Code with Jason
Code with Jason
254 - Amanda Perino, Executive Director of The Rails Foundation
In this episode, Amanda Perino, Executive Director of The Rails Foundation, discusses the foundation's mission to promote Rails through events like Rails World, focusing on finding unique venues that create special conference experiences. She shares insights about venue selection, sponsor negotiations, and the foundation's efforts to showcase Rails amid challenging job market conditions.
Hey, it's Jason, host of the Code with Jason podcast. You're a developer. You like to listen to podcasts. You're listening to one right now. Maybe you like to read blogs and subscribe to email newsletters and stuff like that. Keep in touch.
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Speaker 1:That is just so awesome, Feels like a lost luxury. Chris Sonnier from Dickinson, Texas, says just finished reading my first nonsense monthly snail mail newsletter and truly enjoyed it. Something about holding a physical piece of paper that just feels good. Thank you for this. Can't wait for the next one. Dear listener, if you would like to get letters in the mail from yours truly every month, you can go sign up at NonsenseMonthlycom. That's NonsenseMonthlycom. I'll say it one more time nonsensemonthlycom. And now, without further ado, here is today's episode. Hey, today I'm here with Amanda Perino. Amanda, welcome.
Speaker 2:Hi, thanks for having me back, Jason.
Speaker 1:Yeah, good to have you back. For anybody who's not familiar with you, can you introduce yourself?
Speaker 2:Yeah, my name is Amanda Perino.
Speaker 1:I run the Rails Foundation, which has been around for just over two years, and I've been a part of it for just under two years. At the time of this recording, I think it's about a week before my two-year anniversary. Oh, wow, well, congratulations. And last time you were on the show it was before the first Rails World in Amsterdam had occurred, and, as of this recording.
Speaker 1:there was that one, and then Rails World in Toronto, which I was at, where you and I got to meet in person, and then obviously, there's another one planned for Amsterdam later in 2025. Anyway, catch me up on what's been going on in the Rails Foundation over the last two years.
Speaker 2:So that first year when we recorded that first, the first time I was on your podcast, it was before the CFP was live, even I remember the first one went really really well, better than expected. So we kind of set the bar at a certain level and then Toronto, I think, raised it. So really a lot of our time is focusing on, you know, getting speakers for the events, getting sponsors for the events, finding the city for the event. But besides that, like that takes up a lot of any org who does events. It takes up a lot of time and energy. But as soon as that first Railsworld was done, I had this grace period of a couple of months where I didn't have to work on an event. So immediately then we got the documentation project up and running. So for all of last year we had the documentation team combing over all of the guides. We had Jonathan, the UX designer, redo the look and feel of the guides. So that covers kind of the documentation pillar, so to speak, what I'm calling them. So that was events in the air, documentation in the air.
Speaker 2:We for the education, we knew that Rails 8 was coming, so we were working with Chris Oliver most of the year on getting a tutorial up and written, but he didn't even have access to some of the new features that were being added to Rails. So it was a really kind of hurry up and wait until Rails was live or Rails 8 was live, and then, when Rails 8 was announced, he had to really quickly get the tutorial up and running. So that was the education pillar that we've been working on, and then marketing we've been making videos. We work with Typecraft to make a series of videos about the rails 8 features that were live. So really all of our pillars what I what I always call them marketing, education, documentation and events all the wheels are turning now. So it feels really, really good and it took the full two years really to get it all up and running, but that's where we are now okay, um, and I'm gonna ask what might sound like a dumb question, but like what is the rails foundation?
Speaker 1:and like why does it exist, and all that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I realized as I was saying all that that I should have started with that. So, basically, the Rails Foundation was launched with these four pillars in mind how to support Rails devs that are there now, but also how to welcome new Rails devs into the community that are there now, but also how to welcome new Rails devs into the community just to make sure that all these companies that are built on Rails will have a community of Rails developers to reach into in the future for decades to come. So the four things and DHH started it with our core members and we've expanded that to include a new core member recently, 1password, but he reached out to these eight companies now nine with the idea that the community needs support. The documentation needs updating. We need new events that focus specifically on Rails Marketing in general. Nobody was handling the marketing of Rails, so that needs to be done.
Speaker 2:And the messaging around Rails. And, of course, education. Where are people learning Rails and how can we give free resources to people if they want to learn it? There's a lot of paid resources out there that are amazing, but if somebody just wants to try it themselves, where do they turn to? So that's what the Rails Foundation was launched to do and so far we have pushed all four of those initiatives forward. And now looking at 2025 planning. How can we keep going?
Speaker 1:and now looking at 2025 planning how can we keep going and people? The thing about the Rails Foundation that I like noticed the most is the conferences, and people seem to really love those. I think there's something special about Rails world that makes it different from other developer conferences.
Speaker 1:I'm not sure if I can exactly put my finger on what it is that makes it different from other developer conferences. I'm not sure if I can exactly put my finger on what it is, but one thing for sure at Rails World in Toronto was just the venue was much different, and I remember listening to DHH on the Remote Ruby podcast and he was talking about just like.
Speaker 2:He was like I really noticed, really noticed, like wow, like what a difference the physical space makes to, to how the conference feels yeah, for sure, that's something I I truly believe in and it's it's a really hard thing to get because, for instance, this, the burst from burlaka, which is our amsterdam venue it's in my backyard. I'm super super lucky that I know about it because it's a really hard thing to find. And that is a large enough space that has the charm of an old building, but enough space to accommodate 800 or so people in three large rooms. That's the key. That's really hard to find three large rooms. A lot of old warehouses have one large room, which is really cool.
Speaker 2:But then where does registration happen? Where does food and beverage happen? Where do you put your sponsors? Where's track two? Um, and that's what I'm looking for now all around the world, that kind of venue and it's really, really hard to find. Uh, we found it in toronto. That was, I mean, it was lucky for us that it was in Shopify's backyard and they were willing to sponsor so heavily. But that kind of venue is like it was so hard to find and so beautiful and it really adds to the event. And I always talk about Railsworld not being a conference, hotel, conference, like that's the one thing I don't want, because I don't want to spend time in a conference hotel, so I wouldn't want people to come to our conference and have that vibe Not that there's anything bad about that, it's just not what I want for Rails.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's not bad, it's just not special.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it brings a lot Like. It brings AV support, it brings all like they do it all the time so they know exactly what they're doing. The team on site. They have all the food and beverage there, um, but if I think of all the, all the conferences I put on with, for instance, hashicorp, where we used to do events, internal and external, I can't differentiate which city was which event, because they all look alike, because the the conference hotels were all like, whether it's marriott or hyatt or whatever hilton to, to me they were all the same. So the cities, then there's nothing special, but if you have a special venue, it adds something to it. That's how. That's what I think.
