Open Source, Meetups and Developer Relations with Alessandro Vozza

Hi everyone, my name is Patrick Akio, and if you're interested in open source communities, meetups, Devrell, and more, this episode is for you. Joining me today is Alessandro Votsa. He's Devrell at Solid, the I/O and organizer and founder of the Cabernets Community Days in Amsterdam, and we had a blast of a conversation. I'll put all his socials in the description below, check him out. And with that being said, enjoy the episode. Good stuff.

So you went on, you went on vacation in Italy? Pull. Yeah, me too. I just came back last week. No way. Yeah. Yeah. Wait, I was in the last year? Really. Yeah, Okay. Yeah, so it's my one of my best friend got married in Amsterdam last year and me and my friends, we always go. Every year we go to a Villa okay, we are like 20-25 more. That's a lot more. We stay in this villa, we play music, we all DJs, right? So really. And so this year we decide to do

the villa with the wedding okay. So I got married in this beautiful Maseria. In Puria. And we were like 40 people. Oh wow. Yes, also. And I drove all the way there. Yeah, really. From here, From here. It's like a two day drive, no? Three days. Drive to go, 2 days to come back. But it's beautiful. You go through the best part of Europe. Germany, Austria, north of Italy. We stopped. We have fun. Awesome. It was quite odd. Did you drive with the group as well? They all drove.

I drove to go down. I just came back last Saturday actually. I drove with my 2 best friends. Yeah. And to come back, I drove with my wife. Yeah, best. That's awesome. Companions ever. That's awesome. We're in Puria. I'm not sure where we stayed. I mean, I visited Ostuni. Ostuni is beautiful. Yeah, let's. I'm not close to. I'll show you some pictures after because I usually take a lot of pictures and then I see

on the map where I was. It's so cool because I'm from Pulia, of course, like everybody denigrates his own place, right? So I don't think Pulia is that cool. But then people told me about this. The paradise on Earth is like, it was amazing. Yeah, it's pretty nice. Apparently so we made we did a pasta making class and apparently I I have a natural talent for making Orqueta Orqueta. So many members of my mother making Orqueta with you take a

fork, Yeah, yeah, with a knife. With a knife, Yeah, with a knife. You make a look at it. It's so I grew up. I can imagine. Yeah, yeah. I'm from Taranto. It's the South Coast, yeah. Which is the best part, Of course, Yeah, of course. It's the Mediterranean part. Then there's the Adriatic part. Yeah, but I'm from the Mediterranean, so from my From Taron to On a Clear Day, you can see the cost of Tunisia really. Yes, it's insane. It's insane. Yeah, it's such a beautiful

place. But then of course, I grew up there, I think, I guess. It's not cool, but yeah, my friends all love it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We are so, so good time. Yeah, it was a lot of fun. We did the pasta making class was a lot of fun. We did wine tasting as well. That was a lot of fun. And otherwise just a lot of beaches and a lot of good food. Yeah. And what more do you want from a vacation? Yes. Yeah. These infinite fields of olive trees. Yeah. So that's the typical landscape of pool.

Yeah, right. So I saw that, yeah. And I was. Tuni Al Bello. Bello. Yeah scene we we've talked about it because the the pasta making, the person that facilitated that talked a lot about Alberobello and the truly is truly she had one because we were in in one making pasta OK and then she said if you really want to see all the truly go to Alberobello. Yes. Yeah. So it's a place where Greek culture and E culture combines. In Bari, the capital, there are some churches with mindelets.

So the churches are in. From the from the Asian culture, yeah. So it's Puri is a place of very a lot of mixes, right. So there's Spanish influence, the romance, the Greeks all together in Puri. I saw a lot of like Greek similarities, now that you say it. Taranto takes his name from Taras, the son of Poseidon. We were one of the most important Greek ports. And the culture is from there, You know, it's we are all Mediterranean. It was it's a great, very rich history.

And yeah, I'm proud to be from there. I mean that's cool from all the places. Yeah, it's a good place to be from. That is such a coincidence. You were there two weeks ago then, or one week ago as. Well, we left the 1st of July. OK, Yeah, yeah, I left maybe the day before you. In that case, Good stuff, man. I was thinking about driving and then I was like 2 days. That's a lot. It's a lot, but it's you really go through Europe, Yeah, it's amazing. You see the changes, right?

You go through Germany and then all of a sudden there are mountains and there's Austria and there's Suti roll and Suti roll, and we stop in Bolzano in Bosn. Amazing place. And then we continue to Bologna. You can see the whole landscape. It's gradually changing towards the beach and the flat of Puria. Yeah, that's very cool. I'm gonna pitch it. The friends. Yeah, next time do I make? The attraction. Puria. Maybe.

