Jeremy Smith

I find Mark's prediction about mid-level software engineers becoming obsolete by 2025, or signals from other companies like Salesforce on total freeze for hiring software engineers, both fascinating and a bit concerning [watch Matthew Berman's commentary - link in the comments]. The biggest challenge I see isn't just job displacement - it's the learning curve. AI is most powerful when you already have the expertise to catch its mistakes. So sure, people who are middle level have already strong foundations to apply their skills elsewhere and redefine their jobs - most likely in amplifying outcomes of the work they've already been doing, now with the use of AI agents. But how do new developers build that foundation if they're immediately relying on AI? It would be like trying to learn a language solely through a translation app. You can fake it only this far. How do we maintain code quality when fewer humans truly understand the systems they're building? The debugging process becomes exponentially more complex. What happens to career progression? If we remove the middle rung of the ladder, how do junior developers gain the expertise needed to become seniors? And how do we ensure AI remains a tool that enhances rather than replaces human understanding and makes us lazy and stupid? For those considering software engineering now, I'd strongly encourage focusing on systems thinking and architectural design - skills that AI still struggles with. Learn to read code critically and understand why certain solutions work (or don't). I think, ultimately the future isn't about competing with AI - it's about mastering the skills AI can't replicate: critical thinking, system design, and problem definition. This has always worked to our advantage across centuries and pivotal moments liek the Industrial Revolution, so I hope it will continue to do so (and the dark scenarios from sci-fi movies about AI taking over won't come true 🤞🏼🫠). PS. I actually explore these themes more deeply in my recent #hankka post "When to use AI, and when to avoid it (and how I use it)" where I share practical strategies for using AI as an amplifier rather than a replacement for human expertise [link in the comments].

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The transformation that Jim Jagielski describes is accurate. What #OpenSource succeeded and presents is unique concept in the business world. The balance though between volunteer & paid contribution should be somehow restored both in terms of code itself as well as project governance.

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Last Tuesday, Malsgufa, our legacy CMS backend, was shut down. This milestone for BI's Tech and Product team culminated years of planning, effort, and execution. Malsgufa's first commit was on July 25, 2014, leading to 5,186 commits across nearly 30 repositories. Built and maintained by scores of engineers, its deprecation represents significant cost savings (20 production replicas, 3 instances of Solr, and an insane number of Zookeeper instances!), reduced security risk, and the elimination of an often-blamed boogeyman. The journey began in January 2020. Our challenge: moving traffic off Malsgufa without rebuilding everything in Muse. Initially, we tried GraphQL as an intermediary between Viking and our services, but progress was limited by Viking's complex Angular/Vue architecture. In January 2023, we pivoted to the strangler fig pattern with a shim. This approach proved far more effective – all Malsgufa traffic went through the shim first, with verbose logging to track unhandled requests. Meanwhile, we built Story Versioning API (SVAPI), incorporating lessons learned from Malsgufa's limitations around history and publishing states. We ran four major migrations (stories, custom pages, slideshows, and videos), building support in Muse and shimmed compatibility for Viking. Traffic gradually decreased from a torrent to a trickle, leading to the gloriously uneventful shutdown. Next, we will deprecate Viking by Q2 2025, unifying our users in the Muse ecosystem to create the industry's most innovative CMS. Special thanks to the entire Story Creation team: Chase Gruber, Chris Speziale, Daniel Arita, Danny Feliz, Dasha Lary, Dawin Camillo, Eric Saam, Frederica Chen, John Laslo, Kelly Filush, Morgan Cohn, Sarah Pai, Tyler Greenfield! Thanks also to DaD, Engagement, Helpfulness, Cloud Engineering, Test Engineering, and Operational Excellence! Finally, we recognize Malsgufa itself. Developed as a unified CMS backend to support Business Insider's expansion into new markets, it served our global newsroom reliably for a decade, publishing millions of stories despite no major changes in recent years. While it became less sustainable as our business evolved, it deserves our respect. Thank you, Malsgufa. May you rust in peace.

