In this episode we have our first listener-submission: Rob Sullivan talks about his obsessive-ness and how it helps him, and hinders him in his job. Rory Blyth and Scott then talk openly about Rory's compulsion to keep learning - which leads him to, among other things, stop policemen in the street and ask them about take-downs.

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In this episode we talk to 2 developers who harness their obsessive tendencies to further themselves in their career.

• Rob Sullivan submitted our very first listener story about what drives him as a DBA - sometimes a bit too far
• Rory Blyth - the smartest man in the world talks openly and candidly about his obsessions - and how he can't just learn something a little bit

You can download the MP3 here (46 minutes) and visit our site at http://thisdeveloperslife.com.

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The bandwidth and other costs for this week's show were picked up DevExpress and CodeRush!

Announcing our listener contest...This Developer's Life - Crowdsourced 1

Oh yes. We want to hear your stories. Record your best developer stories and send them to us and if we think they rock, we'll include them in the next episode of This Developer's Life.

What we need from you:

• Your story. We don't want interviews, we want stories. Tell us about your passion, or something crazy that happened at work while solving some technical problem.
• Keep your audio clean. Use a decent microphone or at least make sure you don't "overdrive" your microphone by talking to close or two loudly. Don't record while mowing the lawn and don't record in a giant echo chamber.
• Be passionate. Talk to us like you're talking to a friend.
• Don't worry about editing or music. Just share. We'll handle the Lady Gaga mashups.
• Note we may move your audio around or change the order of stuff to make it more listenable or interesting or both.
• Change the names of companies and people to protect the innocent (or guilty)
• Know that by giving us your audio you're releasing it the Creative Commons and that we may or may not use it for a future show.

Send us a link to your audio file and what you're talking about and we'll do the rest. See you next time!