CTO Think Podcast

We discuss our prototype of Chasms as it's used in the wild, successfully supporting a real business.

The podcast explores topics such as Alexa development, privacy problems, bugs in voice interfaces, the implications of voice interface devices on children, Apple's treatment of developers, and the risk of isolation and lack of community feedback in companies like Microsoft.

We lament about the recent GDPR hullabaloo, our initial reactions to the new regulations, and how we approach projects that we don't have any business handling in the first place, but still fall onto our shoulders.

April Wensel, founder of Compassionate Coding, shares her mission to humanize the tech industry. Discussions include the importance of empathy in tech, reframing team culture for success, the job hopping debate, and the power of compassionate coding to improve software engineering.

We talk about Firebase as a new backend tool for a few projects we're working on and cover many of its features, what is weird about it, and why this seems to be a product in which Google is making a big investment. Hint: It's about the Person, er, people!

We talk about meetings, the negative vibe the tech industry has taken against them, how to best run meetings, or finding ways to communicate without wasting so much time.

In another installment related to the Chasms app, we discuss errors with the prototype, finding the right balance of customer/product fit, and the need to brainstorm without adding requirements to the ideas.

Listen as Don and Randy begin a new side project together from problem/solution explanation, planning, and build approach. We aim to reduce the product scope and target a quicker launch of the prototype.

People (and ourselves) have been asking: Why are you all doing this? What is motivating you to podcast? In this episode, we discuss our motivations for podcasting, our side projects, and why we're doing multiple challenges at the same time.

Would you hire Kanye West if he was a great programmer, despite his social media presence? This week, we talk about social media quality control, public personas, and the challenge of being inclusive while trying to maintain a steady team dynamic. We also somehow bring up Pink, Tim Tebow, and James Damore into the conversation.