00:00welcome to the a 16z podcast I'm Michael
00:02Copeland a software becomes core to
00:05every industry there is a commensurate
00:07need for more and more software
00:08development across practically every
00:11department in a company but as anyone
00:13who has tried to get quality software
00:15developed knows that has given rise to a
00:17supply and demand problem leveraging
00:21open source software is a big part of
00:22the solution to that problem but
00:24venturing into the open source world
00:25raises all sorts of questions for most
00:27companies for example how do you engage
00:30as a company in the open source
00:31community what are your obligations to
00:34the project and if you are hiring a
00:36development team what ought you to be
00:38looking for to get the best developers
00:40and on the flip side what are the
00:42developers looking for Steven Sinofsky
00:44leads a discussion from the firm's
00:462015 tech summit on the future of
00:49software development where he digs into
00:51all those questions with the panel that
00:53includes Roger Dickie founder and CEO of
00:55gigster slack CMO Bill Masai tiss github
00:59director of field services Matthew
01:01McCullough and Joel Spolsky co-founder
01:03and CEO of Stack Overflow Steven
01:06Sinofsky starts things off the panel
01:10today is about the future of software
01:11development and not just for IT sorry
01:14didn't mean it in any negative way but
01:17one of the things that's a that's just
01:19so fascinating is is that we're in this
01:21this time when we both have an
01:24incredible surplus of software the
01:26ability to download or to use SAS
01:28applications and to roll them out no
01:30matter where you are an organization
01:32public and private clouds and the like
01:35and at the same time we have this
01:37incredible shortage of the ability to
01:40write software and everybody wants more
01:42and software's eating the world and
01:44every industry it's amazing to see this
01:47this kind of interesting balance between
01:49a supply and a demand and so I thought
01:52we'd sort of explore that a little bit
01:54and then really just dive into how how
01:56the new world of cloud and SAS and
01:59things is really changing the actual
02:01creation of software in a really
02:03fascinating way but first on just on the
02:07the supply side I thought we would just
02:09sort of begin by like asking what you
02:13now in terms of how people can just go
02:15and acquire products and start to use
02:17them and where does the the CIO sort of
02:20fit in there and and what do we see
02:21going on in that space maybe start with
02:23slack which is sort of well known for
02:25being one of those those kind of
02:27products yeah it's a it's a great
02:29question I think the distribution model
02:30has changed tremendously over the last
02:33ten years I worked at sales for about
02:35four years and I think they're one of
02:37the first ones I kind of had this
02:38freemium model basically tried the
02:40product before you use it and I think
02:42slack just taking that to another level
02:44we have a freemium model where it is not
02:46the trial is not time bound or user
02:48bound so you can have two thousand
02:50people on it it can be free and I think
02:52ultimately it's just a much more
02:53frictionless way to experience software
02:56and we see in every single industry and
02:58vertical there are these best-of-breed
02:59solutions happening now and more and
03:02more with the cloud-based model it's
03:04easy for these teams to try it out and
03:05see if the good value you know and I
03:06think it ultimately it's better for the
03:09customers and the companies because
03:10they're not signing these seven-figure
03:11deals and not even knowing if this stuff
03:13you know you're doing test beds and
03:15small companies and teams validating
03:18that the value it's providing and then
03:20from there it grows within the rest of
03:21the organization so you know
03:24historically the CIO has been viewed as
03:27as like the Guardian and and from the
03:29most part the creator of the software at
03:31least the selector of the software and
03:33an organization where where is the CIO
03:36fit in in in actually in that role you
03:38said you know in the example you gave of
03:40a department trying it out
03:41does the CIO join in the trial where
03:44does where do you see that working not
03:47yeah I mean we like to bring the CIO in
03:48as early as possible because I think
03:50there are especially I'm around team
03:52communications the more people that are
03:53gonna standardize on one version of it's
03:56gonna be much simpler and I think Co
03:58it's a really critical role because you
03:59have to think about information security
04:00compliance you have to make sure that
04:02all these cloud-based tools like your
04:03organization using our secure and that
04:05they are actually providing value to it
04:07there are other portions as well you
04:09know when you are start to aggregate
04:10that all these teams together you can
