Title: Part-time Contract Engineer

Reports to: Director of Product Management

Summary
Tonic is seeking a part-time engineer to help guide Tonic into becoming the world’s leading destination for effortless social activism. Tonic is a media company focused on aggregating and producing content about the good things that happen around the world each day. Our content is current, entertaining, inspiring and filled with hope. The site is supported by projects we do with personalities, with some percentage of revenue from these projects donated to a charity. Based in Mountain View, CA, Tonic will provide the resources, team and vision to allow the right candidate to thrive and make a difference in the world.

Description
Tonic is looking for a talented engineer who can take on specific engineering projects on a part-time and contractual bases. This is also a potential full-time position.

We are seeking an organized, internet savvy, talented, well-rounded, engineer who is passionate about the internet, social media, good usability practices, Web 2.0 capabilities, and is obsessed with constructing a media site and helping to grow our business and a new section of our site.
You’ll report to Tonic’s Director of Product Management, but you’ll work independently. This position is ideal for someone with some solid coding experience but wants a chance to spread their wings and grow with a fast-moving company.

Required Skills and Experience:
• Linux SysAdmin experience
• MySQL
• Basic HTML
• Strong reporting skills
• System/performance tuning
• Experience with Amazon Web Services EC2, ELB, EBS required.
• Ability to manage releases, svn basics absolutely required
• Backend tools/CMS workflow
• Full LAMP stack
Desired (bonus) skills:
• Any Wordpress development (especially UI/Core modifications)
• Query tuning, caching, replication experience
• Specific experience with Redhat flavors of linux
• XHTML, CSS, JS, jQuery, REST, SOAP, JSON
• PHP 5, OOP
• Python
• Experience with EC2 auto-scaling
• A good shot with NERF guns

Qualifications:
• Passionate about entrepreneurship and programming in a fast-paced setting with a demonstrated commitment to quality work
• 4+ years development with the LAMP stack (Linux / Apache / MySQL / PHP)
• Working in a collaborative environment using Subversion, and the ability to work independently under pressure
• Quick learner, ability to learn new technologies and deliver within tight schedules
• Excellent communications and interpersonal skills
• Good technical documentation experience
• Excellent sense of urgency and respecting deadlines very well