Life Is But A Stream

From the heart of the expo hall at Current NOLA, this special episode drops you into the conversations, energy, and the breakthroughs as they happened.Host, Joseph Morais, and co-host, Adi Polak talk with data streaming leaders and community voices to unpack how teams are using Apache Kafka® and Apache Flink® to power low-latency, AI-ready applications—covering patterns from usage-based billing and hybrid operations to cost efficiency and streaming governance. You’ll also hear how shift-left processing and governance make AI-ready data possible at scale. Plus, we break down key launches, including Queues for Kafka, Confluent Private Cloud, the Real-Time Context Engine for AI, and more.You’ll learn:How modern architectures power real-time billing, entitlements, and fraud detectionWhy exactly-once processing and stateful workloads matter at scaleHow Unified Stream Manager and Confluent Private Cloud simplify hybrid, multi-cluster operations with a single pane of glassHow Real-Time Context Engine serves governed, low-latency context to  agentic AI via MCPThe Hosts:Joseph Morais, Technical Champion, Confluent Adi Polak, Director of Advocacy and Developer Experience Engineering, ConfluentThe Guests:Cosmo Wolfe, CTO, Metronome  Kevin Balaji, Sr. Director, Product Marketing, ConfluentAdam Bellemare, Principal Technologist, ConfluentSam Barker, Principal Software Engineer, IBMOlena Kutsenko, Staff Developer Advocate, ConfluentScott Haines, O’Reilly Author and OSS EducatorGuest Highlights: “If your company is shifting to be more nimble with monetization and especially if you're switching to more of a consumption based model, then the underlying systems have to be real time to support that.” — Cosmo Wolfe, Metronome“So many customers out there…they are running in Amazon and in their data center and somewhere else. They're all looking for ways to monitor and manage all these different clusters in one way.” — Kevin Balaji, Confluent “There's a reason we call it time travel—because we're going back to a prior point in history to replay data and do something else with it.” — Scott Haines, O’Reilly Author and OSS EducatorEpisode Timestamps: 01:00 — Cosmo Wolfe, CTO, Metronome 17:10 —  Kevin Balaji, Sr. Director, Product Marketing, Confluent28:40 — Adam Bellemare, Principal Technologist, Confluent43:15 — Sam Barker, Principal Software Engineer, IBM50:30 — Olena Kutsenko, Staff Developer Advocate, Confluent01:05:00 — Scott Haines, O’Reilly Author and OSS EducatorDive Deeper into Data Streaming:EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A StreamEP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A StreamEP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A StreamLinks & Resources:Connect with Joseph: https://www.youtube.com/@thedatagiantJoseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiantAdi’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/polak-adi/Keynote: Building Intelligent Systems on Real-time DataWatch Current On Demand: https://current.confluent.io/archive/2025/new-orleans?utm_source=simplecast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_id=tm.content_life-is-but-a-streamContext-Driven AI Reigned Supreme at Current New Orleans: https://www.confluent.io/blog/context-driven-ai-current-new-orleans/?utm_source=simplecast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_id=tm.content_life-is-but-a-streamBuilding Event-Driven Microservice (2E): https://www.confluent.io/resources/ebook/building-event-driven-microservices-2e/?utm_source=simplecast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_id=tm.content_life-is-but-a-streamLearn more at Confluent.ioOur Sponsor:  Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

How quickly can your business turn usage into revenue? For modern software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies, speed is a competitive advantage. Metronome is redefining what’s possible with a real-time monetization engine that scales to billions of events per day—all powered by Confluent’s data streaming platform and Apache Kafka®.In this episode, Cosmo Wolfe, CTO at Metronome, joins Joseph Morais to discuss how real-time data streaming enables everything from sub-second billing and fraud prevention to new pricing models and product-led growth. He explains how Metronome processes tens of thousands of invoices per second and billions of events per day, all while keeping 90% of their engineering team focused on building features, not managing operations. You’ll learn:How Metronome achieves second-level latency for billing and fraud detectionWhy real-time monetization requires a data streaming foundationHow Confluent’s managed data streaming platform lets engineering teams focused on innovation, not infrastructure What “time to revenue” means—and why it’s the new north star for SaaS growthIf your business depends on billing, pricing, or product usage data, this episode shows how to turn streaming into a strategic advantage.About the Guest:Cosmo Wolfe is the Chief Technology Officer at Metronome. He is interested in using technology to unlock data, and is experienced in building and managing web, security and identity systems and teams. Cosmo is currently reinventing billing at Metronome.Guest Highlights: “We are processing events on a second-level latency end to end. So if an event occurs in your business, it’ll show up on your end customer’s invoice in sub-seconds.”“We think of the core data infrastructure at Metronome as having two axes—time to revenue, which is basically that second-level latency, and the cardinality of data we can support.”