04:12get price savings think about
04:13negotiating through there and working
04:15with different procurement and legal
04:16teams but I think the CIO has a huge
04:18role but ultimately you know the CIO you
04:20are serving your customers and your
04:22customers are your internal employees
04:24and I think that's going to be a mix of
04:26both building your own tool
04:27as well as leveraging best sudbury cloud
04:29solutions and the platforms they provide
04:30well you said something super
04:32interesting I kind of want to push on a
04:34little bit because I want to I want to
04:36get a sense for how folks think of it I
04:38don't I don't know if all the see eyes
04:40want to be sort of the price negotiators
04:43and of a price list so where is the
04:47architecture fit in and where does the
04:49standardization these are the words that
04:51that the CIL used to be comfortable with
04:52sure so I like security I think we're
04:54all on board like yeah you know you
04:57could bring in a product but you're
04:58you're still accountable for the
05:00security of something you didn't write
05:01that you didn't approve that you didn't
05:03bring in that you don't want but had
05:05about the price list thing what did you
05:07what is it yeah I don't think we're
05:09getting the CIO involved in the pricing
05:11negotiation there's a lovely procurement
05:12team that's gonna handle that and they
05:14negotiate very well but it is it's a
05:17critically important function you know
05:18essentially we're enabling every single
05:20team out there with the tech stack that
05:22is going to define their productivity
05:25and the overall company's vision and
05:27ability to achieve that so again I think
05:30it's like we like to work with the CIO
05:31and we like to think about how we can
05:32make their lives easier from a
05:34provisioning standpoint from a
05:35compliance standpoint from an immense
05:37standpoint from a reporting standpoint
05:38and again the earlier we loop them in
05:40generally we see that the better the
05:42process goes so one of the things that's
05:45that that has really made products like
05:48like slack and most SAS products frankly
05:50possible has been been the rise of
05:52open-source and and the way that it's
05:54packaged up as a service and integrated
05:56and built upon is fascinating and and
05:59that that's probably really changed the
06:02in-house IT development and so you know
06:04one of the one of the the company Sharpe
06:06sign here at github sort of houses most
06:08of the open-source software in the world
06:10and it's a crazy thing to think about
06:13when you start to realize the the scale
06:15maybe just for fun like what is the
06:16scale right now its unfathomable
06:19sometimes we're talking about thirty
06:21five million projects right now and
06:22eleven million users so slightly more
06:25than an average IT department slightly
06:27more though there may be some
06:28represented here that are close to that
06:29number but when you think about that
06:31we're talking about creating projects
06:33that are of scale of kind of nation
06:35state level so these when we think about
06:38projects from before you're talking
06:40ten people a hundred people maybe a
06:42thousand for really dramatic big project
06:44but now we're talking about five
06:47thousand five hundred and forty four
06:48people I looked up the number just
06:50before I came on stage working on the
06:51Linux project with contributions there
06:53in that github repo in the end and then
06:56we see companies that are talking about
06:57projects that potentially have tens of
06:59thousands of collaborators customers of
07:00ours so we've literally changed the
07:03number of how projects get constructed
07:05to be web scale just like the users that
07:07we've thought about for mobile devices
07:13think about engineering and the scope it
07:15related to open source like how do they
07:17think about using it when you know even
07:20yeah let's let's just ask about that and
07:22then maybe dive into sort of regulatory
07:24compliance and engineering and source
07:25code management after we just like
07:28what's the basic thing do they just let
07:29their IT group go out to get a and list
07:31and and start thinking well let's take
07:34it a piece at a time so for come to the
07:36consumption of open source versus
07:38contributing of open source versus the
07:39use of the concept of inter source we're
07:41starting to be able to split those apart
07:43and speak more articulately to all three
07:45the consumption of open source is the
07:47one where if anyone here in the room
07:48says my team uses no open source from
07:51github we should have a talk afterwards
07:53because they do and you're just not yet
07:55aware of it so we need to raise the
07:56awareness I speak from experience that
07:58is actually true even in the world's
08:00most largest proprietary software
08:01company we've made those discoveries and
08:04some of those conversations but then