Maybe. But you were born and raised there, and how did you end up in absent? Okay, of course. Best reasons for love, Of course. I met my ex-wife now in Infarada, in the north of Italy. Yeah, At the time I was studying chemistry, chemistry. I'm a chemist by education. So I met my ex-wife. She used to live in Nutrecht. And I really wanted to be a professor at the time. I wanted to continue the academic career. Yeah, So I found a PhD at the University of Amsterdam.

So we moved to Amsterdam to get me to get my PhD in chemistry. And they have to work in restoration. She's an architect, restoring old houses on the canals. It was a really good job. And so I move. To get my PhD in chemistry and to stay with my ex-wife now. So and then I really fell in love and I I've been here since and I changed my career. So when I finished my PhD in chemistry, I moved to it. Yeah, and never looked back. Why did you make the move then? And that was when you were

already here. Yeah, but. I've been around. I'm one of. I'm 47, by the way. So when I was 8, my brother was 12, we got a Commodore 64 and that changed our, yeah, it's like one of these murders so many times. It's like Commodore 64. That was the that was. One of those generation, I don't know if we have a name, but the Commodore 64 Amiga, my brother was very much involved in the demo scene. It was. It was the best time to be, you know. It was so full of. Possibilities, Right.

So new possibilities, Yes, because everything was new. People were, you know, like creating these amazing demos and acting around. And there was like, at the modem, right? So there was no Internet, There was nothing. So we saw it appearing on the

scene. So. So my brother was involving the BBS scene. I don't know if you know what it is. No clue. A BBS. What's that? A bulletin board system? Okay. So before the thing with the pins. No, no, no. So before the Internet, yeah, there was the BBS. So it was a server, a system, a computer coming to a dial up line. Yeah, just a phone. So you were supposed to you called this computer. You download the latest message in the phone. It's like a forum, right? So you could do also games and

interact with other users. You were downloading the latest updates, uploading your own like your replies and that's it. Okay. And then another person would do the same. Yeah, and so on and so forth. Until you establish like a community around this BBS. And it was the beginning of what is today the open source of people were exchanging. Of course, also cracked software and everything software, but also just talking and it was amazing. So there were Bbs in my own town

about peace. It was 19801990. There was the war. There were wars. In the Persian Gulf, it was. Interesting time for quality. So people were talking about how to, how to promote some political ideas like peace, right. So And they were all happening around this BBS and it was an amazing time, So awesome. And then I saw it, you know, then we saw the Internet coming up and the www.theweb. I was there. It's something that I have little kids of course, and they don't know this, they just have

this already made. Internet, interconnected network or computers and But there was a time when you had to call in, upload your stuff, wait for the stuff to download. It was interesting time, I can imagine. And you took that. I mean, that was kind of your

childhood and growing up. You kind of experienced that growing up in a way, Yeah. And then is that also what inspired you to make kind of that switch from chemistry? Yeah, and education. So my origin story, I have a story, so if you have a minute, which is. Quite. I mean, impressive. So chemistry. So I moved to the north of Italy to study. Yeah, to university, right. So now in chemistry, you have to learn one programming language, which is Fortran. Okay.

For some reason, Fortran is very good for mathematical computation. It's part of the curriculum. Yeah. So it was my first year and there was a room full of computers. And my professor was supposed to teach Fortran, but they were all broken and they didn't work and they were running Windows 3.111, so it was a mess. So my professor was really she was very frustrated. So one day I decided with nobody

told you to fix everything. So I took a computer, the most powerful, I put some extra RAM in it, I took cannibalize other computers. I connected to the. The university network, I downloaded Linux, Slack, 0.924 floppy disks and stuff too. So I created a server and I made the other computers like client to this server. So I shared folders, Nfas, all sorts of stuff. So my professor was delighted she could finally, yeah, teach.

Yeah, so everybody was happy. And then two or three days later the the people from the network, the SIS admin of the University of Farrada, they came down, they were like whoa, and they say who are you? Because I figure out all the network Ip's, the Cidr's and stuff and then they instead of kicking me out and expelling me from from the USA, they made me

SIS admin of the chemistry department. So I started there. That's where I started my my open source. Interest. I was part of the Linux user group. Yeah, of a rather of my every major city. At the Linux user group we were helping people switching from Windows to Linux. So we own one of the few DVD ROM in town. So we were asking people to come and we would help them installing open source software. We also. Petitioned the City Council to

move to open source. Because why would you use closed technologies for public service? There's no reason, right? So everything should be open. And there was a yeah, early 2000. Fast forward 16 years later, I joined Microsoft. Of course, that was not because I changed. I was always been around open source. I will always be around open source. I think it's the best way to develop software. It's probably also a very good

business model. Now there's a whole debate about rail and Susan and so on and William is some William Ritzo my friend. So his opinion it. But is also a very viable commercial model. So open source is my my main thing. And so, 16 years later, I joined Microsoft. Not because I change, because they change They came around to. To see the light and to recognize the driving force of open source, and that is a very good influence on the world.

