Shane Snow

Bio:

Shane Snow is a technology journalist and infographicker, currently the cofounder of New York media startup, Contently. A New Yorker now, Shane grew up in Idaho, moved to Hawaii to get away from cows, and came to Manhattan for journalism school when surfing every day got too hard. Shane loves writing, design, pizza, and robots. He has two pet ferrets, Grizz and Dotcom.

• Title: Cofounder, Contently.com
• Age: 27
• Location: Hell's Kitchen
• Contact: @shanesnow

Two questions after visiting your website.  How did you end up in the show Gossip Girl and how did you end up meeting Desmond from Lost?

After living in New York for about a year, I realized they are always filming TV shows in my neighborhood (Hell's Kitchen). In fact, I bumped into Tina Fey one time on my street after they had finished shooting a scene. It made me wonder how hard it would be to get cast as an extra. I was making my own hours, freelancing etc, and was pretty bored, so I signed up for a casting agency. They threw me in an episode of Gossip Girl Season 4, the Fashion's Night Out episode. If you look hard, you can see me in a few of the party scenes (mainly identified by my hair in the background of a couple of them). I ended up doing an episode of Law and Order, and that's where I met Desmond from Lost (and took a ridiculous star-struck picture with him). It was fun, but a lot of standing around til 3am for basically minimum wage. The agency still calls me every once in a while.

Your current startup, Contently, is approaching it’s 1 year anniversary.  What was your most memorable high and most memorable low during that time?  Any advice for new entrepreneurs on what to try and avoid when starting a new company?

The most memorable high at Contently so far was when one of our writers told us we'd changed his life. That was awesome. The most memorable low... probably the point when all my credit cards maxed out and we weren't sure if our seed round would close. I took a screenshot of my bank account with $0.40 in it. One day I'll look back at that and laugh.

You’ve eaten at over 50 pizza restaurants here in New York. The obvious question is which one is the best.  Also, which one had been the most disappointing to you?

By the slice pizza is definitely Joe's on Carmine Street. By the pie is tougher because there are a handful of places that are really close. I like the original Patsy's in East Harlem, and despite the cliche I also like Difara's in Brooklyn because of that guy is an amazing character. John's of Bleecker Street is great, and so is Keste across the street... man I'm getting really hungry writing all this!

And I realized that I never told you what the most disappointing pizza joint was. :) The most disappointing pizza experience I had here in New York was the night I decided to hit 2 places in a row that each claimed to be "the best pizza in New York." I went to Johns of Bleecker Street, which was awesome, and then immediately went to Bleecker Street Pizza... which tasted like a burnt Saltine cracker by comparison. Total let down!