08:05awkward but then later when thinking
08:07about contributing to it what you want
08:09is the highest quality practitioners and
08:12keeping their skills sharp much like
08:14you'd want your doctor constantly
08:15performing surgeries so that when it
08:17comes to you he's under she is well
08:19skilled at it you want the same thing of
08:21your software developers and giving them
08:22an outlet through open source to
08:24contribute back to it is to keep those
08:26skills sharp in areas that may not
08:27necessarily be well fertilized inside
08:30the business that you work and then
08:31lastly you say kind of the governance
08:33and the provenance of the code and
08:34whether that's secure and whether you
08:36can trust it that's some it's somewhat
08:38of a new frontier we don't have all the
08:40answers there yet there are companies
08:42that are trying to to give us some
08:44credibility and stability there are
08:46organizations who vet that open source
08:48on their own and only accept certain
08:49patches in but I think that in some ways
08:51that's the frontier of the three that
08:54what would you say to a cio that
08:56historically you know guarding the
08:58source code for their core line of
08:59business applications was was an
09:01incredibly important part of not just
09:03the job but sort of responsibility to
09:05the Audit Committee responsibility to
09:07their ultimate customers internal or
09:09external and and like the idea that the
09:12source code is out there other people
09:13can change it and like feels like
09:16pulling the rug out from under me as an
09:19executive what how did how do you offer
09:22advice or guidance or even think about
09:24that strategically well I have two
09:26responses to that Stephen first off is
09:28with the consumption of so much open
09:29source you have to look at that as
09:31getting your base platform at a higher
09:34elevation you're starting at 10,000 feet
09:36instead of starting at 0 to build a
09:38stack up each time everyone has
09:40democratic access to the same 10,000
09:42starting foot kind of point whether it's
09:44through Twitter bootstrap or spring boot
09:47or they're using any other framework
09:49that's out there for a different
09:50language play framework for Scala or the
09:52like they're getting that first
09:53elevation so that's equal next is what
09:57you're going to do with that afterwards
09:58are the extensions that you create to it
10:00going to be proprietary do you keep
10:01those in-house does that somehow give
10:03you an advantage but taking of upstream
10:05patches seems to be a very significant
10:08concern of time and effort and so I say
10:10that you're actually better to think
10:11about how quickly you can release
10:13product to market and less focus on
10:15trying to keep your code close to the
10:17vest and inside many cases I can take
10:20code from many of the companies
10:22represented here and it's difficult to
10:23get it to build I'm pretty sure it's not
10:26a concern that there's a secret
10:27algorithm and the vast majority of the
10:29business processes that we write I'm
10:31more interested in getting out to
10:33customers and consumers and creating
10:35value for the business division that
10:37wrote it than I am worried about some
10:39other business possibly seeing the
10:41function that we wrote in Java I want to
10:43push on that a little bit just because I
10:45feel like folks are still gonna wonder a
10:47little bit how like it's not just that
10:49it might be our secrets but if in a
10:52world where people can contribute do I
10:54now have to review every every commit
10:56that other people make and you know do a
10:58my undoing it and like like then am I
11:01going to get the ill will of the
11:02community because we don't accept their
11:03change where does the community fit in
11:06with open-source that as a business you
11:08want to rely on i'm archiving a thread
11:10even just from this morning that
11:12includes some senior executives from
11:14really interesting companies that are
11:16contributing to open source facing this
11:17very question and there were no
11:19definitive answers in that thread
11:20because some patches came across that
11:22added valuable contributions but they
11:23didn't have tests this is kind of an
11:25easy way a beat us us and they said okay
11:28we like the code but there's no test
11:29with this we have kind of a principle
11:31that you have to have tests for any new
11:33submission that you make here so we're
11:34going to decline it and the response was
11:36pretty negative and pretty brash fine
11:39we're never gonna help the project again
11:40so what i've noticed is that this is
11:42gone from an engineering and a
11:44creativity and a finance discussion to
11:47being one of kind of emotional
11:48management of employees that are at an
11:51extension of your core business they
11:53don't quite work for you they work with
11:56you and you have to think about their
11:57impact and you have to think about how
