72% of smartphones run Android. Just 28% run iOS.

Yet Apple’s App Store generates billions—because for years, it controlled the only path to iPhone users.

Until March 2024.

The EU’s Digital Markets Act forced Apple to open iOS to alternative app marketplaces, legally shifting the iPhone from a closed console to something closer to an open computer. But the transition came with friction, including a controversial install Core Technology Fee that left many developers questioning what “open” really meant.

In this episode, Erick Espinosa sits down with Artur Assanskiy, Chief Product Officer at Onside, to unpack what actually changed, why developers hesitated, and how alternative iOS distribution is evolving in Europe.

Find out more about Artur Assanskiy here.

Learn more about Onside here.

Reach out to today's host, Erick Espinosa - erick@sociable.co

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A CEO’s take on AI and the future of content creation

You’ve probably scrolled past it without realizing it. A song on your feed that sounds human—but isn’t. An influencer landing brand deals—who doesn’t exist. And suddenly, the creative world feels split on how this is set to impact the creator industry.

In this episode of Brains Byte Back, Erick Espinosa sits down with Shahrzad Rafati, Founder and CEO of RHEI, to discuss how AI is influencing the creator economy. Will the evolutionary technology scale creativity, or stifle it?

Instead of focusing on fear-driven headlines about fake artists and synthetic stars, this conversation zooms out, looking at AI as an assistive tool, similar to other industries. It looks at what creators are actually struggling with today, including burnout, overload, and the endless work that gets in the way of making meaningful things.

Shahrzad discuss why time is the real constraint for creators, how AI tools, like RHEI, can act more like a behind-the-scenes teammate, and why we need to retire the cynical misconception that AI replaces creativity. Instead, emphasizing the importance of focusing on human signals.

Because while AI can flood the world with saturated content and shape what people see, culture is still defined by human intent, authorship, and genuine human connection.

Find out more about Shahrzad Rafati here.

Learn more about RHEI here.

Reach out to today's host, Erick Espinosa - erick@sociable.co

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In this episode of Brains Byte Back, we take a closer look at the top three AI-powered scams threatening small, mid-sized, and large businesses leading into 2026. With cyber fraud on the rise, attacks are becoming that much more sophisticated, making it harder to spot. AI tools are giving scammers new and creative ways of obtaining the info they need to do damage, using AI to impersonate employees, clone voices, and exploit rapid AI adoption.

According to recent research, 90% of U.S. companies were hit by cyber fraud in 2024, and AI-enabled attacks — including deepfakes and voice cloning — surged 118% year-over-year.

While businesses are learning how to leverage AI, attackers are becoming even quicker at weaponizing it. But we have you covered. Erick speaks with cybersecurity expert Sanny Liao (co-founder & CPO of Fable Security) to unpack:

• How synthetic identities and “fake employees” infiltrate organizations — appearing on résumés, IDs, even video calls;
  

• Why AI-driven social engineering and voice-phishing are now far more effective than legacy scams;
  

• How insecure AI adoption is opening new vulnerabilities inside companies fast-adopting automation and code-generation tools.

Tune in to hear real-world stories and walk away with concrete steps to protect your business. It’s a 2026 wake-up call every founder, manager, and IT leader needs before “trust but verify” becomes “verify or regret.”

Find out more about Sanny Liao here.

Learn more about Fable Security here.

Reach out to today's host, Erick Espinosa - erick@sociable.co

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In this episode of Brains Byte Back, we’re joined by Ibrahim Hasanov, a founder whose story is anything but ordinary.

He started building hardware at six, coding at eleven, and by thirteen, he’d already launched his first startup. Impressive when most founders don’t launch their own startups until the age of 30. Since then, his projects have ranged from an online operating system to an image compression algorithm that caught the attention of Cisco engineers.

Now, Ibrahim is the founder of Myuser, an AI-powered platform that transforms how businesses connect with new customers. Instead of drowning in generic outreach, Myuser helps companies scale with ultra-personalized communication at every step by using what he refers to as a smarter AI combined with a proven sales technique.

