GeekWire
384 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 18 hours ago - ★★★★★ - 110 ratingsGeekWire brings you the week's latest technology news, trends and insights, covering the world of technology from our home base in Seattle. Our regular news podcast features commentary and analysis from our editors and reporters, plus interviews with special guests.
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Episodes
Amazon's Astro ambitions
July 09, 2022 18:36 - 22 minutes - 20.6 MB“Astro is our first consumer robot. It’s not going to be our last.” Ken Washington, the executive in charge of Amazon’s first home robot, speaks confidently about the future despite mixed reviews and early skepticism about Astro’s usefulness. A nuclear engineer by training, Washington was chief technology officer at Ford Motor Co., overseeing initiatives including autonomous vehicles, before joining Amazon as VP of consumer robotics last year. He sat down with us at Amazon re:MARS in Las V...
Microsoft's president on turbulent times for the company, country, and world
June 30, 2022 18:47 - 40 minutes - 37.4 MBMicrosoft President Brad Smith, like many in tech and the broader world, hoped 2022 might bring a bit of a break in the onslaught of national and global challenges. Halfway through, the reality has been anything but. "This has been another year where, to use an old phrase, we have to borrow from our sleep in order to get everything done," the Microsoft president said in an interview this week in his office in Redmond. "I don't think any of us thought, when the year began, that we'd find a m...
Amazon, robots, and the future of work
June 25, 2022 17:17 - 37 minutes - 34 MBOn this episode of the GeekWire Podcast, recorded on location at Amazon re:MARS in Las Vegas, we sit down with Tye Brady, Amazon Robotics chief technologist, to talk about the company's new warehouse robots. Then we jump on the line to reconnect with recent GeekWire Podcast guest Philip Su, a former Microsoft and Facebook software engineering leader who worked the peak season last year inside an Amazon warehouse, to get his take after he watched the keynote. Hear more about Philip Su's expe...
Jeff Bezos' big mistake ... and other lessons in 'career self-care'
June 18, 2022 17:12 - 26 minutes - 24.6 MBIn many ways, Jeff Bezos would seem to have it all. But when is enough enough? In the new book, "Career Self-Care: Find Your Happiness, Success, and Fulfillment at Work," Inc. magazine columnist and Seattle-area author Minda Zetlin points to the Amazon founder's push for financial incentives in the company's search for a second headquarters as a prime example of "the dirty little secret about success." After Amazon's choice of Queens, N.Y., backfired due to objections over financial incent...
A software engineer walks into an Amazon warehouse ...
June 11, 2022 14:03 - 52 minutes - 48.5 MBPhilip Su, a software engineering leader turned non-profit founder, decided to shake up his life last fall — seeking an antidote to his seasonal depression in a job with more structure and less pay than he had experienced in many years. Su worked the peak season at Amazon's giant flagship warehouse south of Seattle, in Kent, Wash., known by the code name BFI4 inside the company. It was a life-changing and eye-opening experience, as Su documents in his 15-episode podcast series, Peak Salvati...
Wild times for tech startups
June 04, 2022 15:52 - 31 minutes - 29.1 MBWhat the heck is going on in the economy, and how will the current market gyrations and geopolitical uncertainty impact startups and venture capital? To help answer these questions we invited Tim Porter to join us this week on the GeekWire Podcast. He's a Madrona Venture Group managing director who has invested in early-stage technology startups at the Seattle-based venture capital firm for the past 15 years, in areas including cloud, AI and enterprise software companies. Follow along with...
Microsoft's union pledge, and the new era of organized labor in tech
June 03, 2022 15:14 - 18 minutes - 16.8 MBConceding that the rise of labor unions in tech may ultimately reach its own business, Microsoft released a new set of principles Thursday acknowledging the rights of its employees to organize, pledging to work constructively with any who do, and making it clear that it hopes they won't feel the need. The move follows a union vote last week by the quality assurance team inside Activision-Blizzard subsidiary Raven Software, maker of Call of Duty. Microsoft needs regulatory approval for its ...
Microsoft's union pledge
June 03, 2022 15:14 - 18 minutes - 16.8 MBConceding that the rise of labor unions in tech may ultimately reach its own business, Microsoft released a new set of principles Thursday acknowledging the rights of its employees to organize, pledging to work constructively with any who do, and making it clear that it hopes they won't feel the need. The move follows a union vote last week by the quality assurance team inside Activision-Blizzard subsidiary Raven Software, maker of Call of Duty. Microsoft needs regulatory approval for its $...
