Hundreds of notifications a day. One you can't miss.
Marqee is a simple app I built for myself when important messages kept slipping past me. It lifts the people who matter out of the noise and puts them in your notch.
The short version
For most of my life, I believed I had to be a lawyer to have any real power in American society. I was mostly right. I loved my years at Howard University School of Law, and I loved the influence and the income the title gave me. What I didn't love was the life. So I left it.
I made a bet on a newspaper, The Cincinnati Herald, buying it with a few friends and betting big on growth. We saved the paper. The fortune we imagined never quite arrived; the market was slowly dying, and our expansion stayed modest. But the experiences were rich, and I'd trade none of them.
From there I took my marketing skills to the Urban League of Greater Southwestern Ohio, where for four years I did work I genuinely loved, the kind with tangible impact on real people's lives. Then I went out on my own. I've been founder, boss, and CEO of my own marketing firm for the past 17 years.
My proudest accomplishment isn't on any résumé. It's that when AI learned to write better than I do, I didn't give in to despair. I chose to go all-in, in a way that benefits me, my family, my community, and the world. Marqee is my first product. Lens will be my second.
B.S. in Marketing, University of Cincinnati
Juris Doctor, Howard University School of Law
Passed the bar in both New York and Ohio
Practiced at Dinsmore & Shohl, the largest law firm in Cincinnati
Co-owner of The Cincinnati Herald
Director of Communications & Community Initiatives, Urban League of Greater Southwestern Ohio
Tech startup mentor
Founder & CEO of an independent marketing firm for 17 years
No dashboard to show off yet, Marqee is early, and I'm building it in the open. The receipts are coming. For now, the proof is the work: 300+ hours, two real users, zero dollars raised, and one problem I refuse to stop solving.
Why I built Marqee
I built Marqee because I kept missing text messages and emails from my wife. I get hundreds of notifications a day, and it's far too easy to overlook the one that matters when it looks exactly like the hundred that don't. If you can't read them all, how do you know which one to read?
So I built the app for myself, and realized other people probably needed the same thing. When I went looking, I found an entire world of notch apps. Mine was the only one built around a single idea: getting the important messages through. There was a missing niche in the notch business. I filled it.
The timeline
Where it started
Born in Jacksonville, Florida and migrated up North to Cincinnati, OH.
Howard University School of Law
I believed I needed to be a lawyer to have real power in America. I wasn't entirely wrong. I loved every minute of it.
Practicing law at Dinsmore & Shohl
The title, the income, the influence, I had all of it, and I hated the life it came with.
The first big bet
I left the law to buy The Cincinnati Herald with a few friends. It was scary as hell. We saved the paper.
The setback that was really a blessing
We lost the bid to buy another newspaper out of bankruptcy, a deal worth millions. It felt like my biggest failure. It was actually the door to everything that came next.
The Urban League of Greater Southwestern Ohio
Four years as Director of Communications & Community Initiatives, doing work with real impact on real lives.
On my own
I opened a one-man marketing agency so I could be the boss. Seventeen years later, I still am.
The AI reckoning
I watched AI learn to write better than I do. I chose not to despair. I chose to go all-in.
I built myself a mentor
I started talking to Claude the way I'd talk to a mentor, and built a Council of Elders to think through decisions with me. Then I realized everyone deserves that. So, I started building Lens.
Marqee
My first product, born the day I missed one too many messages from my wife.
Today
Married to my most supportive best friend, pivoting from writing to measuring the return on investment (ROI) of marketing materials, and building AI-first businesses that provide for my family for the long haul. Lens is next.
What it gave back
The work has given me back two things I don't take for granted: time and confidence. I've reclaimed the hours I used to lose to mundane tasks, and I've gained a real belief in my ability to create, to take an idea and bring it to life. I spend that reclaimed time on new, exciting work, and on building experiences worth remembering.
Two things I'll put my name behind: learning to leverage AI, in your work and your life, is no longer optional, it's essential. And relationships matter more than anything else.
Three things, non-negotiable
Know Thyself
Every good decision I've made started with an honest look in the mirror. I build from who I actually am, not who I'm pretending to be.
Listen Before Speaking
The most important message in the room is usually the one you'd miss if you were busy talking. I listen first. (It's no accident I built a product around exactly this.)
Share Generously
Mentorship changed my life at every turn. I give away what I know, because the things worth having tend to multiply when you pass them on.
Your notch. Their names in lights.
Marqee makes sure the messages that matter, from the people who matter, never get lost in the noise. It's almost ready.