In this conversation, we trace Ibrahim’s journey from having a winner mindset even as a child to winning with my Myuser, and ending with some valuable advice for those young people looking to launch their own tech business, which involves looking behind the curtain. Find out more about Ibrahim H

Learn more about Myuser,

Reach out to today's host, Erick Espinosa - erick@sociable.co

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Construction is a $10 trillion industry, yet delays and budget overruns are still the norm. In this episode, Erick Espinosa speaks with NK, co-founder and CEO of Track 3D, about how simple cameras combined with AI can give builders a live, accurate picture of what s happening on site.

NK explains why progress reports are often unreliable, how 3D replicas change the game, and why contractors are finally ready to embrace tech that saves time and money. He also shares his journey from working on smart cities to launching a startup in the US, and what it really takes to bring advanced tools into a traditional field. It's a look at where construction is heading, what AI can do right now, and why founders like NK believe the industry is on the edge of major change.

Find out more about NK here.

Learn more about Track3D here.

Reach out to today's host, Erick Espinosa - erick@sociable.co

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Did you know Latin America is one of the fastest-growing tech regions in the world? But while we see the region advancing forward, it’s not advancing as a whole, as women are still underrepresented in the growing industry. Across LatAm, only about 23% of technology workers are women, and when it comes to leadership, the number drops even lower.

That gap doesn’t just limit careers; it shapes the kind of companies that get built, and the products that reach the market. Especially when innovations are born through lived experiences, and those experiences look different depending on who’s in the room.

Today’s guest, Odille Sanchez from Tec de Monterrey in Mexico, is working to change that. As the leader of Tech and Scientific-based Entrepreneurship Center of Excellence, she’s on the ground with startups and innovation programs across the region, and has a clear view of both the barriers women face and the opportunities waiting to be unlocked.

Listen in.Find out more about Odille Sanchez here.

Learn more about Tec de Monterrey here.

Reach out to today's host, Erick Espinosa - erick@sociable.co

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If you’ve ever worked in software, you know the pressure to ship fast is real. But in today’s world, where AI can generate entire codebases in minutes, that pressure is colliding with something else: complexity. More code, more tools, more risk…and somehow, slower delivery. In fact, according to a recent report from GitHub, developers now spend over half their time not coding, but testing, validating, or just waiting for access to the right environment.

That’s where today’s guest comes in.

I’m joined by Arjun Iyer, co-founder and CEO of Signadot, and someone who’s spent more than 20 years deep in the world of distributed systems and cloud-native software. He’s worked at places like AppDynamics, and he’s tackling one of the biggest problems in software delivery: how do you move fast and maintain quality?

We talk about the real-world bottleneck slowing teams down, why AI isn’t the silver bullet because as Arjun shares just generating code doesn’t make it production ready, and how concepts like “shift left” are giving teams a smarter way to build. Find out more about Arjun Lyer here.

Learn more about Signadot here.

Reach out to today's host, Erick Espinosa - erick@sociable.co

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As artificial intelligence rapidly reshapes industries, education stands at a pivotal crossroads. In this episode, we talk with Arlène Botokro, Head of Learning Innovation at Wooclap, about how AI is showing up in classrooms and what that means for students, teachers, and families. Arlene has spent the last decade focused on how people learn and how to design tools that support that process.
We look at how some countries are integrating AI into learning, what educators say they need, and how students are responding. Whether you're an educator or just curious about how education is shifting, this episode breaks down what’s real, what’s hype, and what’s next. Find out more about Arlène Botokro here.
Learn more about Wooclap here.
Reach out to today's host, Erick Espinosa – erick@sociable.co
Get the latest on tech news – https://sociable.co/
Leave an iTunes review – https://rb.gy/ampk26
Follow us on your favourite podcast platform – https://link.chtbl.com/rN3x4ecY