Speaker 1:Yeah, interesting.
Speaker 2:I'm keeping that. I gotta say I'm gonna have a really hard time keeping it because I'm scouring the world for these venues and there's not many of them.
Speaker 1:Okay, I want to ask about that, because you say you're scouring the world. So far we've had Amsterdam and Toronto. How do you think about, or how is it decided, what location these events are going to be at?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a good question and I say the world. But then there are. I have looked, but we haven't deep dived into a lot of places. But out of curiosity I've looked, for instance, in Asia. I haven't deep dived into a lot of places, but out of curiosity I've looked, for instance, in Asia.
Speaker 2:Vibe of the venue and cost those are the two and appeal of the city those are the three. I would say main Like, where do people want to go? Is there an appropriate venue there? That's just a wow factor, cool place. And then how much does that venue cost?
Speaker 2:There's a couple of cities in europe that have fantastic venues that we just can't afford because they're extremely expensive. Apparently my tastes run very, very expensive at venues and that's not. Um, it gets really risky with events. You know yourself that you put all this money into it and then if sponsors don't show up, that drives up the ticket price for attendees. And then if attendees can't show up, that drives up the ticket price for attendees. And then if attendees can't afford it, then you're in a huge net loss and that's not a risk we're willing to take. So, looking forward, that's why we came back to Amsterdam. We knew exactly what the costs were going to be. Because we've produced here before. It's a comparatively more affordable than other European cities right now anyway, and it was just a less risky thing. We didn't want to come back to Amsterdam, but that's just how the cards fell.
Speaker 1:Got it. Yeah, that risk factor is real. We got pretty lucky with Sin City. Ruby which, dear listeners, my conference. If you're unaware of it, actually there's now an ad for Sin City Ruby.
Speaker 2:That plays at the beginning of the podcast, so I guess you can't can't have gotten this far and not know about it, um, um.
Speaker 1:But we got lucky the first couple years because we did it at the Tropicana, which was quite affordable, but that hotel no longer exists. They blew it up in 2024, yeah, so this time we're doing it at the MGM Grand, which is a bit more expensive, and the way these things work. I didn't know this before I started doing conferences, but you can reserve a hotel block at a hotel.
Speaker 1:And typically you're kind of on the hook to fill that block to a certain level, like 80%, and if you don't fill it to that 80%, then you have to pay in proportion to how much you didn't fill. So in theory, if nobody came, it would be like I don't know, it's like $50,000 or $80,000 or something just crazy like that that we would have to pay.
Speaker 1:And in my case it's a personal risk, there's no organization behind it or anything like that. So it's a little bit nerve wracking. And then it's funny because, like I sell tickets and it's like, oh great, $50,000 worth of tickets, I'm rich, but not really, because that money just goes straight back out the door to to pay for the cost yeah, you're digging a hole and you're filling it back in again.
Speaker 2:Basically, we had that with toronto. There was one of the hotels that nobody was booking, um, and then we were facing a six-figure loss because of paying for the things and I thought why I'm never doing this again, like, if people aren't going to book the hotels that we do a block, then I just not going to offer blocks and you can find your own place to stay, because that's what people were doing anyway. Um, and it was a lot of I'll call them negotiations with the hotel to like, get them down to a reasonable level. And then a lot of pushing with call them negotiations with the hotel to like, get them down to a reasonable level. And then a lot of pushing with the attendees to say like, please, there's this hotel here where a lot of other it was our largest hotel block actually so please stay there if you want. And I don't know, I had a bad, I had a bad like thing, what do you call it feeling with the whole thing. So I don't know what we're going to do.
Speaker 2:There's definitely a hotel that we're working with for amsterdam, because if the first year we, none of the hotels would work with us.
Speaker 2:The second year we worked with hotels and none of the attendees wanted to book it. And then the third year, I think we found a sweet spot that attendees are going to book this hotel because it's also where we have the speakers and it's a small enough city. If you don't book it, you can still find your way around. You can get across the city in 20 minutes. So I don't know what we're going to do when we go, for instance, if we go back to north america, because that's where it's a lot more strict with hotel bookings. For instance, there's one that we're talking to now that they they want all the rooms, but they also want us to produce some part of the event there. And then here's me for two years saying I'm never gonna have a conference in a conference hotel and they're saying then you can't have a room block because you need to spend x amount of money here so just like it's industry right yeah, that's tough, the stipulations that sometimes come with with those deals.
Speaker 1:Like we had, we have to have like a I don't know. It's like 25 000 a day, uh, food and beverage minimum, something like that. Um, or maybe that that was the grand total for for the two days or something like that, but just a lot of money yeah, um and that was just the way it had to be. Uh, in order to have the event at the hotel yeah.
Speaker 2:So why would would you ever consider? I don't know what vegas has, but like a smaller, more unique venue?
Speaker 1:oh yeah, I would love to do that. It's a little bit hard to well.
Speaker 2:As you know, it's hard to find stuff yeah, I feel I was thinking the other day like, if I wasn't doing this, what's my dream job like? If, if suddenly the board was like you're not wanted anymore, what would you be doing? And I honestly think a location scout would be the best job in the world to find, because my my favorite part of this job is finding the venues and then going to see the venues, finding the hotels that I want to put speakers in. I love that stuff, so to be able to do that full time. If tomorrow I was fired, that's exactly what I would do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a little bit tough to plan. It's crazy that we do it, but by we I mean me and my wife. We hold a conference that's like a thousand miles away from where we live, and so we can't just like run over there and scout out some venues in person. It'd be a whole thing, but we might do that on this next trip.
Speaker 2:Yeah, do you contact the hotel, like like, for instance, the MGM, do they? Do you do a site visit, so like go beforehand see where everybody's going to be, what you're going to be doing Wow, that's amazing, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean it would just be so cost prohibitive to do that and travel is a big deal for us because we have a farm and kids and so like we would have to get somebody to watch the animals and stuff, so whenever we do travel.
Speaker 2:It's a big deal and it adds extra expense and stuff like that, and so it's worth the risk of just going in blind yeah, and plus that that is one of the benefits of, like I was saying before, the conference, hotel conference, because there are people who have done it hundreds of times before, so you're in really really good hands. Hands. For instance, the difference at Evergreen they have done it before, but each event is uniquely set up and shaped. You know, we want booths like this, we want the stage over here, we want this to happen. So it takes a lot of hand-holding, basically.