I think it's a better world because people come together to build software and then give it back to the communities like this. So I agree. So I touched on that with William as well.

I love open source. I love where it's going, but there's also some concerns with kind of the maintenance of open source or kind of the availability like it's a it's a great thing, but the people that become responsible of kind of maintaining that, sometimes that can be a bottleneck as well.

And there's nothing that facilitates it and makes it sustainable for people to do so. Because all of a sudden it could be like a second job to some people but it doesn't have any income or any incentive other than giving back knowledge wise and software wise, no. But I think it should be treated as. Human heritage. So this is what this is part of our heritage as a species in a way, right? So the software is what makes us work and produce and it's everywhere.

Make the society tick so that so it needs to be protected like Colosseum or like something that belongs to everybody and should be protected. Governments and societies at large should step in and do something about it. You think that's where it's going as well? Yes, so disclaimer, I'm a long time communist. So what stands in the way of many other things, not just open source, we're also in the way of survival of the planet itself is capitalism is profit driven interest right?

So. If everything is profit, then of course there's there's less space for for these things like open source. So I think the the trend is to overcome the limitation of capitalism, of pure profit and go towards a a world where people collaborate more and they they I I don't think I'm going to see it, but maybe my grandchildren will see this world where? People collaborate. People help each other without the the profit. As a first thing, yeah.

So yeah, that's I'm an optimist and idealist, just still 47 is pretty, pretty good, right? So yeah, yeah, I agree. I mean, I I like that, right? Because I've done I I had to do a lot of psychological assessments because I'm I'm part of a group that's now team leads within Sybia and out of there.

The assessment said I'm a team player like that was one of the one of the biggest factors there is. I've always been a team player so I like Co creation like working together like consensus even, which is kind of be a challenge being team lead sometimes as well. But working together has always been a big component in software

engineering. I didn't know that at first but it is what I've experienced right working together in a project, if you don't know, dare to ask a question and figuring out figuring it out together right. Building up that confidence as a team to be able to kind of solve

any problem in a way as well. And that's also kind of factoring in open source where people come together, sometimes some person kind of fire starts it or kick starts it, other people come in and collaborate and Co create with that. And then that artifact is probably going to be there for a

really long time, right. And I think we're kind of still, I don't know if it's the forefront, but it still feels like the forefront because we're creating things and the people that have created it are still there. But at some point, the things that we've created, open source wise or software wise, are gonna exist, and the people that have created it or even contributed to it might not anymore. Which is a very interesting thing, I think.

Because right now there's maintainers and there's groups of maintainers, and if those cease to exist, then yeah, the software might cease to exist as well. But a lot of crucial components of businesses or organizations might rely on that open source software then. That's true, we are more than the sum of the parts, right? So because we are together. The emergence of this property is like like software. So I don't know, there is no

answer yet. But there is a, there is a in opposites, there is a maintainer problem. I think we should make maintaining software more fun or sexy or something rewarded, right? So celebrate people that maintain the software instead of. I think it's admirable for sure, but it's not really celebrated or something like that. I think it's a personal opinion. I don't think it's a general one. Yeah, it's it's, I think it's

business should step in, right? So yeah, I personally donate to specific projects on GitHub through GitHub sponsors. I really just set like the the monthly payment and that's the project I believe in or the one that I want to have business. They should put some budget. Maybe it's time for for budgeting, you know, open source contributions. Yeah, you're seeing that. Yeah, I mean, you're seeing that

as well. I think if if an organization does that, a community looks at them differently also. Way different, which could be like there's not really a financial incentive, there's more of a like giving back incentive. And organizations already do that, right? With artifacts like blogs or yeah, going to conferences, right.

Sharing knowledge is one of the artifacts an organization can do to give back, and contributing to open source or giving a financial incentive in that way can be one as well.

Yeah, definitely. There's this rise of foundations now, right? So the crown, the complete foundation. And of course, they all started with the Linos foundation, the Apache Foundation, and now there's a foundation for everything, the Green OPS and the Green Software Foundation and the Finops Foundation. Yeah, but there's a, I see it as a positive trend, right. So there are people from the industry, players, end users, vendors coming together to take care of software.

