# Tony Stubblebine

> Tony Stubblebine is the CEO of Medium and the cofounder and founding CEO of Coach.me, originally called Lift. A former engineering leader at Odeo and O’Reilly Media, he founded CrowdVine and the Medium publications Better Humans, Better Programming and Better Marketing. His work connects software, coaching and writing with the practical question of how people improve their skills.

- **Role:** CEO at Medium
- **Organizations:** Medium, Coach.me, Lift, CrowdVine, Odeo, O’Reilly Media, Wesabe, Better Humans, Better Programming, Better Marketing
- **Education:** Computer science degree, Grinnell College
- **Known for:** Cofounded and served as founding CEO of Lift, later Coach.me., Founded CrowdVine and built a profitable business serving conferences., Authored Regular Expression Pocket Reference for O’Reilly.

## Career timeline

- **2000** — Completed his studies at Grinnell College.
- **Before 2005** — Worked in engineering and online publishing at O’Reilly Media.
- **2005** — Worked with Evan Williams at Odeo as an engineering leader.
- **Before Lift** — Worked at Wesabe and founded CrowdVine, a bootstrapped social-networking business serving conferences.
- **2011** — Started Lift, which subsequently became Coach.me.
- **2015** — Shifted the business toward coaching at the beginning of the year.
- **2022** — Became Medium CEO and a board member, effective July 20.
- **2024** — Medium recorded its first profitable month in August.
- **2025** — Published a first-person account of Medium’s turnaround on July 11.
- **2026** — Published accounts of using TK for daily writing and planning.

## Achievements

- Cofounded and served as founding CEO of Lift, later Coach.me.
- Founded CrowdVine and built a profitable business serving conferences.
- Authored Regular Expression Pocket Reference for O’Reilly.
- Founded Better Humans, Better Programming and Better Marketing on Medium.
- Led Medium to its first profitable month in August 2024.
- Developed and popularized interstitial journaling.

## Latest updates

- **2026-09** — In a September 18 essay following his Medium Day presentation, described his TK-based writing routine and reported generating 120 notes a month and 2,000 words a day.
- **2026-06** — Published 25 Ways That I’m Using TK and invited more early paid-beta testers.
- **2026-04** — Published an account of adapting morning pages with AI tools.
- **2025-07** — Published his account of Medium’s financial and product turnaround, reporting profitability since August 2024.

## Links

- Website: https://coachtony.medium.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tonystubblebine
- Twitter/X: https://x.com/tonystubblebine
- GitHub: https://github.com/tonystubblebine
- Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/coachtony.bsky.social

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/tony-stubblebine
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-10-26