What we learned about Amazon from its annual meeting
May 28, 2022 17:33 - 25 minutes - 22.9 MBAddressing the issue of warehouse worker safety in response to a shareholder question this week, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy described the company's safety initiatives — most of them related to technology and invention. The focus on innovation is "true to their DNA," says former Amazon general manager and retail category leader Andrea Leigh, who is now founder and CEO of the Allume Group, an e-commerce learning company. Looking at it from Amazon's perspective, the approach makes sense, she point...
Startup turnaround specialist Matt Hulett on unlocking growth, competing with giants, and surviving turbulent times
May 21, 2022 15:15 - 37 minutes - 34.6 MBOur guest this week is Matt Hulett, a veteran of the Seattle tech community and the author of the new book, Unlock: 5 Questions to Unleash Your Company’s Hidden Power, published by Page Two Books. A former executive with companies including Expedia, Mpire, Rosetta Stone and RealNetworks, Hulett is now the CEO and president of PetMed Express, a publicly traded, Florida-based online pet pharmacy. We talk about finding the right market segment to pursue, how startups and investors should app...
Former Amazon exec Jeff Wilke on his industrial roots, and the future of U.S. manufacturing
May 19, 2022 15:25 - 45 minutes - 41.7 MBPITTSBURGH — In his 22 years at Amazon, including his role as the first CEO of the company’s Worldwide Consumer business, Jeff Wilke always kept the place he was raised, and the people he grew up with, in the back of his mind. “I always wanted to lead in a way that if I went back, and people from high school could ask me anything about what I was encountering, the decisions I made, how I made them, that they’d be proud of me,” Wilke said. Born at Allegheny General Hospital in 1966, Wilke g...
Startups, superheroes, and the economy at a crossroads: Voices from Seattle's tech community
May 14, 2022 18:53 - 37 minutes - 34.6 MBAfter holding the GeekWire Awards virtually for the past two years, there was a feeling of real catharsis Thursday evening as hundreds of people streamed through the doors of the Showbox Sodo in Seattle for our annual celebration of the Pacific Northwest's top tech startups, leaders, and innovations. For the finalists in the 2022 GeekWire Awards, recognition at the superhero-themed show came with the added bonus of knowing that their companies made it through a period of unprecedented chall...
'My name is Reggie ...' Former Nintendo of America leader on his new book, and what's next in games
May 10, 2022 17:13 - 49 minutes - 45.5 MBOne of the most memorable lines of the past two decades in video games was delivered not by a character in a game but by an executive on stage. “My name is Reggie. I’m about kicking ass and taking names — and we’re about making games,” declared Reggie Fils-Aimé, introducing himself during Nintendo’s presentation at the E3 convention in Los Angeles in 2004. The line represented a new attitude from Nintendo, a statement that the legendary game company hadn’t given up in its battle against th...
Robots, automation, AI, and the Pirate Parrot: Insights from our return to the epicenter of robotics
May 06, 2022 17:54 - 28 minutes - 26.5 MBIt's going to be a long time before robots replace sports mascots, but it might be better for one of our GeekWire colleagues when they do. That's one of the more lighthearted takeaways from our return trip to Pittsburgh, where GeekWire co-founder John Cook somehow managed to make enemies with yet another pro sports mascot, but we also came away with some more fundamental insights into the state of robots, automation and artificial intelligence: Supply chain challenges and labor shortages a...
Robots, AI, cars, and the future, with Matthew Johnson-Roberson of CMU's Robotics Institute
April 30, 2022 14:37 - 42 minutes - 39.2 MBWe're coming to you from Pittsburgh, where GeekWire is reporting on the future of robotics, AI and automation this week in conjunction with the Cascadia Connect Robotics, Automation & AI conference, organized by Seattle-based Cascadia Capital, which is underwriting our independent coverage of this topic. This week's podcast is with Matthew Johnson-Roberson, the director of the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, which has been the source of numerous breakthroughs in robotics ...
Secrets of STEM: Top teachers share insights on innovation in learning
April 28, 2022 17:09 - 45 minutes - 41.6 MBInnovation is alive and well in STEM classrooms across Washington state, inspiring students to seek opportunities in science, technology, engineering and math. At the GeekWire Awards on May 12, we're celebrating the accomplishments of three STEM Educator of the Year honorees who are excelling in their jobs by embracing creative, rule-breaking teaching strategies in their classrooms. These educators are eschewing traditional grading structures, putting students in charge of teaching lessons ...