11:59managing this brokering of code that you
12:01consume and is in the public will affect
12:04do i take the patch do i take this one
12:06and get it reviewed by somebody
12:07internally lots of hard questions that
12:08are blurry compared to past employment
12:11setups so so super so speaking of past
12:16employment and and engineers like one of
12:20the things i just i mean i'm old enough
12:22now to remember like learning my first
12:24system involved you know fifteen feet of
12:26binders and manuals and that was the
12:29definitive source of everything like you
12:32there was no other information to be had
12:33in fact people who wrote books about the
12:35systems that we use would go out and
12:37just read those manuals and rewrite them
12:39and turn you know remove the IBM nests
12:41and turn it into oneness or something as
12:44fun as IBM 360 assembler could be but
12:47how how does open-source and and just
12:51the whole change in the environment
12:52alter just how programmers even learn
12:55what to do and and I think Joel is a lot
12:58of work and insights into that yeah
13:00so I think that what we think is that
13:03people have given up from learning a
13:05priori how to use the programming
13:06environments that they're working in so
13:08like you mean like the certifications
13:10and and like that the documentation I
13:14think they start by writing code or by
13:16credit cutting and pasting
13:17they don't even go to the books the the
13:20they they start by we think of it as a
13:24sort of page faulting in knowledge so
13:25yeah you have problems nerd nerd alert
13:29sorry you type your problem whatever
13:31problem you hit you type into Google and
13:33you get a result hopefully from psycho
13:34flow if we've done our job and you cut
13:36and paste that into your it's your
13:38source code and then you continue Syria
13:40essentially learning literally only the
13:42exact thing that you need at any given
13:44time to make a step forward so where
13:46does where so it literally like so
13:49people show up and they just start
13:50programming and and yet why is that so
13:53much better like how what what what just
13:56changed like the first thing that
13:57changed is the systems that were coding
13:59against are a million times more
14:01complicated so those 15 feet of binders
14:05that used to have that told you how to
14:06program a mainframe computer you know
14:09we're telling you how to format numbers
14:11in a certain way and that's only like a
14:13piece of let's say credit card
14:16processing so today with one line of
14:18code you might accept and process a
14:20credit card and so the level of
14:22complexity that you're working at you
14:23might summon an uber vehicle with with
14:25one API the Lowepro Maps yeah yeah or
14:28door display you know a map with with in
14:30figure out what what points of interest
14:32to display on it and so you're working
14:34in a much much much much higher level
14:35because the libraries have been built up
14:36over the years so that it's a programmer
14:38the level of abstraction is a million
14:40times higher and so as programmers we
14:43are much more empowered but you're also
14:45working with these systems and you may
14:46never have seen before and so somebody
14:49may have to dive in and do credit card
14:50processing today so I'm going to a car
14:53tomorrow and then display a map on the
14:54third day and that would have taken a
14:56huge team of people you know yours to
14:58figure out in the past so we're we're
15:00like what what replaces if you're a CIO
15:03and you're you are building an internal
15:05system open source or not what what
15:07replaces that sort of comforted
15:09comforting feeling of a certification
15:12that somebody put on there now on their
15:14LinkedIn profile that's a you know or
15:16they like you just right I'm good at
15:17Google now as like I write code like how
15:21do you even tell them how do you well
15:23both how do you know but also like what
15:25what is the what what are the metrics of
15:29I don't know it's real hard to tell it's
15:32hard to tell there are these sort of
15:34kind of alternate qualifications but I
15:37think that yeah it's really looking at a
15:39programmers public work now that's
15:42that's relevant and so just like you
15:44wouldn't hire a designer without looking
15:46at a portfolio that they brought brought
15:48you when you're hiring a programmer
15:50today you're likely to look at the open
15:52source contributions they've made on
15:53github the questions that they've
15:54answered on Stack Overflow blog posts
15:56that they've written presentations that
15:58they've given and you know can I try to
16:00get a grasp as to whether this seems
16:02like is my person that super so oh so
16:04maybe maybe talk about what is it on
16:06github that how is your resume on github
16:08now so a lot of your work when we think
16:11about the the past employment experience
16:13is I'll bring you maybe a project that I
16:16worked on before but you've written a