In a more democratic way there's nothing to to ate about it. I mean it's actually and the the cloudary, complete foundation which I'm amble ambassador. I pride myself for being part of the foundation. I mean as a as a contributor it's growing a lot. I mean it grew from nothing. It's going fast. Yes, from there was no foundation seven years ago. Yeah. And today's it's pretty large. I mean, Cuba con Amsterdam, 10,000 people. One of the largest conference in

AMIA. So it's again, I don't know why but it was great to be alive when I was tinkering with the BBS and I feel still is the best time now that we are seeing this, right. So we are seeing this emergence of this cloud native software and so, so much so, I don't know, I'm just lucky that. Every, every moment of my life has been great to be alive. So that's the I think that's the

most healthy and best mindset is the best time to be alive. Is right now is right now. Yes. So make use of it. Yes, with AI and also the technological advancement that it's mind blowing really. If you look what what we were just a few years ago. Yeah. What is today, Nobody can predict what is going to happen in the future. And I'm, I'm an optimist. I mean, I don't, I don't think

AI will destroy humanity. Yeah. If properly handled, of course, like again, if you put profit first, then yes, it's not gonna unlock the full potential. Yeah. But I think it's we can come together and again optimism, right. So yeah. Yeah, I think, I mean, the way you explain kind of being at the forefront of a lot of things in your childhood, I feel like AI and what we're seeing right now,

right now. I feel like we're at the forefront of a lot of things and I hope that 10s of years from now, 20 of years from now, I don't think that's the same 20 years from now, we can talk back and say like, OK, this was really the starting point and these are the things we saw and this is call it, this was kind of the trajectory trajectory.

Have you read the book The Better Angels of Our Nature from Steven Pinker? No. So the world is getting better and better. I mean, I know that feels not feels like this going all, everything's going down, but this is the best time to be alive for a human. If you have to choose a pick pickup, historical either you should. This one now is the future. Yes, and so, so you can also learn from what happened when Internet was released, right?

So when there was a very a good decade of amazing time, like people were coming together discussing things, lots of business built around. Now I think we are a bit going down. So there's dominance of this big social network of big social networks, social media companies, which is probably kind of betraying the original idea behind connecting people, replacing it with just pure business interests, pure commercial interests.

But I think that there's going to be a second wave of like feel good and connecting people together, raising the conditions of humans all over the world. Yeah, that's the the goal of technology, right? So yeah, that's why we do this, right? So to to improve lives

everywhere. I agree now that that should always be the goal. And if you notice that the goal is make as much money as possible and if that's your environment, I think the people that are contributing to that

software then. Are definitely gonna feel the tail end of it because there's gonna be decisions where you're like, no, no, this is the best decision, right, for the people and the organization's gonna be like, no, no, no, this is the best decision for us. And then you're gonna be like, okay, maybe This is not the environment for me. Yes, until we all come together. So I'm. I'm also of course, like, I love unions. I think we as engineers, we have a real power to change things,

to influence things. So we can actually sit at the table of our companies and tell them and there's a thing called the Tech Worker Coalition, it's American, but it's also pretty active in Berlin. And there was a chapter. So it's a union of tech workers. Okay. It's think about it. It's amazing idea.

So and they were famously Google was going to participate in some Department of Defense contract and Google engineers they told them, they told their managers you can win the concert but we're not going to help you writing software for guided missiles or to kill people that forced Google to actually withdraw from the from the competition because. So this is better than there's always this myth you can vote with your wallet. You can just don't buy Amazon. Right. That's hard.

Yeah. And there's so many people anyway buying from them. But as a worker, as an engineer, somebody that you know can write a I code and software you do have power, you can say no, I'm not gonna write this, I'm not gonna work on this. And Tech Worker coalition.org. It's a part of it, and it's pretty cool stuff. I can imagine, yeah, on kind of my micro scale and my history, I've done that before where I'm like, I'm not building this basically like I it might be from an ethics standpoint.

It might be from a principle standpoint where I disagree so much that I'm like, if you want this, someone else has to do it. And I've said that in that way. And that did make people realize or rethink kind of their ways. Like, huh, maybe maybe we shouldn't do this in that way. And that kind of created a movement where we actually ended up doing something else instead. But if you don't take a stand like that, then things are never

going to change. Yeah. If people don't change, nothing change exactly. It starts from from from us, right. So and our work is, it's important, right. So we we spend a lot of time at work, we can really make a difference. So again, like I'm an optimist, I know. I think we can do it. So there's no reason not to. Yeah, good stuff, man.

I was thinking about kind of your history because you're a chemist, more so in education, then became sys admin and eventually joined Microsoft. Was that kind of more sys admin stuff as well? Was that software engineering? What was that? So I'll let you in a secret. I don't code. Yeah, I don't know any programming language, it's my thing. But give me a terraform code. Give me some yaml. I feel really good. Yeah, so I've always been assist admin. I build my own PCs, right?

So it's and then I run Linux on it and I have a closet full of computers and old computers and nooks and Nas drives. I have my own cluster, Kubernetes cluster at home. Yeah, so I've always been that side of the. There was this thing like that even in micro at the beginning it was like IT OPS, okay devs. And yeah, kind of the split there. Yeah, but that's of course with the old dev OPS movement. It's about breaking the bearers and we're all trying to make a living and create something to

work together. Yeah, so that's and 10 years ago I started the DevOps meet up for this reason cuz it resonated with me a lot. It's like why we have difference. We are meant to work together, yeah, paraphrasing Marcus Aurelius, you know Stoicism.

