DevNews

Latest Episodes:

S2:E7 - Cyberpunk 2077, Timnit Gebru’s Firing, GitHub’s ‘State of the Octoverse,’ and Google’s New Chip Dec 10, 2020

Show notes

In this episode, we talk about Google’s move to put their own chips in Pixels and Chromebooks, and notable items in GitHub’s “State of the Octoverse.” Then we speak with Nathan Grayson, senior reporter at Kotaku and co-host of Kotaku’s Splitscreen, about crunch culture in game development and the differences between a company like Supergiant Games and CD Projekt Red, the maker of the newly released and highly anticipated RPG, Cyberpunk 2077. Finally, we chat with Julien Cornebise, an honorary associate professor at University College London and a former researcher with DeepMind, Google’s A.I. lab, about Google’s firing of Timnit Gebru, a co-leader of Google’s Ethical A.I. team, who said she was fired after she sent an email criticizing the company’s efforts to hire more minorities as well as biases in their A.I.

Show Notes

Nathan Grayson

Nathan Grayson is a senior reporter at Kotaku who primarily focuses on streaming, labor, and PC gaming. He also cohosts the Kotaku Splitscreen podcast and is working on a book tentatively titled "STREAMERS" to be published by Atria/Simon & Schuster in the future.

Julien Cornebise

Julien is a mathematician, scientist and coder, was the 5th research at DeepMind from 2012 working on their early algorithms, and co-created their Health Research team. He left in 2016 to start helping NGOs and charities with machine learning, and for that created in 2018 Element AI's "AI for Good" team and their London office. From ASMx86 to convergence theorems, from Google to Amnesty International and academia, he believes in depth and breadth, and that individual responsibility never dilutes in an organization: it multiplies. We must do better!

S2:E6 - Salesforce’s Slackquisition, PHP 8.0, Amazon Sidewalk, and Computer Fraud and Abuse Act Dec 03, 2020

Show notes

In this episode, we talk about Amazon Sidewalk, and SaleForce’s acquisition of Slack. Then we speak with Jerry Gamblin, Manager of Security and Compliance at Kenna Security, about the U.S. Supreme Court hearing arguments this week about the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which has major implications for ethical hackers. Finally, we chat with Sara Golemon, Core Developer and Release Manager on the PHP team, about the new release of PHP 8.0.

Show Notes

DevDiscuss (sponsor)
CodeNewbie (sponsor)
Avalanche (sponsor)
Salesforce Signs Definitive Agreement to Acquire Slack
Introducing Amazon Sidewalk
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act
PHP 8.0 Released!

Jerry Gamblin

Jerry Gamblin is a security and compliance manager at Kenna Security. He is an influential security researcher and analyst, focusing on the enterprise network and application security with over 15 years of experience. His research has been presented on numerous blogs, podcasts, and security conferences. When not at work, his personal research focuses on IoT & embedded automotive systems.

Sara Golemon

Sara is a long-time contributor to the PHP language and is currently serving as the veteran release manager for PHP 8.0.

S2:E5 - COVID Tracking Project, Apple’s Reduced App Store Commission, Tesla Security Flaws, and Twitter Fleets Nov 26, 2020

Show notes

In this episode, we talk about a concerning security flaw in the Tesla Model X, and Twitter’s fleet rollout and subsequent rollback. Then we check back in with Sarah Maxwell, spokesperson for the Coalition on App Fairness, about Apple’s new reduced app store commission for certain developers. Finally, we chat with Kevin Miller, website lead at the COVID Tracking Project, about what has become one of the most trusted sources on the spread of the pandemic.

Show Notes

DevDiscuss (sponsor)
CodeNewbie (sponsor)
Avalanche (sponsor)
This Bluetooth Attack Can Steal a Tesla Model X in Minutes
Fleets: a new way to join the conversation
Apple announces App Store Small Business Program
Coalition for App Fairness
The COVID Tracking Project
RubyConf
Tracking COVID with Ruby

Sarah Maxwell

Sarah Maxwell is the spokesperson for the Coalition for App Fairness. Prior to that, she was an executive at Blockchain.com for three years responsible for communications, expansion, and new business. Before crypto, she was also an early employee at Uber, where she led communications and policy helping to legalize ridesharing in the early days and was on the founding team for UberEATS. Over the course of her career, Sarah has worked on numerous presidential campaigns and for companies disrupting the status quo.

Kevin Miller

Kevin Miller is website lead at the COVID Tracking Project. He is a mountain saunterer, wave tumbler, bike rider, raft flipper, trail loser, and part-time computer starer. He writes applications focused on public good, engagement, and empowerment.

S2:E4 - U.S. Military Buying Location Data, GitHub Reinstating youtube-dl, Apple Server Problems, and School Ransomware Attacks Nov 19, 2020

Show notes

In this episode, we cover how Apple server problems caused slowdowns and crashes for app launching in all versions of MacOS, the rise of school districts being the targets of ransomware attacks, and GitHub reinstating youtube-dl, a program to download videos from YouTube and other video sites, after a Digital Millennium Copyright Act takedown. And then we chat with Senior Staff Writer at Motherboard, Joseph Cox, whose piece titled, “How the U.S. Military Buys Location Data from Ordinary Apps,” shines a spotlight on the location data industry, and who is being targeted.

Show Notes

Joseph Cox

Joseph Cox covers privacy, hackers, and crime for Motherboard.