Speaker 1:I have a question for you just out of my own selfish interest. For Sin City Ruby 2025,. This is the first time that we're having sponsors. It's going surprisingly well.
Speaker 1:I almost can't believe anybody wants to sponsor SinCityRuby um, this could be listening right now yeah, um, but we have a number of of sponsors um signed up, which is great and helps with the financial risk and all that um. But how do you go about finding sponsors for um? I don't know? Rails world, the rails foundation, I? I when somebody sponsors, I don't know exactly what they're sponsoring. I don't know if the conferences are like their own thing, but I'm just curious how you go about all that yeah, so it's.
Speaker 2:It's really kind of setting up the package first, like what are you going to offer um sponsors? So before that happens we have to have the contact or the talk with the venue and then the fabrication vendor. So who's making the booths? It all usually starts with the venue and then the fabrication vendor. So who's making the booths? It all usually starts with the booth packages figuring out a price there, putting it into the prospectus. But I also like the non-booth sponsorships, like, for instance, buzzsprout. They don't need a booth, but they needed something else. They needed a podcast studio. So kind of work. It's a lot of discussions and saying, okay, what's your company values, what do you stand for, what's your product? And maybe there's something that we can add to the event that adds value. Or, for instance, we have the coffee carts that we once sponsored and then Cedar Code so far has sponsored those every year, just because they like to do that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're sponsoring Sensitive Ruby also.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, they're great.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a great team.
Speaker 2:So it's a lot of negotiations and the ones I like a lot are the brainstorming together. I have so many ideas for the event but we just need sponsors to make it happen. So it's a little bit of putting out the prospectus and waiting for people to come to us, and usually the first year it was really hard. I will admit it was really hard and we didn't meet our target because we were a brand new event. The second year then we had a little bit more press around. The first year the attendees had gone and told their companies. So we saw a lot more traction and I'm hoping that continues to grow.
Speaker 2:But it's always. It's always a gamble and it always makes me nervous that we're not going to meet because you don't know until well into planning, when you've already financially committed to everything, if the sponsorship money is going to be there is nerve-wracking because and by the whole thing I mean a conference because, yeah, you have to commit first and then see if it's going to work yeah, exactly, it's just jumping off the edge of the building, basically, and hoping somebody's there to catch you yeah, which is, I guess, no wonder why there there aren't more conferences, although today there are a lot of conferences.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, like not long after covid, I was like man, I wish there were more ruby conferences and now I'm like man.
Speaker 2:I kind of wish there weren't so many ruby conferences, because now it's just fomo all over the place yeah, I know, every time one comes up or the season starts, there's so many that I would love to go to myself. But you have the farm and the kids, I have the old dog. I can't travel much, and already the times that I have to travel for work are a little bit stressful. So once the dog is no more and he's 18 now, so it's, you know, it's life it's going to happen soon. Then I'll be able to go to all these conferences as well and I won't have as much FOMO.
Speaker 1:By the way, I really like your dog pictures on Twitter. Thank you, yeah, yeah. And just to just to mention in case, dear listener, you're thinking about going to conferences In 2023, I went to Friendly RB in Romania. Um and that was a a fantastic experience for for multiple reasons. Um one, um, adrian and Lucian, um who who put it on? Um, and there's other people involved too. I believe, um, I believe they are just the greatest guys. They're so nice and so it's just energizing to be around them. They're some of my favorite people.
Speaker 2:I hear so many good things about Friendly RV.
Speaker 1:So many good things yeah, and the location Bucharest it's a really it's a really nice. Um, it's a really it's a really nice city. Um, it's, it's a very interesting city, um. So earlier in 2023, I had visited Paris for the first time and I guess they call Bucharest little Paris oh yeah have you been to Bucharest?
Speaker 1:no, never okay so it was no offense to Bucharest, but it was a little bit like um, I don't know, like grittier or something like that, like there was graffiti all over on everything, yeah, um, and you could really see like the communist influence, like these giant, uh brutalist buildings, yeah, um, and stuff like that. Um, oh, what they have in Bucharest they have something really interesting and I'm like, just wouldn't they have that? They have not the tallest building in the world, not the biggest building in the world. They have the heaviest building in the world.
Speaker 2:How would you even measure that?
Speaker 1:I don't know.
Speaker 2:I guess we just have to take their word for it yeah, like you can say anything, you can say, like my house is the heaviest. Well, no, that's obvious.
Speaker 1:But but I looked at it and it looked like it could be heavy.
Speaker 2:It's like their capital building or something like that I guess it's the stone or the, the, the material they, they use. It's got to be something like that.
Speaker 1:I guess so yeah. But it was a really nice city to hang out in. You know, Paris is famous for having excellent food, and the food in Bucharest was every bit as good as Paris. Oh nice and I hate everything. So you can take my word for it that the food was really good, because I'm a very what's the word? Strict judge or whatever.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, yeah. So that was great. The venue was nice, the whole thing was just really nice. So if you're thinking of a conference to go to, friendly, rb is a great one, and it happens in 2025, close to Railsworld right.
Speaker 2:I believe it's the weekend after Railsworld and then the weekend after that is Yuruko in Portugal. So we're going to have the trifecta again of Railsworld, first this time, which I'm really excited about, because before the other two were always beforehand. So even if I wanted to go, it's not a time to travel the two weeks before. But now it's going to be the time where I can just release everything and calm down for a little bit and I I'm hoping to make it to one, or probably the port, the one in portugal, yuruko, because I would really love to go to the coast as well oh, that would be nice yeah, I think so do you ever have?
Speaker 1:you know, when you go to conferences other than Rails World, do you ever get nervous and then remember that you don't have to do anything? You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, no, I. So the other one that I've I've been to RailsConf in Atlanta when I first started and then I've been to Tropical Ruby last year and Sirdis, who created Tropical on Rails, is one of the main organizers. He came to RailsWorld and I was so busy and actually I saw you at RailsWorld in Toronto. We didn't actually get a chance to speak and I always regretted it because I was rushing like DHH around to say hi to the sponsors, but at the first event. So he was there and he was kind of promoting Tropical on Rails.
Speaker 2:And then I went to Tropical on Rails and I was like I said to him this is so nice, like I don't have to do anything, I can just be here and speak to people. And he was like yeah, yeah, yeah, like basically I'm too busy to hear that. And then in toronto I was like oh, what's it like to just attend? And he was like it's so nice, I don't like touche, it's so nice, I don't have to do anything, I could just be here and speak to people. And meanwhile I was running left and right across the venue that's funny.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I had that feeling at the last in city ruby. The first time I kind of felt like I was an attendee because there were only 40 people there. It wasn't a big deal and then, the second time there were about 80 people there and that was a big jump and I was just, you know, pulled in all these different directions the entire time doing organizer stuff every minute of the day. I didn't really get to. It's not that I didn't enjoy the conference, but I didn't get to participate in the conference.