No, a bit. I mean, yeah, it's by the way, I'm a Stoic, so that's why I like to quote Marcus Aurelius. We are meant to work together like the upper and lower line of teeth, So we the IT and OPS and Dev, they are just meant to work

together. So that's the resonate with me a lot. So it was there in my career 10 years ago, more or less. So I started DevOps meet up anselm. Yeah, and I blow my mind. I mean organizing meet up. So it was all my it became my one of my passion. And I still do. Yeah, I I saw that. What about it made it become like a passion? Like what? What did it do for you as kind of the organizer? So I always thought, OK, I'm not great at programming. I mean, what can I do? Yeah.

To contribute, yeah, I can do this. I can get people together in a room. I can organize it, find speakers, find venues and then order pizza and then let people talk to each other. So that's my contribution. Have you done that before? No, I started 10 years ago. Yeah, with this wasting, I had no clue what to do it. Yeah, I was in between jobs and as I don'm a big board, I saw this meetup.com.

It was very different. They were way less communities like this and so I started DevOps meet up first meet up. I know I remember there was ING. So they were everybody was really eager to learn and and I always thought okay I'm doing this right. So how do I know I'm doing it right. Yeah. The only way is like talk to people confront myself so I can you know I have some metric to to to to to know that I'm doing right. So that's that's what I that's

all my that's my driving force. Like I want to know if this is the right way. Yeah. And I talked to people. So that's that made me kind of forced me to be an extrovert. Yeah. Of course I've always been an introvert like most people. But that kind of made me I forced myself to to speak and to talk. So that's that was pretty pivotal moment in my career. Yeah. So that's that was cool. That's awesome.

What what was like? I mean, you've organized a lot of meetups. What was like the biggest? Like proud moment that you've had while organizing meetups. Is it always like the attendees, the speakers of the content or what makes you really proud of? Like yeah so so meetups are the best place to learn public speaking, right? So because it's really forgiving, just it's OK if you make a mistake, it's nobody's gonna laugh at you and they

usually nobody laughs. But I help people coming to the meet I you know I encourage them come to the meet up and do that try your your talk there. Yeah.

And it happened. So I saw many people starting at the meet up and then becoming and then going on and it kind of addictive in a way so yeah can't stop and now maybe some of them are speaking like Kubakon or that they went on and ever they they are they are change right So they they I helped them I made the I created the condition I didn't help them out but I create the conditions so people can have a safe space to express themselves and if they want to speak they can do it and also

the connection right. So that's so the meet ups. We have one tonight by the way, so see their offices so. Keep doing it. Yeah, the talks are important. You're there to learn and to, of course. But the magic happens after the talk. When people stand up, have a drink, have a slice of pizza together and they just engage. Right. So it's. So I played the bass. I'm a bass player. Yeah. Now the bass player is the guy that stays in the back. Yeah. And then.

But without the bass, there is no music. If it's not there, you will notice. But if it's there, you don't notice it. It's just. There, right. It's not in the forefront, so that's my role. I like to be the guy in the back organizing, making it happen, but not being the front stage. Yeah, I do like public speaking, of course, but I like to organize things. That's awesome. Yeah. I get a thrill from. There's a good event, everybody's happy, everybody's smiling.

Yeah, and that's my jam. That's the job well done. Yeah, exactly. How do you?

Because this is something I'm struggling with myself is I meet a lot of people, but I don't put in the effort to kind of maintain those connections. And I have a feeling that you do, because a lot of people I've had on William Rito is one of them. Bart Ferrell, I mean, you recommended him to me, and he recommended you as well. Thank you. They all, they all recommend you. They'll talk about. It's like, yeah, like you, you keep maintaining these

connections, I feel like. How do you do that? It's it's just think about people, right? So when when I think about somebody, I just send that, send a message. It's hard. I know you think maybe they're busy. Everybody's busy. So it's I'm busy but it's like I do it with my friends as well. Check in how you doing what you're working on these kind of things. It's the little things it's. I know it's there's no it's not like programming that you have a syntax and it's very clear what

you have to do with people. It's all messy. So try to put them listen to them and try to put your at the same level with them. That's it. That's the best thing. You don't be humble that's that's my that's my approach. But yeah it's so different. I have to say like some many of these people like William didn't know him before we organized KCD, Kubernetes, Amsen together and kind of like you click, that's it. So I can call him a friend. Now it's we talked not every day

but we talk very often. So that's a good thing. Good stuff. You don't have a system. They're just more top of mind. Yeah, maybe Italians, but yeah, it's in general like just I send random messages to people that I that I want to to know more about, right? So LinkedIn is a I don't do TikTok, I don't do much Facebook. LinkedIn is my social. I think is the best one to do that type of stuff, yeah. Yeah. Maybe because I'm old, No. No, no. I like LinkedIn probably the

most as well. I feel like the other ones are more so sending. And I feel like LinkedIn has a bigger kind of career interactive component to it. I'm not a Twitter guy. I mean, I use it. Today I posted, I got some, yeah. But on Twitter you get this only on many social media. You get this dopamine rush. I got all these likes. So in a way, you change your message to get more likes. Yeah, trying to play in the system, but it's a trap, right.