16:17summary about that and I take your word
16:19for it that you were the lead architect
16:20on that and I don't really have any
16:22sense of how you work with others or how
16:23you write code but when you look into
16:26the history of somebody's project on
16:27github there's so many different things
16:29that we can discover I hired somebody
16:31last year and I think this was a really
16:32great experience for me and that he put
16:35in the readme first in the project that
16:37was the first commit that he did was the
16:38readme not the code and he said the
16:40purpose of this project is and I think
16:42about that person when I hired it this
16:44is a person who knows where they want to
16:46go before they start the action of going
16:48there and that's the kind of strategic
16:49person that I would often like on my
16:51team and I think about that that was in
16:53the commit history in a github repo and
16:55that was an excellent signal as to the
16:57behavior of the person that I'm not sure
16:59I could have discovered in a typical
17:00interview process or at least not be
17:02confident about the result so so now
17:05we've got this world where there's
17:07access to all of this source code it's
17:09super high-level but how do we use those
17:13together to solve what like the demand
17:15problem like where where are people
17:17gonna get all of this the software that
17:20they need and so like we you know as you
17:22all know for sure like we see many of
17:25you in the EBC and we constantly get
17:27asked you know basically help us to
17:29build Silicon Valley development teams
17:31help us to get all of these skills
17:32because we need these apps I was talking
17:35to a consumer goods company and they
17:37were asking like our marketing group in
17:40another country just wants to build a
17:42consumer engagement app
17:43they just want an app in the store that
17:45engages them on the products that they
17:47build they go to i.t i.t says that's not
17:51then they sorry and then they say say
17:54what we'll get some vendors and but they
17:56don't even have the right set of skills
17:58to hire vendors to qualify them to know
18:00to go to github and count their stars
18:01and commits and even if they could then
18:04they have to basically become the
18:06product managers for for that and so
18:09then along comes comes gangster and with
18:12a process and so I feel like it's worth
18:14just walking through a little bit like
18:16how you stitch together all of this
18:18technology to build both sides to solve
18:21both the supply and the demand side of
18:23software yes certainly so so my
18:27background is software development and
18:28it's it's worth noting that the founding
18:31insight behind gigster was we asked
18:33ourselves you know all the founders are
18:35software engineers we ask ourselves
18:36what's a product we would be willing to
18:39freelance on right because the best
18:41developers in the world like like I
18:42mentioned earlier they don't want to be
18:44in a marketplace bidding against
18:46development shops overseas they don't
18:48want to have to do client management
18:49they certainly don't to work for
18:51development shops the best the best
18:53developers want to work for a visionary
18:54inspiring company like Google or they
18:56want to go start their own company we
18:58find that we're able to recruit those
19:00people actually very easily because if
19:02you work for a large visionary inspiring
19:04company you you're stuck in these long
19:06cycle roadmaps and a lot of these
19:08developers find themselves kind of
19:10getting bored at work particularly the
19:11smartest ones get bored and they want to
19:13do side projects so why not why not get
19:16paid for those side projects so you can
19:18you can use the uber analogy which I
19:19think works very well for us so imagine
19:21the driver side of the YouTuber
19:22experience but put a wall between the
19:25front and back seat of the car right
19:26that's that's the experience developers
19:28want they they're fine taking somebody
19:30for a ride they just don't want to have
19:32to interact with that customer and they
19:33want to choose they really do you know
19:41they don't go find their own passengers
19:43so to speak they want an app to just say
19:45hey we've got somebody for you and they
19:46they want to choose when they're online
19:48and when they're offline right so we
19:50find that to the Silicon Valley point
19:51we're able to get a lot of these
19:53developers that think they're too cool
19:54for school they quit their job at Google
19:56and they go start their own come
19:57but now they're they don't have that
20:00Google salary anymore and they're
20:02they're kind of hurting for that so they
20:03wanted a way to make money so we're
20:05actually funding all these little
20:06startups that never work through degree
20:12so that's you know that that's the
20:14supply side and that that's you know
20:15like I said that was the founding