Netflix ads, Amazon shipping, Paul Allen's legacy
April 23, 2022 14:08 - 33 minutes - 30.7 MBDoes it seem like activity is picking up out there in the tech world? Big fundings may be happening less frequently (with notable exceptions such as Convoy) but the return of events and in-person meetings seems to have created a collective energy that's been missing for the past two years. In that spirit, we've got a grab bag of topics on this week's show: New era for Netflix: News that Netflix is exploring a lower-price tier, supported by advertising, has us thinking back to our recent ep...
Moscow-born Seattle tech CEO grapples with invasion of Ukraine, closes 800-person Russian operation
April 19, 2022 14:22 - 40 minutes - 37 MBSergei Dreizin is co-founder and CEO of software engineering company Akvelon, based in Bellevue, Wash. Born and raised in Moscow, he moved to the U.S. in 1992, after the Soviet Union's collapse, getting his computer science degree from the University of Minnesota before going to work for Microsoft in the Seattle area. But he maintained personal connections to Russia, and Akvelon established a large engineering operation in the country — numbering about 800 people, or more than half the comp...
The new frontiers of AI and robotics, with CMU computer science dean Martial Hebert
April 16, 2022 15:01 - 23 minutes - 22 MBThis week on the GeekWire Podcast, we explore the state of the art in robotics and artificial intelligence with Martial Hebert, dean of the Carnegie Mellon University School of Computer Science in Pittsburgh. A veteran computer scientist in the field of computer vision, Hebert is the former director of CMU's prestigious Robotics Institute. A native of France, he also had the distinguished honor of being our first in-person podcast guest in two years, visiting the GeekWire offices during his...
Words with AI: Language and the future of work, with Textio CEO Kieran Snyder
April 09, 2022 16:07 - 48 minutes - 44.2 MBWhat's the impact of the words we use? Augmented writing platform Textio uses machine learning and natural language processing to take the guesswork out of business communication, offering predictive analytics designed to help companies recruit a diverse workforce and build an inclusive culture. The 120-person Seattle-based tech company, led by CEO Kieran Snyder, has been going through a transformation of its own during the past two years, expanding its product lineup while taking its own ...
Technology, data, and the future of TV, with iSpot tech chief Anthony Skinner
April 02, 2022 17:26 - 39 minutes - 35.8 MBMost online publishers and advertisers are accustomed to real-time analytics, the ability to see how many people are viewing a website or app at any moment, where they're coming from, generally who they are, and what they're doing on the site. But that concept was a novelty in TV advertising before a startup called iSpot.tv came along in 2012. The company, based in Bellevue, Wash., took the turnaround time for data about television ads from weeks and days to hours and minutes. A decade lat...
Testing SpaceX Starlink; U.S. tech worker migration; and a GeekWire Awards sneak peek
March 26, 2022 16:28 - 34 minutes - 31.9 MBThis week on the GeekWire Podcast, we talk about what could be an enduring era of remote work — for some people, at least — as enabled by new technology and illuminated by new data about migration within the United States. First up, GeekWire co-founder Todd Bishop reports on his experience testing the SpaceX Starlink satellite service in my hometown in rural Northern California, including efforts to use the service from multiple locations. Then GeekWire co-founder John Cook assesses a high...
Tony Hsieh, Zappos, and Amazon
March 19, 2022 15:03 - 31 minutes - 29.2 MBTony Hsieh was a legendary entrepreneur who built Zappos and sold the online shoe retailer to Amazon for $1.2 billion in 2009. He was known for unusual experiments in management and business structure, and for pursuing long-term passions over short-term profits, as described in his 2010 book, Delivering Happiness. A new book, Happy at Any Cost: The Revolutionary Vision and Fatal Quest of Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh, tells the rest of the story of Hsieh's life, leading up to his tragic death from ...
Jeff Bezos, future Seahawks owner?
March 12, 2022 17:33 - 22 minutes - 20.9 MBThis week's blockbuster trade of Seattle Seahawks QB Russell Wilson could be the first in a series of moves that leads to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owning the team. That was the hypothesis offered by veteran Seattle sports columnist Art Thiel in a piece this week at PostAlley.org, blending smart sourcing with informed speculation. Rumors of Bezos' interest in buying the Seahawks have been around for years, but the team's deal with the Denver Broncos makes the possibility worth revisiting. ...
