Michael Grinich has an unusual vantage point, his company powers enterprise infrastructure for hundreds of companies, so he sees how the AI transition is actually playing out across the industry, not just in the headlines.What he's noticing: the whole ecosystem is accelerating, not just the AI companies. And most people are misreading what kind of moment this is. Kent and Michael talk about building when the marginal cost of software approaches zero, what the Red Queen theory tells us about AI competition, how engineering leadership is quietly changing, and what drew Michael to the itchy-brained compulsion to make things in the first place.

This season of Still Burning is sponsored by WorkOS and Augment Code.

Angie Jones spent years as the "geek whisperer" — translating technical possibility into human progress. Then she led one of the most ambitious AI adoption programs in the industry, and the rug got pulled out. Now at the Agentic AI Foundation, she's working to make sure the standards powering the next era of software are built in the open, by everyone. Kent and Angie dig into the impossible bargain AI has handed engineers, what it really means to hire junior developers right now, and what scares her most about where we're all headed.

This season of Still Burning is sponsored by WorkOS and Augment Code.

Amelia Wattenberger didn’t want to be a developer — both her parents were, and from the outside it looked boring. Then she accidentally built a website, and everything changed. In this conversation, she and Kent talk about why play matters more right now than productivity, what we actually lose when every project has a KPI attached, and why the most important skill in augmented development might just be knowing when to step back.

This season of Still Burning is brought to you in partnership with WorkOS and Augment Code.