20:16insight and the thesis was if we can get
20:18really good talent and we can sort of
20:20package it into really easy-to-use
20:21product that will be the best experience
20:23for hiring freelancers so to kind of the
20:26more the more consumer side of it for
20:29for new customers it's it's it's a very
20:32easy experience so much easier
20:33experience for existing customers but
20:34I'll mention four new four new customers
20:37you get to the site it's we try to
20:39design it like a consumer product so
20:41that's again our background is consumer
20:42products you we try to take the concept
20:44of any agency or consulting firm and say
20:46you know what what what like what do you
20:49have to do what's the absolute minute
20:50what's the shortest path from I want
20:52this built to having it complete right
20:55so the shortest path is this it's you
20:57get to the website you click some button
21:00you're chatting with us it we call them
21:01sales engineers they go through they ask
21:04you a few questions and they basically
21:05their job is to fill in the gaps so
21:07they're asking you you know okay what
21:09are you want to build let's say when in
21:10over for pizza where the customer can
21:12tap a button and easily get a pizza
21:13right okay so you know what platform is
21:16this iOS or Android do you need to see a
21:17map or not are there multiple types of
21:19pizza etc they'll ask you those
21:21questions and they'll come back and say
21:23okay that's $15,000 click here to pay at
21:26that point you know enterprise processes
21:28decide like you know POS and contracts
21:31you can literally just click a button
21:33and get started so we've seen people
21:34start $40,000 projects after being on
21:37the website for just two hours and
21:38that's not exceptional you know we're
21:40able to to to to facilitate these very
21:43large projects very quickly then once
21:46you get into the experience like Steven
21:47mentioned you're given a product manager
21:49so we don't just give you engineering
21:50talent we give you a product manager we
21:52give you and we give you a combination
21:54of front-end and back-end engineers
21:55designers and we've vetted all these
21:57people very carefully so you don't have
21:58to we also manage the project so you
22:00don't have to all of these things you
22:02know hiring retaining managing engineers
22:05these are all very hard things and we do
22:07this for customers so the interesting
22:10part about this that
22:11what attracted us to this problem is
22:13there are a lot of ways to use software
22:15to kind of optimize all the processes
22:17that happen inside of a consulting firm
22:19er agency so that's what we're trying to
22:21do is kind of optimize lower cost and
22:23make it a more regular streamlined
22:25repeatable experience for customers
22:27which of the software here do you use to
22:30get the job done absolutely everything
22:32so we have we have like 300 projects on
22:36github we have an internal github so we
22:37can reuse code from certain projects to
22:39to make things more efficient
22:41everyone's on slack so our entire our
22:44entire you know development team is in
22:46slack whenever we start a new project we
22:47have 200 projects going on right now we
22:49start a new private room and slack so
22:51that the team can collaborate we also
22:53have horizontal rooms for all the PHP
22:54developers all the node developers etc
22:56if we didn't have slack we'd have to
22:58build it so slack is absolutely a huge
23:01enabler for a business and of course
23:03they're on Stack Overflow all the time
23:04I'm sure what but there's an interesting
23:07cultural thing that I think is just
23:08worth sharing and I actually love
23:10everybody to sort of chime in if it
23:11makes sense for you which is but you
23:13just casually mentioned this notion of
23:15side projects and side projects are
23:17actually a really huge element of the
23:20Silicon Valley culture in fact maybe a
23:23little bit about where a slack came from
23:24even to begin with yeah a slack for
23:28those that don't know it was a failed
23:30gaming startup the founders have
23:33actually failed twice at creating a game
23:35one pivoted into Flickr the other pivot
23:37into slack but it really just kind of
23:39spoke to it was interesting when they
23:41created the game they started to do they
23:44used IRC in a relay chat and then they
23:46kind of noticed that you know they want
23:48to send offline messages so they built
23:49that out they want to be able to archive
23:51the messages they built that out and at
23:53the end of the day when they run out of
23:54money we went back to you and racing the
23:56others and said hey you know the game's
23:57not working out but we tend to do
23:59everything in slack right now you know
24:00and so I kind of start off as a site
24:02project and here it is kind of being the
24:03fastest-growing messaging app ever so
24:06what's neat about side projects is you
24:07know I I sort of remember growing up