A former tech columnist's antidote for 'dangerously divided times'
March 09, 2022 14:54 - 19 minutes - 18 MBWhat would happen to the divisions in our country if we set aside our phones, and our assumptions, and truly tried to understand people who are different from us? Mónica Guzmán did this in her own family, and she's convinced that the country could do it, too. The Seattle-based journalist, entrepreneur and self-described liberal starts her new book with the personal story of coming to terms with her own parents, Mexican immigrants who voted twice for Donald Trump for president. The rest of ...
Amazon's Bizarre Bazaar
March 08, 2022 00:28 - 7 minutes - 6.9 MB“Best Book Club Ever,” read one sign inside Amazon Books at Seattle’s University Village this weekend. On the bookshelves below it were products including an electric 1.5-liter ceramic kettle, a sugar dispenser, and a marble cheese slicer. Elsewhere in the store, shoppers browsed items as varied as a plush baby shark, a Lite Brite, Funko figurines, a USB mic, game consoles, a smart fitness scale, a WiFi router, and kitchen scissors. There was not, as far as I could tell, a kitchen sink. Y...
Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer on the State of the Union in Numbers
March 05, 2022 14:19 - 39 minutes - 36.5 MBUnderstanding any subject requires knowing the numbers, and that includes looking at the long-term trends. That was one of Steve Ballmer's guiding principles as Microsoft's CEO, and it remains his mantra as founder of USAFacts, a non-profit, non-partisan organization that compiles and reports U.S. government data. Ballmer, the chairman of the L.A. Clippers and former Microsoft CEO, joins us on the GeekWire Podcast to discuss the USAFacts State of the Union in Numbers report, including the d...
Rewind: Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella talks about his son, Zain
March 01, 2022 23:23 - 8 minutes - 7.59 MBThis is a special episode in remembrance of Zain Nadella, the son of Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and his wife, Anu Nadella, who died Monday at the age of 26. Those who knew him are remembering Zain for his wide-ranging taste in music, his bright smile and for his profound impact on his dad's life. Zain suffered from asphyxia in utero and developed cerebral palsy. Satya Nadella wrote candidly about his experience as Zain's dad in his 2017 book, Hit Refresh, and he spoke with me about Zain's...
Key trends in digital commerce, with the former Amazon exec leading Seattle’s newest unicorn
February 26, 2022 16:25 - 33 minutes - 30.7 MBThis week brought news of a big fundraising by e-commerce technology startup Fabric, a $140 million Series C round led by Softbank. With the deal, Fabric became the Seattle region’s newest unicorn startup, a privately held company valued at more than $1 billion, or about $1.5 billion in its case. Our guest on this week’s GeekWire Podcast is Fabric’s CEO, Faisal Masud a former executive with companies including Amazon, Alphabet, Groupon, Staples and eBay. We talked about the state of physi...
How Zillow's flexible work strategy is going
February 23, 2022 18:13 - 20 minutes - 18.9 MBZillow Group knows a thing or two about homes, and during the past two years the Seattle-based online real estate company has emerged as a leader enabling its employees to work from theirs — or from anywhere else they want. As companies including Microsoft and Expedia make the transition back to the office, in some cases expecting employees to spend at least half of their time working in-person, Zillow has already been through its own transition to a completely flexible approach to work. ...
Armoire's startup survival story
February 19, 2022 13:38 - 42 minutes - 39.1 MBArmoire CEO and founder Ambika Singh and her team built a women's clothing subscription service with their "bosslady" members in mind, providing an on-demand wardrobe of apparel primarily for work and events. Two years ago, the Seattle-based startup was on a roll, posting a record month in February 2020 after growing nearly 400% in 2019. But then came the pandemic. Armoire's members no longer needed to dress up for the office or to go out. So close the door on Armoire, right? Not so fast. ...
Why Microsoft's return to the office may not be the norm
February 16, 2022 01:07 - 20 minutes - 18.5 MBWhat does Microsoft's return to the office mean for everybody else? That was one of the questions raised by the tech giant's announcement Monday that it will fully reopen its Washington state offices, including its Redmond headquarters, starting on Feb. 28. The company says it will offer flexibility but expects most employees to be back in the office at least 50% of the time. Microsoft and other big tech companies were among the first in the country to ask employees to work from home at th...