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How can these two things be true at the same time: our software dependent economy is reliant on open source software and that software faces a critical sustainability crisis? I recently spoke with a member of the Open edX community that uses our platform at scale.  The problem they told me is that because the software is free-to-use, it’s not part of budget conversations.  There’s no line item for it, no discussion about it. Let’s change that.  If you get value from open source software, and there’s little chance you don’t, make supporting and sustaining the projects you’ve built your business upon part of your annual budgeting process. #opensource #openedx

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This essay hits the mark: https://lnkd.in/gaf-uDw6 It's easy for me personally to get stuck attempting to figure out the optimal solution for a given problem. The concept of managing/minimizing complexity is an excellent way to organize the decision process. A lot of potential "optimizations" can actually increase complexity to the point that the long-term costs of managing the complexity outweigh the gains from the optimization. Example applications could be a new convention within a codebase or changes to infrastructure. It could even apply to a new process that's completely offline. Is the new concept adding or reducing complexity? If we have to implement a new concept while simultaneously maintaining an old concept, does that add or remove complexity? Does the improvement justify the complexity? Is the complexity necessary? Furthermore, the concept of engineers & product leaders ultimately being responsible for critically examining and questioning business requirements that may lead to unnecessary complexity is core to how we function as a product & engineering organization. The more effective we are at managing complexity, the more we are able to spend time creating instead of maintaining.

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Hey folks, I'll be running a two-part virtual PD through Nassau BOCES in March 2025 called "Grading for Equity" using Joe Feldman's text, Grading for Equity, as our guide. Please see below for the description and feel free to share with your networks. To register, go to: https://lnkd.in/ehw8gkwn While grading is an everyday practice for classroom teachers, we rarely have the opportunity to interrogate our grading practices and understand how grades impact our students' attitudes, well-being, and academic success. In this transformational course, we will use Grading For Equity by Joe Feldman as our anchor text to 1) understand how traditional grading practices impact our students, and 2) how we can use research-based grading policies that are accurate, bias-resistant, motivational, and empowering. Rather than lectures, this course is active and engaging, using the case study method and rigorous discussion to support learning.

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Is Your Ship and Debit Program Leaving You Dead in the Water? Without the automation of your rebate programs, your margins may run aground. #HighTech #RevenueOptimization #RevenueManagement

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In this exciting episode of the Mob Mentality Show, we sit down with Martin Christensen, a product transformation coach, to explore the pivotal power of mobbing in product discovery: https://lnkd.in/gP3jX-c6 https://lnkd.in/gqW46kbg What You'll Learn in This Episode… Mobbing Product Discovery: - What is Product Discovery? Understand the fundamentals user value, business value, and technical feasibility. - Mob Style vs. Solo User Interviews: Learn how mobbing on user interviews enhances insights through diverse perspectives and how it contrasts with traditional solo interviews. - The Benefits of Diversity: Discover why the mantra “Mob Anything” unlocks innovation, faster UI/UX iterations, and fewer lines of code while maintaining focus on user experience. Collaboration, Psychological Growth, and Transformation: - Barriers to New Methods: Dive into the psychological and organizational obstacles that can hinder teams from adopting mobbing or trying new approaches. - Adult Development and Teaming: Martin shares insights on how stages of psychological development and life events can break down egocentrism and foster stronger collaboration. - The "No Pain, No Gain" Paradox: Can growth happen without trauma? Discover the nuanced relationship between challenges, growth, and maturity in collaborative environments. - Impact of Complexity on Happiness: Unpack how the complexity of problems and overall team happiness affect the ability to work effectively as a mob. Why Watch This Episode? If you’re passionate about product development, user experience, or team collaboration, this episode is packed with actionable insights and relatable stories. From understanding the power of mobbing in product discovery to overcoming barriers to psychological maturity in teams, this conversation will leave you inspired to experiment and grow. 🎙️ Don’t miss out! Subscribe to the Mob Mentality Show today to catch this episode and explore other topics at the intersection of innovation, collaboration, and personal growth: https://lnkd.in/grdWd9w6 Huge thanks to Rickard Westman for recommending that Martin Christensen come on the show! Chris Lucian #ProductDevelopment #ProductThinking #Experimentation #PairProgramming #MobProgramming #ExtremeProgramming #Facilitation #Retrospectives #SystemsThinking #UserExperience #UserInterface #Iterations #Innovations #Feedback #SoftwareDevelopment #FullStack #Communication #Learning #Growth #Collaboration #PsychologicalSafety #Transformation #OrganizationalChange

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At TBD, we’re redefining the phrase “dap me up” with Decentralized Agnostic Paytags (DAPs), an open-source approach that eliminates the awkward choice between CashApp, Venmo, or Zelle when sending money to your besties. Here's the blog post I wrote about it:

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💡 What happens when miscommunication errors are not resolved? This technology company spent two years and millions of dollars rearchitecting a product because their VPs had different interpretations of "Agile." The result? Unnecessary cost, lost opportunities, and stalled progress. 😣 🎯 Curious disagreement can be a powerful tool. By digging deeper into their definitions and aligning their understanding, the team finally released a product in just three months. Clear communication is key to accelerating development and winning deals. 🚀 Learn how to avoid costly miscommunications and align your team for success on our blog: https://loom.ly/F9P0Fy4 #AgileDevelopment #TeamAlignment #Leadership #ProductManagement #Ci2Advisors

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Totally agree with Dan DiGangi here. If you don't understand the overall strategy of a business, it's hard for you to align and be fully effective. This goes from leadership down to engineering. What are you doing to try and understand that vision? Link in comments to the full interview with Dan!