So it's then you make something just because you want to have this approval. Right. So and that's not my thing. Yeah, I'm OK. I'm. I'm through myself. And LinkedIn is different. You just share what you do. It's more of a forum. I think it's. Yeah. And it's more about. And the personal messages are really most important. I use it more than e-mail, more than WhatsApp, of course. It's my thing. Good stuff.

That's very cool, man. I like that. I think I should do more of that. You have to build your persona. So yeah, you have to build your persona, right? So who you are, what you do and how you want people to see you, right? So and then you put it out there. But is your persona the same You It should be, no. Otherwise, it's hard. Yes, most of most of it. Of course. Like I post on LinkedIn that I'm a DJ, so we organize parties. By the way, I have this second

life, Second life. It's not a second life. It's the life. So, so me and my friends, we we organize sometimes like illegal rapes in Amazon, this kind of thing. I don't mind, like, sharing it, you know, There's nothing to be ashamed of. I mean, with age it comes like, I don't care what you think of me. This is what I am like if you don't like it. Yeah. You don't like it? Yeah, but that's yeah, you.

It comes with age. It comes with with the territory, you know, like the older you get, the less you care about what people think. But you do want to be one person, right? So not not having multiple faces, multiple personalities, you know, it's I think ever see like, I dress better, I dress like this because I dress like this at home, right? So I like it. So it's I try to be more of myself everywhere, and it's getting there. I think.

I think that's the best way to do it, otherwise it's just going to be exhausting. And yeah, it's some of the feedback I got on this show as well, that I am myself on the show and off the show. And I really like that feedback. Like in the moment I was like, yeah, that is true. And in the beginning was different, maybe because I was like the podcast was more new, was more fresh, maybe I didn't know how to be myself, I didn't really think about it. But now it's just, yeah, it's the same.

Hopefully, Hopefully you'll notice it as well. I mean, I see. I mean, you don't need to impress anyone. Yeah, only yourself, right? I mean it. It's a recipe for disaster and unhappiness when you look at other podcasts. And no. Trying to be someone else is your success. You know, you measure you, you define it and you, you achieve it. If you, if you believe in yourself, that's it. So that's in my and in this job, in this industry, I mean,

there's so many people more successful than you as this always. Yeah, this impostor syndrome is everywhere. Just live with it. Yeah. So, yes, of course there's more people successful, apparently more successful according to their own metrics. They are doing great. But are you doing great according to your own? Yeah. Measurement. Yeah, that's. I try to live by this rule, right. So only I define my own success and I want to achieve it. Yeah.

I think that's healthier and there's a lot of stuff. I mean, especially with social media. Now that might. Seem like you're not successful. But who defines it right? It's it's your own measurement and you can change your own. You can change your own measurements, right? If you're happy with what you're doing, then why does it matter what everyone else is doing? If you're happy with what you're doing, you should be happy as well. Yeah. Again, Stoicism. So I'm big on soy the the IT

kind of guide. My life is a personal philosophy, right? So everything is in your mind, like how you react to to events. It's up to you. Things can happen to you. This is like a background, right? So it's something that happens to you. The car breaks down or you get fire or or or you win money. Yeah, all these app, these are events and the only thing that you can influence is how you react to this external stimuli. And that's it.

This is the old the core of choices is that you are in control of your own thoughts, and having good talks makes a

good life. Yeah, so it's again Marcus Aurelius. Not me, of course. Good stuff. I've heard that before, and I've even said that before because I agree with that. But I didn't know it came from Stoicism. Of course it originated from there, yeah. Marcus Aurelius. It was fighting a war with the German tribes and he lost children to illness. He was the emperor. Yeah. A lot of pressure. And it took the time to sit down every morning write his own memories and to appreciate what

they got right. So the the good things that happen in his life, you know. So be grateful. Appreciate what you have. It's a it's a great life lesson that comes from from 2000 years ago from from a Roman emperor. Right so and before I am like a Seneca and other philosophers from Glee so so it's I think everybody should have his own personal philosophy. So think about life and think about what to do with your life and how do you want to go through life. And I found my own in there.

But everybody's free to find your own philosophy. Yeah, yeah, I like that. I might give that a read, or hopefully there's a good audio book, because I like audiobooks more. And then read. I'll give you. I'll give you my copy of Good Stuff Meditation from Marcus. That's awesome.

