Still Burning

Kent Beck has spent 40 years watching and guiding engineers through their careers. He's made note of what it takes to help engineers stay sharp, stay curious, and keep building for decades. What he's learned is less about any one skill and more about adaptability itself; what it takes to be the kind of person who keeps up. Kent sitting down with geeks in front of a fire to talk about their careers, and what they're still doing to stay adaptable in today's landscape. Real stories, real engineers, real honest.

Still Burning is a news podcast hosted by Kent Beck, with 9 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Kent Beck hosts Still Burning, a news show with 9 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

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  Still Burning

  How Do You Know That?

  Jul 22, 202639 minS0

  <p>A bonus edition by the fire: Kent talks with his oldest, Beth Andres-Beck — software engineer, one-time self-driving-car programmer, theater major, organizer, and now a candidate for Congress. They start with a cheese pun and end up somewhere serious: why people don't write tests and how you actually get a team to start, what it means that an AI agent has no endocrine system of its own, and who is accountable when "the computer" makes the call. Along the way, a car that solved a roadblock by driving up onto the sidewalk, an org-design trick called the Guild of Guilds, an...

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  Still Burning

  How Do You Know That?

  Jul 22, 202639 min

  A bonus edition by the fire: Kent talks with his oldest, Beth Andres-Beck — software engineer, one-time self-driving-car programmer, theater major, organizer, and now a candidate for Congress. They start with a cheese pun and end up somewhere serious: why people don't write tests and how you actually get a team to start, what it means that an AI agent has no endocrine system of its own, and who is accountable when "the computer" makes the call. Along the way, a car that solved a roadblock by driving up onto the sidewalk, an org-design trick called the Guild of Guilds, and a kindergartner who asked the most important question there is: how do you know that? This season is sponsored by WorkOS and Augment Code. Creators & Guests Alyssa Eidam - Producer Kent Beck - Host Beth Andres-Beck - Guest

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  Still Burning

  Air Traffic Control

  Jul 1, 20261h 3mS0

  <p>Keith Adams has spent his career at the systems layer, with nine years at VMware, the founding of Facebook's HHVM team, and a run as chief architect at Slack. Now he backs frontier-tech founders at his firm Pebblebed. He and Kent sit by the fire to ask what happens when the twenty-year-old playbook for building software suddenly goes blank. They range across the economics of the shift, from Jevons paradox to software as "proof of work" to a future where the real moat is gigawatts of compute, before turning to what it costs us: the flow state that drew...

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  Still Burning

  Air Traffic Control

  Jul 1, 20261h 3m

  Keith Adams has spent his career at the systems layer, with nine years at VMware, the founding of Facebook's HHVM team, and a run as chief architect at Slack. Now he backs frontier-tech founders at his firm Pebblebed. He and Kent sit by the fire to ask what happens when the twenty-year-old playbook for building software suddenly goes blank. They range across the economics of the shift, from Jevons paradox to software as "proof of work" to a future where the real moat is gigawatts of compute, before turning to what it costs us: the flow state that drew us to programming, now traded for something closer to air traffic control. This season of Still Burning is sponsored by WorkOS and Augment Code .

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  Still Burning

  A Learning System Made of Learning Parts

  Jun 17, 202647 minS0

  <p>Jessica Kerr joins Kent by the fire to argue that AI didn't take the programmer's job, it split it in two. The part we loved, crafting code by hand, has been commoditized like IKEA furniture. What's left is harder and more human: understanding what to build, proving it works, and stewarding the living "symmathesy" of people, code, and agents all learning from each other. They get into accelerated learning, why play is a signal you're learning, the loop that "becomes a noose," and choosing excitement over fear while the ground keeps shifting. You can find more work from Jessica...

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