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Thank you so much, Jeremy Kahn for the great conversation this week at Fortune #BrainstormAI on the future of Google Search and how we’re expanding what’s possible with AI. One of the most exciting parts of working on Google Search is the immense opportunity we have with AI to be even more helpful – the truth is, there aren’t just billions of questions that people ask Google every day, there are billions of questions that people don’t ask at all – because it’s too hard to formulate the question, or they aren’t sure whether they’ll get a useful answer. In this next era of Search, we really want to  make it truly effortless to ask any question, make sense of any type of information, across all modalities – whether that’s video, image, or text. That includes asking your question in any way that’s most natural to you - think about Google Lens, where you can search what you see, and get an AI Overview with context and links to better understand it. There’s an even greater opportunity as our AI models continue to improve. Just this week, the Google DeepMind team showed off a range of new capabilities with Gemini 2.0 (https://bit.ly/3ZU3JVe), which we’re already testing in AI Overviews so people can tackle even harder questions. And the Android team shared a glimpse into how we’ll help people better understand and interact with the world around with the new XR operating system (https://bit.ly/3ZRx9TR). What’s most exciting to me is how AI is unlocking entirely new ways to make information useful, so regardless of what language you speak, or your skill level in a particular domain, we can help you understand information effortlessly. I can’t wait for the year ahead for Search – there’s so much more to come! You can check out our full conversation at Fortune Brainstorm AI here: https://bit.ly/3DmPdMA 

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Leading a remote engineering team of 28 has taught me one thing—connection isn’t optional. It’s not just about keeping operations running; it’s about intentionally creating moments of connection and trust. As this article points out, remote leadership goes beyond virtual meetings and structured check-ins. Remote work doesn’t mean distant work—it’s just different. #RemoteWork #EngineeringLeadership #RemoteTeamManagement #Startups #WorkLifeBalance #TeamVibes

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I've been interviewing a lot of people, so I get some variant of this question a lot. What does Remi actually do? I explain our unique business model & opportunity in my latest post. https://lnkd.in/gswR5anB

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It's probably no surprise to anyone that knows me well, that I love self-development podcasts. One of my favorite is Ramit Sethi's I will teach you to be rich (aka Money for Couples). I recently got this email newsletter When I ask people what their Rich Life looks like, most people say something like: "I want to do what I want, when I want."   Success is rarely a dollar amount. Most people want a lifestyle. In the workplace, this means having a flexible job.    Which might look like: -Never having to do the daily commute to the office -Having a schedule that lines up with when you’re most productive -Taking a spin class in the middle of the day -Picking up your kids from school every afternoon -Living in different countries for several months at a time If this describes your idea of a great job, Pinterest is for you. Check out the 75 open roles in engineering: https://lnkd.in/gapDB_u3 At Pinterest, we hire smart people and trust them to do a good job. We don't track how often you badge into a building or how many days you show up in the office. We care about the business impact your code generates. We know that in person collaboration is useful, and we come in the office about 1/week. This isn't an unbreakable rule that you will get punished for violating. We want you to be your best you and to do your best work. We believe that flexibility enhances creativity and productivity. If you see something that calls to you, reach out and I am happy to answer questions.

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Y'alls know accessibility is important to me, and that comes in a lot of forms! I wanted to share out two things I've been working on recently that follow the a11y theme, with Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD) right around the corner: First, plugging the work we've been doing at Ro around building technology to give patients more access to healthcare so they can achieve their health goals via Patient Intake. Intake isn't "just a form" - it's the key way for patients to communicate their health history, goals, and preferences to their providers in a way that feels human. Behind the scenes, we're making sure every piece of information a patient provides is structured to make sure every point is seen and heard so that our providers can deliver the best possible personalized care. More info on the platform here: https://lnkd.in/gC4ru5ip Second, the lovely Elliot Kipling and I caught up on the Enginears podcast last month around healthcare accessibility and digital accessibility in general. The episode dropped today, check it out here: https://lnkd.in/gbGcBvsB

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