Speaker 2:No, yeah, you're working the whole time. I would love to go to Rails World one time. Right, yeah?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like I wonder what it's like to go to Sin City. Ruby, I've never done it, I've only organized it.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, tropical on Rails. Tell me about that. That's one that I would love to go to, and, in fact, some speakers, or at least Chris Oliver. He's going to go and speak at Tropical on Rails. Yeah, and then straight from there, just like a couple of days later, come and speak at Sin City Ruby.
Speaker 2:Oh, it's that back to back.
Speaker 1:Yes, so it's going to be a heck of a heck of a trip for him. But yeah, tell me about that it's.
Speaker 2:I had a lot of fun and I tried to sort of think okay, what was it that they did right? And it's everything that and this is very back patty, I'll admit, but it's everything that I would do as well. They cared about the production quality. They were very thoughtful in what the attendee would experience. For instance, so small, but they put like protein bars and snacks in the swag bag because they knew everybody would be hungry at a certain point, even though were snack breaks. It was just a really nice small touch for the speakers. They had, um, uh, what do you call it? Plug conversions because they knew that a lot of people would be coming from abroad and might not have that. So it was just the tiny little details throughout. Plus, the production quality was high.
Speaker 2:I mean, they had some like av problems, like everybody does, but that you could tell that the thought was put into it problems like everybody does, but that you can tell that the thought was put into it and the enthusiasm, basically like Brazilian warmth and hospitality, is second to none. So like we were all brought out all the time and everybody was gathering and the nights would be late. I swear like I tell everybody this and I'm not lying. I came home and I stopped drinking entirely, like it was just too like so much cachaça at a certain point. I came home and I stopped drinking entirely, like it was just too like so much cachaça at a certain point. I came home and I was like puffy and tired and I was like, okay, I don't know if I can survive another Brazilian trip. Wait, what's cachaça? It's a liquor that they put in caprinhas and like drinks and stuff.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:It hits you, it sneaks up on you Delicious. It hits you, it sneaks up on you Delicious, but it really sneaks up on you. Plus all the food that we were trying. So everything like. I didn't know I was eating the whole time because all the fruits were so exotic but all Brazilian based that doesn't get out of the country. So everything was great, not just the event, but everything around the event as well. So I recommend everybody. I mean they sold out, it's hard to get tickets Like. So I recommend anybody. I mean they sold out, it's hard to get tickets Like. They sold out. I think within a day this year, oh wow, they even increased the number. So, as far as I'm concerned, they're very, very similar to Rails World, but in South America.
Speaker 1:Yeah, interesting, yeah, I really hope I can go at some point. I was talking with somebody who's involved in organizing it and she was like you got to come to brazil and she was talking about all these things she would like show me and my family and stuff like that, and it was very nice.
Speaker 1:But it it happens to me a lot where people like oh yeah, you got to come back to romania, you got to come back to france yeah ah, I would love to do all these things, but I know I have to have a life and stuff like that too, and I don't have unlimited money either.
Speaker 2:Yeah, also I know, but that's the good thing, right, like we can, when we can travel. If you want to make it like a business and pleasure, there are Ruby events all around the world, and I even heard of a couple more coming Ruby or Rails events all around the world that you can combine. So you go there, you meet people that you know from the community, but you can also go to a fantastic location or someplace that you haven't been before, Like, for instance, maybe you in Brazil. It's really like a wealth of choice for us and it's super exciting. You and I can't travel that much and it's a little bit of a FOMO hell right now, but when we can travel, we have a lot of choice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and there's even you know for you, there's a lot of conferences happening in Europe.
Speaker 2:Yep.
Speaker 1:So that's nice, although that doesn't mean that there's all the time in the world to go to these things. Yeah, there's that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's also just the money to go to these things. Yeah, there's that, yeah, it's also money, and that's also something I really, when I went to Brazil, it really opened my eyes of what you're asking people to do when they come to your conference. You know you're asking them to come away from their families, their friends and their lives and their comfortable homes, put work on hold for a while, which not a lot of people can do. So creating a space for them to work, for instance, at Railsworld. We're gonna do that because you can't always just shut down for three days and go away. But the expense of it, the time zone issue of it, it really helped me kind of go. Okay, people make a huge commitment by coming to your conference. It's a time commitment, it's a money commitment. What can we do to make that as seamless and as nice and as valuable as an experience as possible?
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a good point. I wasn't really thinking about it from that angle all that much, but that's definitely a good thing to remember. I want to share a couple things about Sensity Ruby that I'm kind of proud of.
Speaker 2:Yeah, do it.
Speaker 1:I think you might find interesting too. Um. So the second time we did it, um, we did something we didn't do the first year. Um, I call it forced socialization, where at the beginning of each day.
Speaker 1:Um, we put people into random groups and gave them a couple seed questions like where are you from, when do you work, Stuff like that, and people would go around the circle and start a conversation and that went great. People really liked that. More than one person came up to me afterward and they're like I was really uncomfortable during the forced socialization, but I'm really glad we did it because I met people and I think it was a really good thing for us to have done so. That was great.
Speaker 1:And then the second day we had arm wrestling and my wife arm wrestled two men and beat them both, so I was really proud about that.
Speaker 2:What's her name? Nikki, job Nikki. Yeah, yeah, the, the forced socialization thing. I think on paper it sounds like a nightmare for people who don't want to do that kind of thing, but like, like it's always going to be valuable, like it's, it's not. It's only because people have this introverted idea of themselves that they think, oh no, what am I going to say? Why do I have to speak to people? But then coming out on the other side and you know somebody, and now you have spoken to five or six people, however big the group is. It's the same with the curated connections that we do beforehand, where we invite everyone in Rails world to almost like a chat roulette style thing. You get randomly paired up so that you can have beforehand. People really like that, but the numbers of people who do it are quite small because you're asking them ahead of time hey, do you wanna do this? Forced, uh, forced, what do you call it socialization?
Speaker 2:so a lot of people are like hell, no, of course I don't want to do that like. And then they complain later to say like it was hard meeting people.
Speaker 1:So it breaking that gap is really, really hard and you can do it with a smaller group to force them yeah, yeah, um, it's it's capped at 100 people and so, and so it's it's easy to do that if there's like a thousand people can't do that kind of thing so much.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, Okay. Well, let's see Synthity, Ruby Rails World. Do you know? We talked about location a little bit. I'm just really curious about like okay, next one's going to be Amsterdam. Do you have any idea about after that?