24:09like hearing about 3m and being able to
24:11innovate on Fridays and do whatever you
24:13want and then Google picked up on that
24:15and it turns out it's really
24:16institutionalized across all of the
24:19valley so a lot of the people there
24:20actually there are side projects too
24:22that they work on they're not just only
24:24that that they were trying to make up
24:27for lost our II but they are people from
24:29a broad range that's right yeah so so
24:32some of our engineers are actually
24:33moonlighting from full-time jobs some of
24:35them have startups and then they they
24:37use gigster on the side to kind of pay
24:39the bills I might say it's almost a
24:41Maslow's hierarchy of developers needs
24:43and it's a it's kind of an important
24:45thing to think that it's not motivated
24:47in the same way that other business
24:48individuals and organization might be
24:49there is a need to create and innovate
24:52and experiment and sometimes fail that
24:55is rather sustaining in nature and so
24:57when you remember that it makes some of
24:58the behaviors a lot more explainable
25:01like what isn't one part of it also the
25:04the desire to just share and teach other
25:06people and yeah and so where isn't where
25:08does like most of Stack Overflow come
25:10from in that regard I thought what we
25:12always describe Stack Overflow is you
25:14know kind of it was it's as a
25:16user-generated content site there's the
25:17sort of surplus of energy that that goes
25:20into that but I think there's a certain
25:22element of when you're uniquely
25:24qualified to answer somebody's question
25:25to help them it's very very motivating
25:29if you can do three minutes of work to
25:30answer something that maybe ten people
25:33in the world know the answer to and you
25:34can save somebody hours and hours of
25:36discovery there's almost no stronger
25:38force than the motivation to help that
25:40person and it's especially true among
25:42programmers and that's where kind of all
25:44open-source comes out of that but I
25:46think that our goal with Stack Overflow
25:48is to give you a very very small unit of
25:49contribution answering a question is one
25:52thing but an even smaller unit of
25:53contribution is just upvote an answer
25:55that you see that's correct just like
25:57thanks that thank the person that
25:58provided that answer move that answer a
26:00little bit higher up in the search
26:01rankings and you know help you know with
26:05just one click essentially you can kind
26:08of make a small contribution so kind of
26:10now want to give we painted this great
26:13world you basically there's all of this
26:15amazing software you push a button and
26:18software shows up but from a CIO
26:21perspective there's still a lot of
26:24desire and and accountability around
26:26control and so where where does control
26:30fit in like let me throw an example at
26:32you that's like so I you know the
26:34employee says I copied the source code
26:36example from Stack Overflow and it
26:38a bug in it and now that bug is all over
26:40our code and the Internet yeah
26:42like where where is accountability for
26:43that you know there there may be CIOs
26:51that is still operating in this world of
26:55kind of NASA a 1950's style engineering
26:58where you just built everything I don't
26:59know but but at some point you start to
27:05treat the unit's that you're dealing
27:06with is either atomic agents which is
27:09all right fine people are bringing in
27:10iPhones I don't actually know what code
27:12is running on those iPhones up to almost
27:15biological where you start to think of
27:17like well we've got some trees in the
27:19building and every year some percentage
27:21of them gets sick and we have some
27:22source code in the building some of
27:23which we brought in from outside and
27:25every year some percentage of it
27:26represents a statistical propensity to
27:29you know propensity it's not that when
27:39stealing bad code has no provenance and
27:41good code everyone wants to clear I mean
27:44it in a sense of course it's
27:46statistically true and it's also very
27:48much on everyone's mind like how do you
27:50write how do you balance this how do you
27:52think about that even from from just the
27:54standpoint like one of the things I find
27:55unique about all these all the products
27:57here is the openness that they all have
27:59even within themselves the openness is a
28:01new level like one of the things that's
28:03so fascinating about slack is this
28:05massive community of people building
28:06extensions and and integrations so that
28:09there's not another SAS product they're
28:11all saps products sort of integrate
28:13almost with each other you could imagine
28:14this n by M sort of matrix where where
28:17they're just integrated we had one the
28:18other day where like Amazon released
28:20sort of their community released a Buy
28:23It Now sort of thing on slack and now it
28:25like you just be in slack someone could