“When you’re making monetization a core part of your product experience, it requires really up-to-date data. And so it requires Metronome, and thus requires Confluent.”Episode Timestamps: *(00:45) -  Metronome and the Importance of Real-Time Data*(05:45) - Data Streaming Goodness*(25:25) - Beyond the Stream*(38:00) - Quick Bytes*(42:35) - Joseph’s Top 3 TakeawaysDive Deeper into Data Streaming:EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A StreamEP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A StreamEP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A StreamLinks & Resources:Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiantMetronome: @getmetronomeJoseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiantCosmo’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/cosmowolfeHow Cursor and WarpStream Power AI Productivity: The Future of Coding: How Cursor and WarpStream Power AI Productivity | Life Is But A StreamLearn more at Confluent.ioRegister now for Current NOLA 2025Our Sponsor:  Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Software development is changing fast. With Cursor, Anysphere is building an AI-forward IDE that fuses human creativity with machine intelligence. At the heart of this transformation is data streaming—making it possible to train models responsibly, deliver lightning-fast Tab completions, and scale telemetry without breaking engineering velocity.In this episode, engineer Alex Haugland shares how WarpStream gives Cursor sovereignty over user data, how telemetry and accounting pipelines strengthen product decisions, and why “coding is really just a bug” in how we interact with computers. You’ll learn:Why data sovereignty and trust are critical for AI-powered productsHow WarpStream abstracts complexity while preserving control over dataWhere telemetry and accounting data streaming improve both user experience and business outcomesHow to right-size your data stack and avoid mismatched scaleFor senior leaders evaluating AI and streaming strategies, Cursor offers a blueprint for balancing innovation, cost, and trust.About the Guest:Alex Haugland is an engineer at Anysphere working on Cursor. He is a massive scale distributed systems performance engineer enthusiastic about understanding complex technical systems, organizational systems, and mentoring junior engineers.Guest Highlight: “Our business is built on top of data, and a lot of it is data that people have been really generous to allow us to use… WarpStream lets us do that in a way where the data sits entirely inside stuff that we control and have access to. Being able to say, ‘All this stuff is locked down on S3; we have control of it,’ is really, really important to us.”Episode Timestamps: *(00:45) -    Anysphere, Cursor, and Data Streaming Strategy*(04:05) - Data Streaming Goodness*(21:30) -  Beyond the Stream*(32:00) - Quick Bytes*(34:45) - Joseph’s Top 3 TakeawaysDive Deeper into Data Streaming:EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A StreamEP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A StreamEP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A StreamLinks & Resources:Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiantWarpStream: @WarpStreamLabsCursor: @cursor_aiJoseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiantAlex’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/alex-haugland-4ba8893bLearn more at Confluent.ioRegister now for Current NOLA 2025: https://current.confluent.io/new-orleans?utm_source=simplecast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=tm.content_life-is-but-a-streamOur Sponsor:  Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

All AI problems are data problems—and one of the biggest is getting AI agents to talk to each other. This special episode with Sean Falconer dives into how agents built by different teams often end up stranded in “intelligence silos,” unable to collaborate or share context. The result? Fragmented AI that struggles to deliver real business value. Tune in to learn why moving beyond isolated AI experiments calls for a robust data streaming backbone—and how Confluent's strategic partnership with Google Cloud sets organizations up for building multi-agent AI systems at scale. With technologies like Apache Kafka®, agents can tap into a central stream of trustworthy data—effectively creating a nervous system for your AI ecosystem. That backbone enables real-time exchange, scalable collaboration, and reliable intelligence across the enterprise—unlocking speed and innovation that siloed AI can’t deliver.About the Guest:Sean Falconer is a Senior Director, Product Management - AI Strategy at Confluent where he works on AI strategy and thought leadership. Sean’s been an academic, startup founder, and Googler. He has published works covering a wide range of topics from AI to quantum computing. Sean also hosts the popular engineering podcasts Software Engineering Daily and Software Huddle. Guest Highlight:“What is the message between agents? It's just data. You're moving that data from one agent system to another agent system, whether that's a multi-agent system that's collaborating or even these agents that exist in different, you know, parts of the business, you can use data streaming essentially be the bridge where those agents shared language, the shared communication becomes events.”Episode Timestamps:*(00:00) - Introduction*(00:34) - Why AI is Fundamentally a Data Challenge*(02:17) - Data Streaming: The Foundation for AI*(07:21) - The “Island of Agents” Problem*(09:46) - Streaming Agents vs. Chatbots*(12:35) -  The Consequences of Disconnected Agents*(14:09) -   The Power of Event-Driven Architecture*(25:04) - The A2A Protocol—Google