Speaker 2:yes, in about two weeks I head off to check the place out that I have in mind. Uh, checking on two cities based purely on the venues that they have available. I'm not going to say anything yet because they could fall through. And that's happened to me every year so far, where I get excited about a certain city and then I figure out I can't, um, can't, produce there, because it's too expensive.
Speaker 2:And then I already have 2027 cities in mind and then I'm already worrying about 2028 because you have to because, like I said, like these venues are really really hard to find yeah and until we're ready to pay more for the venues that I want, that I had to say no to um. Eventually we're gonna have to to produce there because we don't want to continue to come back to amsterdam or the places that we've been before yeah, it's funny.
Speaker 1:It sounds like you hate amsterdam um I I know you don't luxury yeah um, yeah okay, and by the way, I'm gonna try really hard to come to to rails world in amsterdam this time.
Speaker 2:Hopefully the stars align for me and let's like actually sit and have a coffee and actually chat this time, because I felt so bad like you were just coming over, I think, to say hi to dhh and I was like I need him for two minutes in the whole two days and these are the two minutes yeah, yeah, well, hopefully, if we go we can all, me and my family we can all stay for a bit after and then then you and me can.
Speaker 1:Can hang out after the conference when you're not so in demand.
Speaker 1:um, yeah, uh, changing topics, I wonder if we could talk for a minute about this terrible, horrible, no good, very bad economy that is happening right now. And I think you asked me pre-show, like have I seen signs of things taking a turn or anything like that? So I have a worry that this isn't a temporary condition, but this is just how things are now and I think people need to be like prepared for that possibility, because if we could somehow know for sure that it's only a temporary thing, then it's like OK, well, we can kind of ride it out and things will go back to normal at some point. But if this is like the new normal, then I think that calls for different stuff. You need to handle that differently.
Speaker 2:And what do you see as the cause of the downturn in the economy, or at least the hiring market?
Speaker 1:let's say yeah, I can only guess, but there's a few things. One is the whole AI wave and I've explained to people that the effects of AI. He doesn't need as many people anymore and maybe wants to cut 10% of the team or something like that. It doesn't even have to be true, but if they believe that, then it'll have that effect. Yeah, so that's a possibility. I have no way of knowing whether that's real. Yeah, that's just a guess. Another is what you might call the Elon effect, where he bought Twitter and then fired.
Speaker 1:I don't remember two thirds or three fourths a huge proportion of the employees of Twitter, and people predicted that it would crash and burn, but here we are. However, much time later, um, and from outward appearances, things are fine.
Speaker 1:yeah, certainly the site didn't permanently go down no yeah, and so maybe people saw that and like hmm, yeah, we don't need all these people and, frankly, a huge amount of the economy and I've really gotten a front row seat to this in my consulting work a huge amount of the economy and I've really gotten a front row seat to this in my consulting work a huge amount of the economy is just performative.
Speaker 1:There are people who aren't really doing a lot of real work, but they're still getting paid, and so there's a lot of room to just let go of those people and still get by. So that could be part of it too those people and still get by.
Speaker 2:So that could be part of it too. Yeah, once you put it in those terms, it does seem like a situation that's not really going to turn around. Then I think one thing that I've always been not concerned about but curious on how to address is the issue of, in addition to all this, for instance, the issue of rails, because, of course, rails foundation and the messaging that you don't need a big team to to to scale up to a certain point. You don't need that because rails is the one person framework and of course, that's not all the way up to IPO, for instance, but we have that messaging that we're doing. But we also have the messaging that you can get hired in Rails and there's jobs out there, and these two things sometimes are hard to reconcile together. What does that mean when you have so many people looking but teams are very, very small, and how do we kind of address that? The only thing that I can say that I've seen companies say do you have something about that, about that juxtaposition.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I can share my take on it, which is like if Rails is the one person framework which is definitely how I see it you can start something new and kind of rely on yourself instead of relying on others, and then if you start something and it ends up being successful, then that's a job creating event. So I don't see those things as necessarily in conflict.
Speaker 1:Actually, that's a good way to look at it, but that also asks that every developer be an entrepreneur at the same time yeah, that's not realistic, um I know that a lot of ideas, ideas, people for sure, developers, yeah um, the sad reality is only a very small fraction of people who try to start a business end up creating something that's successful.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I've been trying for a good 15 years myself.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, do you have ideas?
Speaker 1:Oh, I've cycled through quite a number of of ideas, and the one I'm working on now I feel is the most promising out of anything I've ever worked on. I'm building a CI platform, and part of the reason why I feel optimistic about it is it's just like it's not particularly novel, like people need CI and so it's. It's not a question of, it's not a question of, uh, do people need this new thing that's never existed before? It's just, are people willing to use my thing instead of the existing options? That kind of.
Speaker 2:And how far along are you with it?
Speaker 1:I'm to the point where I'm starting to onboard potential customers and stuff like that. It's the phase where I'm running it through the ringer to uncover the flaws and weaknesses and stuff like that, and so it's a process of getting somebody to try it. Okay, it blew up in our faces. Now I need to go do a couple weeks of work and we'll try again in the future, that kind of thing.
Speaker 2:All right, let me know when you're going to hire your first Rails dev. I'll give you a code for the job board. But that's a good look actually, and that's something I have to keep in mind, because sometimes I'm like, oh, these are two conflicting things, but actually not really. It's that one can lead to the other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and again, it's the great minority of people who try it who succeed. But sometimes the people who succeed succeed big One of those people who tried created Shopify. Yeah, yeah, yeah, the people who succeed succeed big one of those people who tried created shopify. Yeah, yeah, um, yeah, um. So, yeah, we were talking about the um. The causes of this situation, um, I guess another, is just like the overall economy is in a bit of a rough spot and so, naturally, the software industry is going to go with it, but it seems like we're being hit a bit harder than other industries. I'm not sure if that's the case or not.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean a lot of money was already there, so that's going to be where money needs to be cut back a little bit. You know, especially if you're saying there's so much overhead with a lot of developers who aren't really pulling their weight, that seems an easy win to get rid of. But I've also seen I mean it wasn't just we kind of had it across the board right, it wasn't just the tech industry that was seeing layoffs, it was pretty much across the board, maybe more so in tech and not necessarily engineering departments as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I read this I read this our marketing. Everybody was affected I read this article in the wall street journal the other day saying how basically just white collar professionals in general are having a really hard time finding jobs oh, that's interesting yeah and um, not to get like too philosophical or whatever, but my boss a past boss of mine pointed something out to me once and I'll share my interpretation of it. He said something like as technology advances, easier jobs get automated and then the remaining jobs are more difficult.
