Tom’s frontrunner story

Building a community through enthusiasm for the sound and feel of mechanical keyboards.

It all started with a fellow student raving to Tom about what a huge difference a mechanical keyboard makes in daily work. Tom began wondering why we spend so little money on a keyboard, the tool of our time, that we use 8 hours a day. As a result, Tom purchased his first mechanical keyboard in 2014 and has been a big fan ever since. Typing and working with it is just so much more fun than with a cheap keyboard. Newbies are often initially intrigued by the look and sound of keyboards. An innocuous Google search can be the first step down the mechanical keyboards’ rabbit hole. Once there, a world of possibilities, a Reddit thread with more than 1 million subscribers and a history of design and engineering opens up. On top of that comes the variance of weirdly satisfying typing sounds and feels.

Tom’s frontrunner story

Building a community through enthusiasm for the sound and feel of mechanical keyboards.

It all started with a fellow student raving to Tom about what a huge difference a mechanical keyboard makes in daily work. Tom began wondering why we spend so little money on a keyboard, the tool of our time, that we use 8 hours a day. As a result, Tom purchased his first mechanical keyboard in 2014 and has been a big fan ever since. Typing and working with it is just so much more fun than with a cheap keyboard. Newbies are often initially intrigued by the look and sound of keyboards. An innocuous Google search can be the first step down the mechanical keyboards’ rabbit hole. Once there, a world of possibilities, a Reddit thread with more than 1 million subscribers and a history of design and engineering opens up. On top of that comes the variance of weirdly satisfying typing sounds and feels.

To give his passion a home at Alasco, Tom created the Slack channel #keebs and in doing so provides a platform for exchange among mechanical keys enthusiastic Alascians. It’s a movement that has swept others along. In #keebs, a small community has emerged, sharing their latest achievements, as well as tips and tricks, and Tom has already inspired other Alascians to get their first mechanical keyboard. For him, his keyboard is an essential part of his desk setup, and investing time and money in the tools he works with every day is a way for him to show appreciation for his work and his achievements.

As Alasco’s very first employee, Tom has been shaping and sustaining the company’s culture driven by the values of Trust, Ambition, Appreciation, and Positivity. As a Software Engineer, besides the daily programming, Tom also recruits new engineers and thinks strategically about how our backend should look in the future – all of this, of course, accompanied by the satisfying sound of his keyboard.