S2:E3 - Apple ARM-Macs, COVID-19 Vaccine, Privacy ‘Nutrition Labels,’ and Controlling Computers With Our Brains Nov 12, 2020

Show notes

In this episode, we talk about about Pfizer/BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine’s effect on certain tech companies, and we get into Apple’s App privacy “nutrition labels.” Then we chat with Ish ShaBazz, iOS engineer and creator of Capsicum app about Apple's ARM-based Mac’s and other noteworthy announcements from this week's Apple event. Finally we speak with Peter Yoo, director of research at Synchron, Inc, about the first human trials of their Stentrode brain implant which allows users to control computers with their brain.

Show Notes

Ish Shabazz

Ish Shabazz is the founder of Illuminated Bits, and an iOS Developer who supports other developers.

Peter Yoo

Peter Yoo is director of research at Synchron, Inc.

S2:E2 - iOS Accessibility Features, GraphQL Editor 3.0, Raspberry Pi 400, Stripe Climate, and CodeSandbox Nov 05, 2020

Show notes

In this episode, we cover Raspberry Pi 400, Stripe Climate, and CodeSandbox's series A funding. Then we speak to Kaya Thomas, senior iOS engineer at Calm, about iOS’s new back tap feature, and other accessibility features on iOS that developers might not know about. Finally, we chat with CTO of GraphQL Editor, Artur Czemiel (Cha-mial), about the release of GraphQL Editor 3.0.

Show Notes

DevDiscuss (sponsor)
CodeNewbie (sponsor)
Avalanche (sponsor)
Raspberry Pi 400
Stripe Climate
CodeSandbox Secures $12.7M Series A Funding
Apple added a secret button to your iPhone, and you may not have even noticed
Apple: Human Interface Guidelines
GraphQL Editor 3.0 - new release

Kaya Thomas

Kaya is a senior iOS engineer at Calm, formerly at Slack. She also writes and has spoken at conferences all around the world.

Artur Czemiel

Artur Czemiel is the CTO of GraphQL Editor, and CEO of Aexol.

S2:E1 - Hacktoberfest, Node v15, Edge, McBroken, and Tech-Related Issues on U.S. Ballots Oct 29, 2020

Show notes

In this episode, we talk about Oculus Quest 2 users being forced to link their account to a Facebook account, a fun use of the McDonald's API, Microsoft phasing out Internet Explorer with Edge, and some important tech-related issues on U.S. ballots. Then we be speak with Emily Kager, senior mobile android engineer at Mozilla, about a big controversy over Hacktoberfest. Finally, we chat with senior software engineer and Node.js TSC Member at Red Hat, Beth Griggs, and Michael Dawson, Node.js lead for Red Hat and IBM, about the release of Node v15.

Show Notes

Bethany Griggs

Beth Griggs is a Senior Software Engineer at Red Hat and Node.js Technical Steering Committee Member. Her work includes contributing to the upstream Node.js project, to building tooling to support Node.js deployments to Kubernetes.

Michael Dawson

Michael Dawson is an active contributor to the Node.js project and chair of the Node.js Technical Steering Committee(TSC). He contributes to a broad range of community efforts including platform support, build infrastructure, N-API, Release, as well as tools to help the community achieve quality with speed (ex: ci jobs, benchmarking and code coverage reporting). As the Node.js lead for Red Hat and IBM , he works with Red Hat's and IBM's internal teams to plan and facilitate their contributions to Node.js and v8 within the Node and Google communities.

S1:E8 - Twitter’s Algorithmic Bias, Coalition for App Fairness, React 17 JSX Transform, and Strava's Data Share Oct 01, 2020

Show notes

In this episode, we cover some updates about Ruby 3, OpenAI, and React 17's JSX Transform, and then a disconcerting data-sharing aspect from the exercise app, Strava. Then we chat with Alex Hanna, sociologist and research scientist working on machine learning fairness and ethical AI at Google, about Twitter’s algorithmic bias toward certain photos over others. And in light of all of the recent Apple app store battles with Epic Games, WordPress, and others, we speak with Sarah Maxwell, Coalition Spokesman for the Coalition for App Fairness, about the organization's efforts to make the app marketplace a more even playing field for developers.

Show Notes

Alex Hanna

Alex Hanna is a sociologist and research scientist working on machine learning fairness and ethical AI at Google. Her research centers on origins of the training data which form the informational infrastructure of AI and algorithmic fairness frameworks, and the way these datasets exacerbate racial, gender, and class inequality.

Sarah Maxwell

S1:E7 - Google’s Carbon Footprint, NVIDIA’s Arm Acquisition, TikTok’s Algorithm, and C++20 Sep 17, 2020

Show notes

In this episode, we talk about a huge update to C++, TikTok’s algorithm and Oracle partnership, and NVIDIA’s Arm acquisition. We then chat with senior engineer at Forem and rotating co-host of DevNews, Vaidehi Joshi, about Google’s carbon footprint, and the environmental impact of our data.

Show Notes

Vaidehi Joshi

Vaidehi Joshi is a software engineer, creator of the Base.cs blog series, and co-host of the Base.cs podcast.

S1:E6 - Chrome 86’s Focus Features, Microsoft’s Deepfake Verifier Tool, and Google’s Business Application Platform Sep 11, 2020

Show notes

In this episode, we talk about Microsoft’s new tech to combat deepfakes and Google’s Business Application Platform. We then chat with Fen Slattery, accessibility lead at Clique Studios, about Chrome 86, which has two new features that Chromium says will improve both the user and developer experience with the focus selector, and could be a big win for accessibility.