I was wondering because I saw on your LinkedIn profile that I mean first of all you've done a whole lot, but now you have a dev rail role. Yes. And the the dev rail role to me is very interesting also because it's. I mean I've applied to a dev rail role and I I didn't in the end want to do it because first of all I'm inexperienced and it was a small team. So I I would have only the role and it would have been too much

unknown I feel like at the time. And 2nd, I didn't really love the product, but the dev rail role is like kind of how you. Fit in with the organization and really depends on the context and what you're trying to do product wise, what the business goals are in that way. Which is really weird because it's not a role that I would have seen probably 10 years ago, but it's definitely a role that's more up and coming now. It's rising. Yeah. There's even a Devil Cone. I saw that. Yes. Yeah.

There's one. There was one in Japan. I'm going to speak in London in September. It's. For some reason, of course, companies are realizing that Dev Rail is a good investment, right. So they are hiring lots of people to do this, right? So they there's it's technical marketing, but there's some something more to it, right. So it's not just that. No, it's a like a like a it's an act of love. So you have to love developers so much that you want to, you know, help them succeed in

through your product. Of course if. Can happen, yeah. But but it's a it's very difficult and not difficult. I mean, you need to have some

prop, some qualities, right? So first of all. Be nice. Yeah, that's that's the first thing that. Helps Should be an easy one yeah should be easy one. But you really want to help other people so it's amazing role. I quit my job at micro because I wanted to be a dev rail awesome you all. I thought I'm too young to settle and I need to pursue my passion and I like to do this public speaking and help people so so that's that's why I joined

Solo to be a devil. We call it platform advocate now because we do more about platform. But yeah, that's the core is talking about technology and if you are passionate, you're already on a good track. And yeah, it's I'm also learning. It's a role that you have to define for yourself. Some people like to blog more. Some people like the Twitter crowd. But you have to. Find your way. I feel like as well, Yeah, Which is? Great, right. So yeah, it's a, it has pros and cons, right?

No one's going to tell you what to do, but no one's going to tell you what to do. So there's opportunities and there might be either risks or unknowns, and you have to figure that out yourself, right? It's it's whatever you create out of it, which sounds really cool. I think you should give it. But yeah, I mean, I don't know

when, like this is always how I describe it, right? I feel like I'm still at the forefront of a lot of things. If you would ask me two years ago, because I was more so I knew within software engineering probably three or four years ago. Nowadays I was really interested in the kind of the Scrum Master role facilitating and making sure the process runs smooth, cuz probably again because of that team player aspect. Right, bass player, right of the team, maybe the bass player, yeah.

Or I was really interested in kind of the Product Owner role, right? Defining where the value is going there as fast as possible and being in control of kind of the priorities and the business goals there and facilitating that with developers and development in that way. That was really my interest at the time, 3-4 years ago and nowadays more so a year ago, I think maybe even two it started was I like working a lot with people, right?

So I like personal development, I like goal setting as well. I like seeing other people achieve their goals with or without my help. But with my help especially, right. Giving advice, giving feedback in that way that really apparently is a value of people. It gives me fulfillment when I see that. So then I'm thinking about okay more so A-Team need role more so an engineering manager path in that way. But I've also done this podcast. I love public speaking in that

way. Content creation, that is more so the dev rail role, yeah? Storytelling. I think you got this right. So I hope so. My girlfriend says I'm awful at it because she sees then kind of the artifacts of this and she sees me try at home and I'm like, I'm trying to improve that's. All yeah, that's storytelling is everything like that.

People. You help people when you connect with them, right. So that's why we tell our kids connection before correction Okay. So connection is everything. It's what makes us humans. Right. So and we connect by exchanging stories. We. We evolved to tell each other stories, and that's where culture comes in. So we create culture by telling stories, and if you can tell story and people can connect to you, you don't put yourself in the. It's not your story. It's like how they, the other

people, connect to your story. That matters. It's not like this is how I do it and you should just do this. No, it's. Making making them feel that you are helping them because they can see their own struggles in your struggle, right? That's why we we always choose when we do meetups or we love to, to to hear stories from the trenches. A this is what I did. I made some mistakes, Mistakes I'm telling you so you don't do the same mistakes. It's amazing, right?

So it's an act of love. For people, because you are sharing your story and helping them. Yeah, it's if you see this in this light, like a connection and love, it's the best job in the world.

Yeah, right. That's why it's really hard to me, because it's because my interests vary and I feel like there's always a people component nowadays. Yet like you, I would describe myself an introvert, right? If I have one of these conversations I can do, I can do a second one. After that I'm exhausted. When I go to a meet up or even a conference, I'm exhausted afterwards because of all the social interactions in that way. So then I'm like, should I do it?