Speaker 1:Oh, what is remaining in that kind of like, what kind of what can be automated, basically, yeah, well, let's see, think about a medical clinic, for example, with a bunch of administrative work that needs to be done around billing, right, there's a lot of like phone calls and paperwork and stuff like that kind of accounting related type stuff around billing. And you know, let's say 50 years ago or something, that must have all been pen and paper and manual phone calls and stuff like that. And then as time goes on, more of that gets computerized and automated and so there's a bit less work to do but it's a bit harder because now you have to be computer literate and such and managing the systems and whatnot.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and at this medical clinic that I worked with, we got the systems like really dialed in like beyond what most medical clinics would, and the easier work went away and what was left was the harder work. And it takes different people. You can't just have you can't always have the same people doing the new job. Like at a grocery store there used to be only human checkouts and now there's human checkouts and automated checkouts. I don't know if it's just as easy to supervise 10 auto checkouts as it is to be a cashier. I can't imagine it's way harder.
Speaker 1:So maybe that's a case where it can be done by the same person. But you can imagine scenarios where, oh, I can't imagine it's like way harder. So maybe that's a case where it can be done by the same person, but you can imagine scenarios where oh, I don't know.
Speaker 1:Here's a better example A factory where assembly line workers get replaced with robots and now the jobs that are left are the people who design the robots and maintain the robots, and stuff like that, Way harder, probably needs to be done by different people yeah, yeah indeed.
Speaker 2:So then what happens to the people that aren't needed anymore?
Speaker 1:right, exactly, there aren't unlimited low-skill jobs for people to do do you know?
Speaker 2:it's wild. I was just speaking to somebody and I'm trying to remember now who it was they since I had last spoken to them. They had a new job and I was asking how it was going to remember now who it was, since I had last spoken to them. They had a new job and I was asking how it was going. I just remembered who it was and she said it's great, but they are not up to date with anything like technology. So you have to go into the office, which is already old fashioned in today's world, but it was parts in a supplying parts for something. So it was like a machine or fabrication kind of company.
Speaker 2:Every time somebody ordered parts, you had to write by hand on the carbon copy thing and take one of the copies to another floor. And she said, like that, they refuse to automate, they refuse to use technology for this, they refuse to use the cloud carbon copy handwritten order forms in 2025. And I was like, wow, there's so much. And like they, they don't do zoom calls. That's why you have to be into the office. Like how do you, how do you survive like that in a world like this? Is another like one question that's really interesting.
Speaker 1:I've certainly encountered that same thing. Um. One of my entrepreneurial entrepreneurial attempts was scheduling software for hair salons and a lot of hair salons. You know this was 10, 15 years ago. A lot of them were still using pen and paper and I'm sure they're still using pen and paper now, and not just older people, like younger people too, because for some things it's like the old technology is um just as good, or at least there's a certain kind of person who finds it just as good. Um like me personally, I still actually use pen and paper for a lot of stuff, even though it's like antiquated or whatever some people do everything on a, on a tablet or laptop or whatever.
Speaker 1:Um, but yeah, those those like commercial applications of technology. It's just an objective fact that it's way less efficient to do the manual version, but there's still people who are going to do it that way. It's really interesting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, do you want to hear a story that will make me sound like I'm 50 years older than I actually am?
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:And when you say, like you prefer paper. And we're talking about businesses. When I was six or seven I lived two blocks away from a candy store called Smokey's. This guy was I don't know why he was named Smokey, but his nickname was Smokey and he was cantankerous and he was mean to little kids that came into his store. But you have a candy store like you can't be mean to kids. So I would go in there and do you know Swedish Fish? Yeah, yeah. So he would have this big jar of Swedish Fish and I would ask for like however much money. I had like 50 cents worth of Swedish fish. So he would dump some on the counter and he would count them off, one, two and slide them across and on the back of a little brown paper bag he would take his pencil, lick the end I don't even know why people do that anymore and mark down how many he was counting off and how many cents it was and then put it in the little bag. I still remember that so clearly, like watching him count out.
Speaker 2:I think it was like two cents per fish or something like that and I would say count out one, two, three, four and then growl at me and I would pay my 50 and leave the kind of business still be working on paper.
Speaker 1:Yeah, maybe he was grumpy all the time because he was just so mentally taxed by all the arithmetic.
Speaker 2:All the Swedish fish yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I give people advice sometimes on how to make themselves stand out. Um, there are huge parts of the job search process that I'm not good at and should not be giving people advice on like the actual interview itself. Um, but what I can say for sure is that if you're just like anonymous and indistinguishable from all the other candidates, you're not going to have as easy of a time as if you are some kind of Well, if you have some something that makes you stand out.
Speaker 2:Like what.
Speaker 1:Basically OK. So all these things are sales and marketing related things, and maybe people don't connect those things to a job search, but that's what a job search certainly is, so I can use myself as an example. I'm known in the Ruby community because I have this podcast. I write blog posts, I have a book out, I speak at conferences. I attend conferences. I put on my own conference. Yep, I have a youtube channel. I do an online meetup, um those things so just things to get yourself out there.
Speaker 1:And there's even more um, like mundane things, like just having a um reasonably high quality picture in your linkedin profile yeah um, not like a cropped picture from a wedding or something where it's like it's only three-fourths of your face because there's somebody else in the picture, that kind of thing? Um, and having like a website that is like just some just your own website that has like a one paragraph biography of yourself and a photo or something like that.
Speaker 2:Um, even having that puts you ahead of like 90 of people, because most people don't have that um yeah, email address with a custom domain, not gmailcom, something like that, those kind of things so personal branding, basically, is what I'm hearing, like the more that's out there about you as a brand and as an owner in the space that you're claiming to be an owner in yeah, exactly legitimate you seem.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I believe it yeah, um, and I was surprised. A few years ago I embarked on a job search and I would do interviews and I had an interview with a company you and I both know very well, um, and the guy was like oh, I see, here you have a podcast. Uh, what's it about? I'm like god damn it. I've been doing this thing for like years, putting in all this work, and people don't even know about it. And I interviewed at 20 places and I only got one offer, which I was. Really it was a very humbling experience, but now that was back in like 22 or 23.
Speaker 1:Now I'm finding it a bit different. I just started searching for a job a couple of weeks ago. I'm in talks with three places and all three of those places I'm talking with them because of these things. Yeah, one guy responded to me and he's like hey, I'm familiar with your writings, let's talk. Another guy was like hey, I know who you are. I was pleasantly surprised to see that you applied, let's talk, applied, let's talk. And then somebody else just reached out to me. They were like hey, I saw that you're looking, let's talk. And this is a well-known organization that's known in the Ruby community too, so that was really neat and flattering to have them reach out, so it definitely can work.