Cloud and Confluent *(31:19) - Model Context Protocol (MCP)*(34:13) - Agent Development Kit (ADK)*(37:36) - Real-World AI Use Cases*(42:20) - Key GenAI Features on Confluent Cloud *(45:43) - Wrap-Up: TakeawaysLinks & Resources:Connect with Joseph: https://www.youtube.com/@TheDataGiantWhy Google’s Agent2Agent Protocol Needs Apache Kafka®Joseph’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thedatagiantSean’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/seanf/Real-Time AI Agents Powered by Apache Kafka®, Apache Flink®, and Google CloudListen to podcast: https://flowsto.com/r/9BRiRRl1cLearn more at Confluent.ioOur Sponsor  Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io.About the ShowHosted by Joseph Morais, Life Is But A Stream is for technology leaders looking to embrace the data revolution and transform their organizations through data streaming. Instant analytics, next level customer experiences, and business innovation that was previously unimaginable: it all starts with Life Is But A Stream. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In a highly regulated industry where every millisecond matters, Swedbank is shifting its data strategy to move fast without breaking trust. In this episode, Rami Al Lolah, Lead Architect at Swedbank’s Integration Center of Excellence, shares how the bank built a future-proof foundation using Apache Kafka® with Confluent Cloud.From early investments in building reusable data products to shift left, , Swedbank’s strategy goes beyond infrastructure. It’s about enabling interoperability, eliminating data silos, and empowering teams to think differently about how data should flow across a modern financial institution.You’ll Learn:How Swedbank reduces risk by accelerating data availability across teamsWhy “shift left” is a cultural and architectural shift,not just a development patternWhy choose Confluent over other solutionsWhere Swedbank sees the biggest opportunities for AI and streaming in the futureWhether you're leading modernization for a financial institution or scaling real-time data for your organization, this episode offers a blueprint for transformation. About the Guest:Rami Al Lolah is a seasoned professional, technologist and domain expert for 25+ years within the application and systems integration domain. His expertise is in delivering, designing, writing major integration solutions from world leading integration technology providers, leading technical/services teams, and directing major integration technical implementations. Guest Highlight: “We need to embrace the [shift left] mindset and methodology, and try to move critical considerations, for example — compliance, security, governance, and data quality earlier in the development process. This means that when teams build something like a Kafka topic, or even an API or a file based integration, they are not just focusing on making it work technically. They are already thinking about who owns it, who owns the data, what the contract, what the schemas look like, who will access this data, and how the access will be managed.”Episode Timestamps: *(06:40) - Data Streaming Goodness*(33:15) -   The Runbook: Winning Strategies*(41:15) -    Data Streaming Street Cred*(47:40) - Quick Bytes*(54:30) - Joseph’s Top 3 TakeawaysDive Deeper into Data Streaming:EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A StreamEP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A StreamEP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A StreamLinks & Resources:Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiantJoseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiantRami’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/ramiallolahLearn more at Confluent.ioOur Sponsor:  Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Strategic partnerships don’t work without trust. And in the data streaming world, trust begins with transparency.In this episode, Elena Cuevas, Sr. Manager of Cloud Partner Solutions Engineering at Confluent, joins Joseph Morais to unpack what it takes to collaborate with hyperscalers like AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure. From managing competitive overlaps to future-proofing enterprise data architectures, Elena shares her battle-tested strategies for driving alignment across complex stakeholder ecosystems.You’ll learn:How to collaborate effectively across competitive cloud partnerships Why transparency builds trust and drives adoption in partner-led salesWhat  shift left unlocks for streaming data governanceHow Confluent supports GenAI use cases with real-time data Whether you're working with a cloud provider or building your own ecosystem, Elena’s playbook will change how you think about partnership, transparency, and long-term scale.About the Guest:Elena Cuevas currently leads the Cloud Partner Solutions Engineering team at Confluent, where she and her team focus on strengthening technical relationships with cloud providers.Prior to joining Confluent, Elena spent several years at Google, working directly with some of the company’s largest Google Cloud customers in both pre-sales and post-sales capacities.She is passionate about helping members of historically underrepresented communities see that a path in STEM is within reach if they choose to pursue it. Elena has served as an #IamRemarkable facilitator, an instructor for the Computer Science Summer Institute, and is a frequent speaker at universities and high schools.Guest Highlight: “Sometimes we talk about competing and about one or the other, but we do better things when it's ‘and’, and not an ‘or’.”Episode Timestamps: *(07:55) - Data Streaming in a World of