy panel for my FFA project, using mostly recycled materials, like discarded, randomly crushed aluminum cans painted flat black, for instance.  I then started a small business selling these and installed them on a few barns, before the price of oil then crashed and people lost interest in solar energy.
- Then I was educated as both a computer scientist and a geologist and I taught university geology laboratory courses, up to senior level, for 6 years total (before and after I took a break to work at Vail)- in between I decided to have an adventure and worked 1985 to 1986 at the Vail, Colorado ski resort, for Vail Associates (G. Gillette) as a warehouseman at the Mid-Vail on-mountain lodge and restaurant. Then I left resort work to finish school.
- After I graduated with a dual major in Geology and Comp. Sci, I worked as an environmental (water quality) geologist, a petroleum geologist, and a geophysicist working with seismic data on supercomputers for Western Geophysical in Houston, Texas. 

- I am a 28 year member of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, and a Charter Member of the Division of Environmental Geosciences, where I have also been a member for 17 years.
- I've also been a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science since 1983.
- I returned to graduate school for 18 semester hours at University of Houston and was in both the Geology and the Computer Science post baccalaureate programs, but it was not paying my bills so I exited without a Master's in either subject. I made A's in every class except one while in grad school for computers and geology. 
- I then went back to work as a petroleum geologist, doing computer models of the subsurface, and also started a computer consulting company on the side, doing LAN's and computer work for small to medium sized firms.
- during this time I wrote programs to normalize and uniformly sample well data digitized from paper logs, where the logs were often only digitized at inflection points; to analyze and provide economic valuation of petroleum properties; and to do trend-surface analysis of sedimentary sections taken from well logs across a region.
- I'm an internet pioneer that started the first internet business (Cyberstation, Inc.) in N. Central Texas (Wichita Falls) in 1994/1995 and I still own and operate that company. I grew that company from just me, to 8 modems and one server, to over 10,000 user accounts and 12 full time employees and revenues of $83,000 per month average for 2002. I became an excellent salesperson during that time, a good boss and executive, and made all the decisions for the company in addition to doing most of the engineering work.
- I was awarded "Texoma's Best Internet Provider" by the readers of the Wichita Falls Times/Record News in 1998, and 2001.
- During this period of time I was on retainer as a consultant to several new internet companies, including primarily IP Communications which was funded by GE for $500 million initially. I designed and built the ISP portion of their service, in addition to being a wholesale transport customer through Cyberstation.
- I also acted as a consulting engineer and vendor for Colleges, Law Enforcement, Banks, Oil Companies, TV Stations, Real Estate firms, Law firms, and many others during this time. My team and I also did websites for all of these businesses and entities.  
- I designed and built many multi-location business networks for customers during this time, connecting organizations with their remote offices, often in many different towns, together into business-wide networks using internet protocol technology and VPN technology. My work gave customers huge improvements in efficiencies and cost savings.
- I sold many, many complicated network and computer proposals during this time and learned all the business end of things, in addition to filling out and further developing my technical skills.
- I was featured as a guest expert on television and radio at this time and interviewed for national publications.
- IP Communications filed bankruptcy and liquidated in 2003 and we lost all the customers, covering 5 states, that we had with them. I also lost my consulting contract with them. I then left Dallas and traveled the USA to work computer contracts and build up content for websites.
- I then attained a contract out of NYC to do internet protocol engineering worldwide for AT&T, and part of the deal was I could be anywhere as long as I could get on the net and reach their private network, so I moved back to Vail in Oct., 2004.
- ATT was purchased in 2006 by SWBell which was an old enemy of mine, basically they are the reason IP Comm went under, so I refused to work for them and dumped the contract.
- I then spent several years developing 52 different travel and resort websites, and making deals with travel product aggregators like Travelocity, hotel booking systems like Interactive Hotel Systems, and advertising deals with Google, Microsoft and Yahoo. In addition I did most of the photography and video for the sites, and wrote most of the copy.
- During this period I further developed my understanding of Search Engines, SEO/SEM, Pay-per-click advertising strategies, and the technologies and strategies of developing web traffic in general.
- my websites attained traffic of approx. 180,000 visitors per month by Feb. of 2007, and we were bringing in revenues of $23,000 per month from hotel and advertising sales by that time.
- that business proved a bit unstable, and dependent on the whims of Google, so I don't emphasize it as much now, even though we still sell advertising and hotel rooms through the sites developed.
- I have been selling, building, and servicing computers and networks for very close to 20 years, (post-college, not counting my youthful pre-college work) I have wholesale accounts and I am a Cisco Partner since 1996, and former IBM partner (a status I could attain again, if needed).
- I have many industry contracts and I can get whatever hardware, software, or talent I need to solve a customer's problems and improve the IT side of their business.
- I've taken many hours of industry training from Cisco, Microsoft and others. However I believe my ability to think on my feet, my deep understanding of computer technology, networks, servers and services, and the internet, and my creativity has been more important to me and my customers.
- I currently maintain a rack of high-end Ubuntu Linux servers in a Houston, Texas datacenter with multiple fiber connections to various backbones. My customers have access to this considerable resource as needed, for web and email hosting, file storage, backups, whatever we need.
- I own my own servers, and my own IP numbers of two class C networks, my own routers, switches and firewalls. I'm in total control of the network resources my customers need and use, and do not have to ask any outside or third party vendor or hosting company to do anything I need to do.
- I can also offer space in my rack for your own internet server if you need it.
- I have some oil producing leases in Texas from my days as a petroleum geologist, and after 15 years in the internet business, starting January 1 of 2011, I'm no longer drawing salary from internet businesses and consider myself full time back in the oil business.  Cyberstation, Inc., still exists, mainly as a platform for whatever computer consulting I do.  
- I'm versatile and business minded, and perform very well as a business, computer or geological consultant, a network engineer/designer, a wellsite geologist, a geological computer modeler, a web developer, or anything related to my past activities.
- I have a professional appearance and demeanor, I'm well spoken and personable, have a good business wardrobe, and I do very well in technical sales.
- I am not looking for a full time job, but prefer short term contracts; however I would take a contract up to 3 years in length if it was a really good opportunity and provided time with my wife and young son.
- I generally charge $100 per hour for any work I do, however I would consider lowering that if a company or individual were to pre-pay me for a good-sized block of work, say 50 hours or so prepaid I would do for $80/hr.
- I do not like to go below $75/hr but I'm willing to listen to any proposal, and look at any deal.

- I also accept and look at business proposals, partnership proposals, website proposals, drilling/lease proposals, projects, teams, etc.,

- I will read anything you send me and reply personally.