Speaker 1:I don't want to overstate like how much or how frequently it works, but when it does work, it works so then, what happens when everyone's doing it?
Speaker 2:will it still be as valuable?
Speaker 1:no risk of that you don't think yeah, it's like I don't know. It's like somebody discovers the secret to um having a perfect body and it's like, oh, but what? What happens when everybody?
Speaker 2:has a perfect body. You know, I guess so, but it also, I mean, depending on the quality of what you put out, that could also work against you, for instance, or it could. It could give people who want to hire you an insight into whether your work is going to be good or not.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, and but frankly, one way to look at that is like if you put your work is going to be good or not, right, yeah and. But frankly, one way to look at that is like if you put your work out publicly and it sucks, you don't, you don't deserve the reward.
Speaker 2:Yeah, true, yeah, one thing on the subject of hiring and whatnot, one thing I have noticed is companies who have said and this was late last year that their 2025 hiring policy was going to involve juniors more and early career starters, which is a really nice I mean bad for seniors, but a really nice change of pace because they also see that a lot more effort needs to go into hiring juniors and helping them and mentoring them through the career pipeline. Let's say so. I think that's a trend that we'll start to see soon and that might be driven by the economics of hiring juniors versus seniors and putting the effort in there for less salary. Let's say but regardless, I think that's a good trend that I think we're going to see more of.
Speaker 1:Interesting. Yeah, that's something that I completely endorse and support, and all that. Sadly, I do think it's economically irrational, because hiring a junior is a really big bet, because it's really hard to tell the difference between somebody who is not a very good developer yet and somebody who's? Not a very good developer and never will be. And sadly, there are a lot of people in the latter category, the people who don't have very much experience yet.
Speaker 1:But no matter how much experience they get, they're not going to be great. I have a consulting client who hired a team of fairly junior people because that's all his boss gave him budget for, and they've worked there for years and they haven't really improved, and so that's a big risk.
Speaker 2:But who's mentoring them then? And I know it has a lot to do with your own initiative and your own drive and, of course, the skill set that you either have or you can't like you have and can hone or not, but surely there must be somebody who's putting effort in or not putting effort in to these folks.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we tried that. We tried having me mentor one of the guys.
Speaker 2:Excuse me, oh no, I didn't mean. Oh no, I didn't realize it was you, Sorry.
Speaker 1:And we did a session. The guy had been programming for years, He'd been doing Ruby for years and we were going to troubleshoot something. And I was like, okay, let's open up an IRB console. And he's like, how do you do that? And it's like, bro, if you've been doing Ruby for a number of years and you don't know how to open an IRB console, then like you're never going to get much better, so sadly, there's a lot of people in that category where you know there's a certain amount of development that you should be doing on your own, and these people in this particular instance, they're not doing that.
Speaker 2:Oh, wow, yeah, and that's just a bad match, a bad selection, maybe.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. And so, again, it's hard to tell which type of person you're getting, and so I think that's a reason why companies are shy of that, and even if you get somebody who has amazing potential, you have to take on the cost of getting that person up to speed. And it's probably going to be kind of a net negative for the first, maybe couple of years, and then by the time they get trained up they might leave.
Speaker 2:I think some of the companies, though, at least, that have shared this with me, are the kind of companies that are larger in scale and can weather that a little bit better, like they have internship programs that are quite robust. So I think that it's a little bit. It's a great. I think. If these companies actually do this and we'll probably start talking about it soon it's like starting on an amazing foot, like you're starting your career on an amazing foot, like I know Shopify also does this. They have a whole program for new graduates at certain universities. I think I think I'm hopeful that, if done right, it could really help the economy, or at least help the higher. Let's say yeah, that makes sense to me.
Speaker 1:I can definitely see the bigger companies help the economy, or at least help the higher. Let's say yeah, that makes sense to me.
Speaker 1:I can definitely see um the bigger companies who can absorb that cost yeah, and you're always going to have some churn right of people who just aren't cut out for it in any role yeah, yeah, but if you have the, if you can afford to take the risk and you have the systems in place to train the people and you can incentivize them to stick around somehow, then I could see that working. Maybe it's not very, um, maybe it's not very, uh, economically rational for startups.
Speaker 2:Maybe they can't afford to do that but the bigger, more established companies, maybe they can yeah, I imagine with a smaller, the smaller company, it's going to be a lot harder, a lot more of a crap day yeah, and I wish people appreciated the the nuances and realities of this a bit more, because I see a lot of criticism being thrown around for companies not hiring juniors.
Speaker 1:But it's like, hey, what would you do in their shoes? Um, would, would you be taking this big risk that they have to take? I don't know if you would. So I don't think people are like putting themselves in the other person's shoes and thinking about everything that they have to factor in.
Speaker 2:No, indeed, it's always the case. Though, whatever it is, whether it's like an app, why didn't they think of this? Or whether it's an event, why didn't they do this?
Speaker 2:Unless you're the one doing it. You know that you've covered all bases, or at least tried to. And then another thing that we talked about before we started recording was the rail shops and agencies. I was talking to somebody from a rail shop a Netherlands-based rail shop earlier about the difficult kind of position that they can find themselves in in an economy like this, and it really makes me think. I think about this a lot.
Speaker 2:I've had conversations with robbie from planet argon, all of the all the members of the rails foundation that are agencies as well. It's they're in such a unique position for rails to be the what I was saying to this guy earlier the front line. Basically, they're essentially pitching rails to clients constantly if you need a new application, and they're a rail shop specifically. They're kind of defending rails as a choice all the time. So I'm really thinking a lot like how do we support? What do they need from the Rails Foundation? You know, like if it's case studies to refer back to, if it's clear documentation so that the internal teams, if they pass an application back to the internal team, the internal team is ready and can come up to speed with Rails, if they're not already.
Speaker 2:So I think a lot about the unique position that agencies are in right now, because it's different than looking for a job or looking for developers to hire. It's completely yeah a first line of defense is all I can think about and it's something that we really need to keep in mind that they're doing a really important job. And I hear from them once in a while and some have said you know, we're going all in on Rails, even though sometimes we need to convince clients that it's a good decision, and they only do that, of course, when it is the good decision. Most agencies won't like falsely pitch rails if it's not, but yeah, it's it's. It's a hard time for them right now as well interesting.