Clouds *(14:25) -   The Playbook: Winning Strategies*(23:25) -    Voices from the World of Data Streaming*(28:30) - Quick Bytes*(31:15) - Joseph’s Top 3 TakeawaysDive Deeper into Data Streaming:EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A StreamEP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A StreamEP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A StreamLinks & Resources:Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiantJoseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiantElena’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/ecuevascLearn more at Confluent.ioOur Sponsor:  Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Blockchain may be decentralized, but reliable access to its data is anything but simple. In this episode, Ethan Chan, Co-Founder & CEO of Allium, shares how his team transforms blockchain firehoses into clean, queryable, real-time data feeds.From the pitfalls of hosting your own data streaming infrastructure to the business advantages of Confluent Cloud, Ethan reveals the strategic decisions that helped Allium scale from 3 to nearly 100 blockchains, without burning out their engineering team.You’ll learn:Why Allium opted for Confluent Cloud from day one How data streaming supports mission-critical blockchain use casesWhat makes stream sharing a force multiplier for customer successHow Confluent connectors accelerated their integrations with Snowflake, BigQuery, and DatabricksWhether you’re building real-time monitoring tools or reconciling petabytes of cross-chain data, this episode offers a blueprint for scaling with Apache Kafka® and Confluent.About the Guest:Ethan Chan is the CEO and Co-Founder of Allium. With over six years of experience in the AI and natural language processing space, Ethan has come to believe that high-quality data is the key constraint in building the best-performing models. This insight drives Allium’s mission: to provide the highest-quality blockchain data infrastructure for crypto analytics and engineering teams at institutions and funds. Allium focuses on delivering clean, reliable data in a simple, accessible format—data served on a silver platter.Before founding Allium, Ethan was the Director of Engineering at Primer, where he founded and led the Primer Command product and team, and re-architected the core machine learning pipelines powering Primer Analyze. Earlier in his career, he lectured at Stanford University and conducted research at the Stanford Intelligent Systems Lab as a graduate student.Guest Highlight: “We definitely always wanted to go for a managed service from the get-go… If you break [streaming], every other engineering company is going to complain and you become infamous—for no reason.”Episode Timestamps: *(01:10) - Allium’s Data Streaming Strategy*(05:20) - Data Streaming Goodness*(26:50) -   The Runbook: Tools & Tactics*(29:55) -   Data Streaming Street Cred: Improve Data Streaming Adoption *(32:10) - Quick Bytes*(36:40) - Joseph’s Top 3 TakeawaysDive Deeper into Data Streaming:EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A StreamEP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A StreamEP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A StreamLinks & Resources:Ep 8 - How Airy Powers Real-Time AI Agents with Data Streaming and ConfluentConnect with Joseph: @thedatagiantJoseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiantEthan’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/ethanyschanLearn more at Confluent.ioOur Sponsor:  Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

For enterprises managing sprawling systems and frequent M&A activity, data latency isn’t just inconvenient—it’s a blocker to business value. In this episode, Joe Pardi, Senior Director of Global Data Engineering at Covetrus, explains how his team replaced fragile data pipelines with a robust real-time data streaming architecture that enables instant decisions  across the entire enterprise.The Covetrus team started with open source Apache Kafka® and then shifted to Confluent Cloud for scalability and data governance.  Joe shares the adoption has drastically reduced operational overhead, strengthened data governance, and supercharged innovation. He also emphasizes the strategic importance of data integration in post-merger scenarios and how real-time data streaming helps uncover and address data quality issues early on.You’ll learn:Why Covetrus moved from self-managed Kafka to Confluent CloudHow real-time data streaming helps detect data quality issues fasterWhat are the requirements for scaling a data architecture across hundreds of engineersHow data streaming supports M&A integration and value creationWhether you’re centralizing data across silos or enabling downstream systems with real-time feeds, this conversation offers a blueprint for building data streaming platforms that scale.About the Guest:Joe Pardi is the Senior Director of Global Data Engineering at Covetrus, a leading provider in the veterinary services industry. Based in Portland, Maine, he has held this role since January 2021, where he leads data engineering initiatives to support Covetrus' global operations.Guest Highlight: “The whole key with that acquisition strategy is to unlock the value. It's easy to make an acquisition go from 1+1=2, but you're really trying to make 1+1=3… If you're going to do an M&A, you have to get really good at integrating data.”Episode Timestamps: *(05:10) - Covetrus’ Data Streaming Strategy*(06:40) - Data Challenges: Latency and Quality*(26:05) -   The Runbook: Tools & Tactics*(31:15) -   Data Streaming Street Cred: Improve Data Streaming Adoption *(38:25) - Quick