• W3C SWAG Group: https://www.w3.org/community/swag/ - and GitHub repo https://github.com/w3c-cg/swag with meeting minutes

In this episode, we welcomed back Christopher Robinson, aka CRob, to discuss his extensive work in the Open Source Security Foundation (OpenSSF). We chatted about the importance of open source software security, detailing the various initiatives aimed at improving security standards. CRob shares insights into the working groups and projects within OpenSSF, focusing on their efforts to educate developers and security researchers. We also touched on the upcoming SOSS Fusion event, and its role in fostering community engagement and collaboration in open source security. We encourage listeners to join these endeavors and contribute to solving significant security challenges. 

00:00 Welcome Back, CRob!

OpenSSF

SOSS Fusion

Christopher Robinson (aka CRob) is the Director of Security Communications at Intel Product Assurance and Security. CRob is a 41st level Dungeon Master and a 24th level Securityologist.  He has worked at several Fortune 500 companies with experience in the Financial, Medical, Legal, and Manufacturing verticals, and spent 6 years helping lead the Red Hat Product Security team as their Program Architect.

CRob has been a featured speaker at Gartner’s Identity and Access Management Summit, RSA, BlackHat, DefCon, Derbycon, the (ISC)2 World Congress, and was named a "Top Presenter" for the 2017 and 2018 Red Hat Summits. CRob was the President of the Cleveland (ISC)2 Chapter, and is also a children's Cybersecurity Educator with the (ISC)2 Safe-and-Secure program. He holds a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) certification, Certified Secure Software Lifecycle Professional (CSSLP) certification, and The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF) certification. He is heavily involved in the Forum for Incident Response and Security Teams (FIRST) PSIRT SIG, collaborating in writing the FIRST PSIRT Services Framework, as well as the PSIRT Maturity Assessment framework. CRob is also the lead/facilitator of the Open Source Security Foundation (OpenSSF) Vulnerability Disclosures and OSS Developer Best Practices working groups as well as a Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) member. 

He enjoys hats, herding cats, and moonlit walks on the beach.

Katherine Druckman talks to fellow Intel Open Source Evangelist Ezequiel Lanza about building and deploying AI applications using Retrieval Augmented Generation. We break down RAG concepts and processes involved in providing additional context to general AI models for specialized use cases.

Guest:

Katherine speaks with Demetris Cheatham, the Chief of Staff to the CEO of GitHub, about her unique perspective on the open source landscape. The discussion covers her experiences in various sectors and the impactful 'All In' project created to elevate developers from underrepresented backgrounds. They highlight the significance of community, the power of relationships, and the pivotal role of natural language and AI in making coding more accessible globally. The talk also addresses critical challenges like the digital divide, funding for diversity programs, and the importance of evolving diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in tech.

00:00 Introduction

Ezequiel Lanza and Katherine Druckman from Intel's Open Ecosystem team chat with Daniel Whitenack, founder and CEO of Prediction Guard. They discuss the importance and implementation of guardrails for securing generative AI platforms and cover the operational challenges and security considerations of running AI models, the concept of responsible AI, and practical advice for integrating guardrails into AI workflows. Additionally, the conversation touches on multi-model integrations, open source contributions, and the significance of vendor-neutral frameworks in achieving a secure and efficient AI ecosystem.

00:00 Introduction

Guest:

Daniel Whitenack (aka Data Dan) is a Ph.D. trained data scientist and founder of Prediction Guard. He has more than ten years of experience developing and deploying machine learning models at scale, and he has built data teams at two startups and an international NGO with 4000+ staff. Daniel co-hosts the Practical AI podcast, has spoken at conferences around the world (ODSC, Applied Machine Learning Days, O’Reilly AI, QCon AI, GopherCon, KubeCon, and more), and occasionally teaches data science/analytics at Purdue University.

Taylor Dolezal from the Cloud Native Computing Foundation discusses his role as the Head of Ecosystem, working closely with end-users implementing CNCF projects. He shares his open source origin story, tracing back to high school programming experiences. We touched on community dynamics, experiences with project forks, and the evolving landscape of AI and its intersection with open source. We also discuss the importance of sustainability in open source communities and the critical role of vendor neutrality.

00:00 Introduction

Taylor Dolezal navigates the cloud native universe with a knack for puns and a keen eye for psychology. Living in the heart of LA, he blends tech innovation with mental insights, one punny cloud at a time. Avid reader, thinker, and cloud whisperer.

In this episode, we chat with Luis Villa, co-founder of Tidelift, about everything from supporting open source maintainers to coding with AI. Luis, a former programmer turned attorney, shares stories from his early days of discovering Linux, to his contributions to various projects and organizations including Mozilla and Wikipedia. We discussed the critical importance of open source software, the challenges faced by maintainers, including burnout, and how Tidelift works toward compensating maintainers. We also explore broader themes about the sustainability of open source projects, the impact of AI on code generation and legal concerns, and the need for a more structured and community-driven approach to long-term project maintenance.

00:00 Introduction

Luis Villa is co-founder and general counsel at Tidelift. Previously he was a top open source lawyer advising clients, from Fortune 50 companies to leading startups, on product development, open source licensing, and other matters. 

Luis is also an experienced open source community leader with organizations like the Wikimedia Foundation, where he served as deputy general counsel and then led the Foundation’s community engagement team. Before the Wikimedia Foundation, he was with Greenberg Traurig, where he counseled clients such as Google on open source licenses and technology transactions, and Mozilla, where he led the revision of the Mozilla Public License. 

He has served on the boards at the Open Source Initiative and the GNOME Foundation, and been an invited expert on the Patents and Standards Interest Group of the World Wide Web Consortium and the Legal Working Group of OpenStreetMap. 

Recent speaking engagements include RedMonk’s Monki Gras developer event, FOSDEM, and as a faculty member at the Practicing Law Institute’s Open Source Software programs.

Luis holds a JD from Columbia Law School and studied political science and computer science at Duke University.

In this episode, Madelyn Olson, a maintainer of the Valkey project and an AWS engineer, joins us to discuss the life of an open source maintainer and the experiences surrounding the launch of the Valkey project. We cover the pivotal moments that led to the creation of Valkey, a Redis fork, following the Redis license change. Madelyn also shares insights on the challenges and pressures of being a maintainer, strategies to manage burnout, and the significance of creating a community-driven, open source project. The episode highlights the technical advancements and future directions for Valkey, working to leverage modern hardware, manage large clusters, and expand the extension ecosystem.

00:00 Introduction

00:48 Redis License Change and Birth of Valkey

06:17 Maintainer Life and Burnout

14:54 Forking a Repository: When and Why

19:30 Community-Driven Open Source Projects

21:32 Future of Valkey and Closing Remarks

In this episode, Intel's open source AI evangelist Ezequiel Lanza and Dave Nielsen from IBM join the discussion to talk about the AI Alliance, a collaborative initiative formed by IBM and Meta in December 2023. We discussed the importance of openness in AI, how it fosters innovation, community involvement, and ensures AI remains safe and trustworthy. We also covered the significance of community in technology development, and upcoming events such as the Open Source AI Demo Night showcasing innovative AI applications. The episode emphasizes the role of open models in making technology more accessible globally.

00:00 Introduction