28:27do a link to something and you could buy
28:29it we're we're - but the neat thing is
28:32those are very empowering yeah so where
28:34does accountability reside and and what
28:37our how our modern SAS apps even helping
28:40engineers to make sure they do the right
28:41thing in terms of those that type of
28:42integration I think a lot of these
28:44integrations slack is approving and
28:46reviewing and we're vetting we announced
28:47today our / commands which basically law
28:50is it easy for any of these business
28:52integrate with slack and lift was a cool
28:53so you can make you do a back slash lift
28:55save my home and boom you've got a lift
28:58coming straight there I don't I mean I I
29:00like I like to think of the world more
29:01through just the value you're creating
29:03and I think you know in the CI role that
29:05essentially you're trying to create
29:07value and you know you want to leverage
29:09the ecosystem of both your internal team
29:11your external team but do it in a safe
29:13and compliant manner and I think that's
29:15the juggling act that you know that that
29:16role has so let me wrap up a little bit
29:19with one philosophical question and I'll
29:21take any takers on this one which is is
29:24is being a software engineer a new form
29:28of literacy that everybody's going to
29:29have to look for in terms of who they
29:31hire or is it gonna be the old kind of
29:35manufacturing we're gonna look back and
29:36they're all gonna be eaten by robots
29:39well I'll kick kick that off by saying
29:42that when we started building Stack
29:44Overflow we did a lot of research on how
29:46many software developers that were in
29:48the world and the conclusions needs to
29:50be nine million people that call
29:51themselves software developers in the
29:52world and we had at that time six
29:54million users so we thought that was a
29:55pretty good percentage of them and then
29:57we got to nine million users and then we
29:58get to 20 million users and we thought
30:00who the heck are all these people
30:01writing code that we never expected
30:02we're writing code and today we're
30:04looking at about 40 million people every
30:06month human beings not unique visitors
30:08that appear to be using Stack Overflow
30:11every month so the number of people
30:12writing software is probably around 40
30:14million out of you know only nine
30:17million people that call themselves
30:18developers still not in the billions but
30:22a pretty large number and if you look at
30:25the contributions on a github project
30:27people don't really think in terms of
30:29geography or base or spoken language
30:32very much the first thought is to what
30:35the function looks like are there tests
30:36around that does it add some value to
30:38the project it's it's interesting how
30:40delayed the geographical or associative
30:43of where where you work the association
30:45with where you work is in the thinking
30:47process I rarely hear it mentioned in
30:49open source projects yeah I think
30:53there's kind of an overemphasis on this
30:55you know everyone everyone should learn
30:56to code you know mantra that you see a
30:59lot in the press to me I think I think I
31:03think software literacy is about its
31:05about recognizing this software is the
31:07new business tool and try to understand
31:09how software is built because of you
31:10know how something was built you'll be
31:12you'll be a better user of it and you
31:14know perhaps that and also thinking like
31:16a software engineer so one of the
31:18reasons that engineers tend to make good
31:20founders is because engineers think in a
31:22certain way so you know I think
31:24understanding at least how engineers
31:26think and being able to think in that
31:27same kind of process driven and logical
31:29way helps everyone be a little better
31:31you know be a little better at business
31:32even if they can't code themselves
31:37I'm not a software developer I'm the CMO
31:39so so I think if you hire none so you
31:43have to hire people so I think the world
31:45is moving so that anyone can create that
31:47value and that you don't need the hard
31:49core development language skills and I
31:51think the same analogy is like I'm the
31:52business analyst IDE there used to be
31:54time we're only hard core analysts that
31:57knew the data warehouse could extract
31:59their sequel queries and pull it out and
32:00it's shifting with BI tools now where
32:02anyone can be an analyst that anyone can
32:04provide that value and I think it's lack
32:05we're trying to viewing it the same way
32:06where we integrate with over 100
32:08different business apps it's easy to
32:10create those there's an ad just like
32:12button you can add those integrations on
32:14your own you don't have to have these
32:15massive technical skills to create that
32:17value cool well thank you very much it's
32:20been a great chance to chat about the
32:21future of software engineering thanks
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