Bytes*(42:15) - Joseph’s Top 3 TakeawaysDive Deeper into Data Streaming:EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A StreamEP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A StreamEP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A StreamLinks & Resources:Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiantJoseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiantJoe’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/joepardiLearn more at Confluent.ioOur Sponsor:  Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Agentic AI is transforming how modern systems interact with data, and Airy is at the forefront with its real-time approach.In this episode, Steffen Hoellinger, Co-founder and CEO of Airy, discusses the transformative impact of agentic AI for enterprises and why real-time data streaming is a crucial component. From Apache Flink® and Apache Kafka® to the importance of focusing on core business challenges, Steffen breaks down how Airy builds intelligent systems that react to data as it happens.You’ll learn:How Airy’s team uses Confluent to simplify their data infrastructureWhat agentic AI means beyond the buzzwords and why it’s a leap past basic natural language processing (NLP)Why real-time interaction is essential for creating next-generation software experiencesHow business users can create and test AI-driven patterns without writing any codeIf you’re building AI-powered apps—or planning to—this one’s for you.About the Guest:Steffen Hoellinger is the Co-founder and CEO of Airy, where he leads the development of open-source data infrastructure that connects real-time event streaming technologies like Apache Kafka® and Apache Flink® with large language models. Airy helps enterprises build AI agents and data copilots for both technical and business users across streaming and batch data. Steffen is also an active early-stage investor focusing on data infrastructure, AI, and deep technology.Guest Highlight: “Real-time is getting more and more important. Once you understand all the fancy ways people in the market are trying to solve a real-time data problem, you come to the realization that [data streaming] is the best way of doing things. It became natural to adopt it early on in our journey.”Episode Timestamps: *(05:10) - Overview of Airy’s AI Solutions*(37:20) -   The Runbook: Tools & Tactics*(44:00) -   Data Streaming Street Cred: Improve Data Streaming Adoption *(47:50) - Quick Bytes*(50:25) - Joseph’s Top 3 TakeawaysDive Deeper into Data Streaming:EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A StreamEP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A StreamEP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A StreamLinks & Resources:Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiantJoseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiantSteffen’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/hoellingerLearn more at Confluent.ioOur Sponsor:  Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

What does real transformation look like when the stakes are high? Todd Smitala, Technology Solutions Architect at the Association of Professional Flight Attendants (APFA), shares how his journey of modernizing data system support 27,000 union members.With the legacy infrastructure crumbling under peak traffic during a high-volume union vote, Todd’s team turned to cloud-based real-time streaming with Apache Kafka® on Confluent Cloud. The result? A more reliable, scalable system that delivered immediate impact, ensuring every vote counted. In this episode, Todd walks through the technical decisions and leadership alignment that made it possible.You’ll learn:How real-time infrastructure solved a high-stakes voting challengeWhat it took to modernize under pressure and bring leadership on boardHow to frame cost, reliability, and system ownership to drive successful changeIf you're leading a data streaming initiative and need a blueprint for impact, this episode is for you.About the Guest:As a Technology Solutions Architect at APFA, Todd Smitala brings over 10 years of experience as a flight attendant and 20 years in IT, allowing Todd to bridge the gap between technology and the needs of flight attendants. He’s passionate about leveraging technology to create meaningful change, support union members, and enforce contractual legalities. This combination of industry insight and technical expertise empowers Todd to deliver innovations that make a real difference. Outside of work, Todd enjoys scuba diving, adventure travel, hiking, playing music, and dancing at Carnaval in Brazil.Guest Highlight: “We all agreed that Confluent Cloud would be the way we want to go because of how it does host. It does really handle all of the background stuff. I'm not a Java developer… We didn't have the time to invest in all of that so Confluent Cloud is actually perfect for this type of thing.”Episode Timestamps: *(01:22) - How APFA Is Using Data Streaming to Empower Members *(20:39) -   The Runbook: Tools & Tactics*(26:45) -   Data Streaming Street Cred: Improve Data Streaming Adoption *(28:30) - Quick Bytes*(33:36) - Joseph’s Top 3 TakeawaysDive Deeper into Data Streaming:EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A StreamEP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A StreamEP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A StreamLinks & Resources:Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiantJoseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiantTodd’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/tsmitalaLearn more at Confluent.ioOur Sponsor:  Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.