Speaker 1:So is it maybe the case that there are some like cultural headwinds that are making it harder to choose Rails, harder for an agency to say, ok, we'll build this Greenfield project and we're going to build it in Rails. And then there's pushback from the client because they have certain reasons for wanting to use different technologies.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like sometimes internally they want to use a different technology or they have been using a different technology or it's what they can maintain. I'm trying to think of all the it was a really great conversation earlier today all the things that he was facing. There's more choice now, so it's also finding developers who are gonna stick around for Rails in the agency, Whereas, for instance, he said like when Elixir came up, everybody was like, oh, this is fun and exciting, I wanna do Elixir now. And they offered more than just Rails, so then they offered Elixir as well. And then people were like no, I wanna do Elixir all the time. So they left the agency for other Elixir based jobs I don't know. So there's a lot of other things that they're fighting with on a micro scale. That makes their job harder, I would say.
Speaker 1:Yeah, interesting, yeah, and that's a that's a tough one to work against because it's like, how do we change the general culture of the software industry and change the perception in people's minds of rails?
Speaker 2:that's a big thing well, that's actually one thing that if only the rails foundation was started like five, ten years ago, you know, because I think when nobody was talking about Rails and I say nobody wouldn't, I'm like exaggerating, of course people were still talking about Rails, building companies on Rails, creating courses about Rails, but the Rails Foundation is now there to talk about Rails in like a very systematic way, let's say, and talk about the benefits all the time. And when nobody was doing that, it's easy to think that because nobody was talking about it, it wasn't relevant anymore, when people just had their heads down and they were working on it period. And meanwhile, all these other frameworks are popping up and making more noise and it's the new shiny thing. And we know, in tech, that's what people immediately turn to. We're seeing it now with AI. That's what people immediately turn to.
Speaker 1:We're seeing it now with AI.
Speaker 2:So if only the foundation was here earlier and had been, and I know Ruby Central was doing fantastic work, but they weren't specifically Rails marketing, and this marketing is a lot of what we're doing at the foundation now. So we're slowly in the tide, but I only wish it had happened earlier.
Speaker 1:So part of what you're wanting to do is market Rails to the general software community.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think it's working Well. It's hard to measure, but I definitely I think what I hear, the no, what's a good way to say this? What makes me most happy is when I hear developers in other languages saying like oh hey, rails, like you're doing good stuff Not, you're doing good stuff, but Rails is doing good stuff over there. I watched the Rails world keynote and I agree with everything David said and I love the direction that Rails is going and that's happening more and more from developers. I know in other frameworks who are noticing and possibly they're noticing because we're connected on LinkedIn or whatever, but I like to think that they're just keeping an eye on trends in general.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, and anecdotally, something I've seen more of in recent times is newbie questions in the Ruby and Rails subreddits and people asking like hey, I'm thinking of switching to Rails, like is it a good choice? Blah, blah, blah. Which is you know? I wouldn't even see those questions come up like three years ago.
Speaker 2:Yeah, also the same under when we put the videos out for either Rails world videos or now this typecraft, and we're going to do more when people and like're going to do more when people and like it's one by one, you know like we're winning, one by one, new Rails devs and you don't even know if they're going to follow through. But it's like, oh, I was thinking about it and I'm going to try Rails now. Like, okay, excellent, this is what we want. We want to make Rails attractive enough that people are like, hey, I'm going to give that a shot and see what it's all about, and maybe that turns into a career rails dev, maybe not.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, it's good to see more people coming to it. I still think it's the best framework there is.
Speaker 2:Excellent, tell your friends.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, we should probably start wrapping up soon. I want to plug Sin City Ruby once more and I want to make sure we let people know about when Rails World is happening and stuff like that, although with Rails World it's probably not like, hey, you should know about Rails World because you don't know about it yet.
Speaker 1:It's like hey you should immediately buy your ticket when they go for sale, because it's guaranteed to sell out. Anyway, if you're interested in learning more about Sin City Ruby, dear listener, you can go to sincityrubycom. Chris Oliver from GoRails is going to be there, along with a bunch of other really great speakers. I've said the date wrong on this podcast before, so I'm going to make sure I get it right April 10th and 11th 2025. And again, you can get a ticket at sincityrubycom. And Amanda, what would you like to share?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, so we're going to release the tickets a little later than we did last year. So I think in springtime we'll release the tickets for little later than we did last year. Uh, so I think in springtime we'll release the tickets for rails world, which is september 4th and 5th in amsterdam. Um, we ruby on railsorg slash events. Yeah, I don't have any information yet. We don't even have a landing page for this year. That's going to be made soon. So as soon as I have information, that's where you'll find it. But I also wanted to say, jason, thank you for the nonsense.
Speaker 2:Um, is it the nonsense, nonsense, monthly, yeah, I get it every month and when it comes in I do my pot of coffee, even though I'm not drinking it now, and I sit down and I have a read. And this time it really made me laugh, because one of the things you said uh, the way I think about what, oh, the way I think about what was it the way I think about some like really complex topic? And I was like, do you just sit around thinking about that?
Speaker 1:I do. Yeah, I'm not a normal person. Yeah, and, by the way, dear listener, nonsense Monthly it's my snail mail programming newsletter like a piece of paper that comes to your mailbox, programming newsletter like a piece of paper that comes to your mailbox, and you can check that out at nonsensemonthlycom and it lives up to its name. It's not a serious endeavor. So if you sign up, don't expect serious stuff. It's not. But yeah, thank you for reading that, amanda. I'm glad you enjoy it.
Speaker 2:It's a highlight, monthly highlight.
Speaker 1:Okay, and for Rails world, is there like a mailing list or like how can people find out when tickets go on sale?
Speaker 2:We are going to add the mailing list back to the website. It was on a previous event website. Social media. Linkedin is probably one of the best. We're also on X still. And then all the important information gets into the this week in rails newsletter so they'll also have it.
Speaker 1:So if you're signed up to that newsletter, you'll get it okay, because if I'm able to go, I'm definitely going to do the virtual equivalent of like bringing a tent at 3 am and like camping outside of the door to get tickets right when the tickets are available, because if I don't go, I don't want it to be because I didn't snag a ticket.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well last year, so this is a tip for people. Last year, um, we had a lot of last minute changes, especially in the two weeks as soon as I. You can't make any changes after this. It seems like everybody wanted to make changes. So, historically, the past two years, everybody on the waiting list has gotten a ticket one way or the other, either from other people selling it, or we can like release one or two more tickets. So if you don't get it the first time, please add your name to the waiting list.
Speaker 1:Okay, thanks for that and Amanda thanks so much for coming on the show.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me, Jason. See you next time. Thank you.