But maybe I really like doing it, so I should. Yeah, you got this social budget right. So yes, maybe now two conversations you are too tired and. But by doing it more often than you can have three or four and then did you feel like it increased? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, of course. I I like to cut time for myself. When I go to a conference, I always take an afternoon for myself. I don't want to talk to anyone and just listen to music. Usually I explore the city.

I mean, the best thing ever. That's awesome. But on the other hand, it's actually nice to talk to be

these are real people, so. This job, of course, code, create, open source. Awesome. It's about the people. The real core of this job, the job we do is people. Yeah. And in the end, like you have to convince somebody to depart from their money and give it to you for some value in exchange. And now you do it. You just tell a story about yourself, about what you do. So it's a it's A1 secret weapon we have, right? So if we get better story telling. The world is your oyster.

You you unlock the potential of of of your of yourself. So yeah, when? When would you say you got really good at storytelling? Or do you even consider yourself really good? No, of course I'm. You're always learning. I'm a part of one. No, no, no, not a Jedi yet. But yeah, by public speaking at the first meetups are organized, right? Because I was organized. So I have to stay good, get on stage. And do my thing right?

So tell everybody some stories and that's that's how I get there and I like it. Actually it's it suits you, I feel like. Yeah, of course. Don't worry. It's always, at least for me, I don't know if other people, I don't know anybody that actually does that. But it's always, always very. It's very It makes you very anxious. Like, I don't sleep the way before. Yeah, it's OK. Just embrace it, you know, just because, you know it's going to be good in the end.

So just go for it. Sometimes I just, you know, jump into it. It's better, best, best

strategy, best tactic. Yeah. Does it still make you anxious, like, after all this time? Yeah. Yeah. Yes, of course. Yeah. It never goes away, does it? No, no. It's part of you. Yeah, it's. I feel like that that makes you really want this and really want to make it in a in a good way. Yeah, When I, when I look publicly speaking, I read books about. So my philosophy is this. So first of all, you owe people that in the audience sometime. So they're all there for you.

So they invested you. You are now responsible for 30 minutes of their time. Now multiply that for 300 people, it's a lot of hours, right. So, So treat it with respect. Be prepared. Tell a story. I mean, don't just improvise. So that's, that's the first thing. Give them something that they can take home. Don't talk about yourself. Try to connect with them. It's it's very, it's how I feel it, right. So you owe these people some good information, good story,

good talk. Yeah. And that's it's our responsibility. But it's, it's a good one, right? So it makes makes me want to do more. Yeah. So it's. I really love that perspective, Yeah. And I think it's true. Yeah. And I think you also notice it in the audience. If a speaker or a presenter doesn't take it as seriously you're like, this is kind of a waste. Waste of my time. Yeah. It's literally they are there for you. So first, I also don't get scared because they are there

for you. Yeah, yeah, you are also a good thing. Right. So it's a no one else is there? Yeah. So don't accept to be put down by anyone. Yeah. Because you're there. So you deserve it. So now really deserve it do do do your part. So we just this. Yeah, I get prepared and do one make a nice story. Good stuff, man. Yeah, cool. This was this was a lot of fun. I must say. I'm going to enjoy listening back. Maybe one day we'll be colleagues very, very on stage.

You see, man, I think the world is, especially the tech world,

is smaller than I thought initially. Oh yeah, and having done this podcast for as long as we have now, I've met a lot of people and I think the world is even smaller. So I think it's really cool to be able to build those connections up. Yeah, and probably must be the same for you with the rest of the meetups. Smaller but bigger because we have more diversity of opinions. I love your show because it's people not don't talk about tech, right.

So it's it's beyond tech, right. So yeah, so that's. That's why all I really wanted to be. I'm really happy that I've had you. Is is there anything you still want to share before you round

up? No. So well we have the largest one big meet up. So we have 2000 people we we work on this middle for seven years or so. The Dutch Kubernetes meet up, it's our room. So I encourage people to if they want to get involved, I mean committee is a, it's an open space, right. So I have people coming. Telling me or LinkedIn, of course I want to do something, just come organize something. It's an open door. Everybody's welcome. So yeah, we would like to have

more people. Actually, I'm a bit tired. But yeah, if somebody else wants to step in and be, it's a team, right. So we also, I want to thank Andy, William, Marcel and everybody else. Pablo. And I'm sorry, I'm not forgetting somebody. My own wife, of course, Meg, also she helps with the meet up in the community day, so it's never a solo sport. I like that team sport, team effort, good stuff. Could not be any.

Could not have achieved what I have without the help of a lot of friends and colleagues and the people along the way. That's awesome. Cool. We're going to round it off here. Then I'm going to put all of us on those socials in the description below, as well as some links to some meetups here and there. Check it. Outlet them. Know you came from our show. And with that being set, thank you for listening. We'll see you in the next one.