The realities of Amazon's pay increase; inside Microsoft's HoloLens business
February 12, 2022 15:52 - 32 minutes - 30.1 MBOur guest this week, Ashley Stewart, is a Seattle-based senior tech correspondent for the news site Insider who reports on Microsoft and Amazon. She and her colleagues reported on Amazon’s executive exodus and its internal deliberations about compensation in advance of the increase in maximum base pay announced by the company this week. After the announcement, they reported on internal documents indicating the types of pay increases employees can expect. We also discuss her reporting on tu...
Amazon's big salary bump
February 07, 2022 21:20 - 16 minutes - 15 MBAmazon informed employees about a major change coming to their pay structure Monday morning. The company raised the cap for its base pay to $350,000 as part of its larger package of stock and cash compensation for corporate and tech employees. The maximum base pay has long been $160,000. The move has implications not only for Amazon employees but for the broader tech industry. Garry Straker, senior compensation consultant at salary.com, spoke with GeekWire's Todd Bishop about the Amazon ne...
Amazon defies gravity, Microsoft's biggest challenge, and one startup's quest to wipe out deforestation
February 05, 2022 16:26 - 25 minutes - 23.4 MBThis week on the GeekWire Podcast: Amazon's latest results demonstrated its extraordinary flexibility and ability to overcome challenges in the broader economy using the built-in safeguards in its business, most notably the Amazon Web Services cash machine. Amazon spent an extra $4 billion to keep its business running smoothly despite a clogged economy. Plus, Microsoft hires an Amazon veteran to take on "one of the greatest challenges of our time," and Seattle startup Cloud Paper raises $5 ...
Sony's $3.6 billion Bungie buy, explained
February 01, 2022 01:32 - 22 minutes - 20.5 MBThe latest jaw-dropping deal in video games is Sony Interactive Entertainment's agreement to buy Bellevue, Wash.-based Bungie, maker of the Destiny series of online multiplayer first-person shooter games, originally known for developing Halo for Microsoft's Xbox. Bungie was spun out of Microsoft in 2007 and has operated as an independent company in the meantime. It's expected to be an independent Sony Interactive Entertainment subsidiary and continue to operate under its current management....
Data journalist Sherrell Dorsey on her new book, 'Upper Hand: The Future of Work for the Rest of Us'
January 29, 2022 16:17 - 46 minutes - 42.3 MBData journalist and entrepreneur Sherrell Dorsey is a Seattle native whose story is a powerful testament to the potential of kids in overlooked communities, and to the possibilities that emerge when their paths are cleared. Dorsey is founder and CEO of The Plug, a venture-backed news and insights platform covering Black startups and ecosystems. Her new book is Upper Hand: The Future of Work for the Rest of Us. Read an excerpt from Dorsey's book on GeekWire: Seattle’s ‘Motown of tech’ change...
Microsoft's Candy Crush: Madrona's Hope Cochran, former King CFO, on the $68.7B Activision deal
January 22, 2022 15:29 - 47 minutes - 43.7 MBHope Cochran, managing director at venture capital firm Madrona Venture Group in Seattle, was previously the chief financial officer of King Digital, the maker of Candy Crush and other hit mobile games. She led King through its initial public offering in 2014, and its $5.9 billion acquisition in early 2016 by Activision Blizzard. That gives her a unique perspective on Microsoft's deal this week to acquire video-game giant Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion. We also talk about Cochran's...
NFTs, Metaverse, Web3, and new realities of startup investing, with Founders Co-op’s Aviel Ginzburg
January 15, 2022 16:41 - 51 minutes - 46.9 MBSo much of what happens in the startup world comes from serendipitous moments, random interactions that lead to fresh insights and new collaborations. And so much of that has traditionally happened at events, meetups, coffee meetings, and other in-person gatherings. Two years into the pandemic and remote work, what are the implications? That's our first topic on this episode of the GeekWire Podcast, with entrepreneur, software engineer and investor Aviel Ginzburg, general partner at Seattl...
Amazon's Alexa is going to space
January 08, 2022 14:00 - 35 minutes - 32.4 MBAlexa, open the pod bay doors. Amazon's voice assistant hasn't quite reached the level of HAL, the iconic AI from 2001: A Space Odyssey. However, we learned this week that Alexa is going to space later this year, and around the moon, for a technology demonstration on the Orion deep-space capsule as part of NASA’s Artemis 1 mission. Veteran space reporter Alan Boyle, GeekWire contributing editor, joins us on this episode of the GeekWire Podcast to explain what Alexa will be doing during the...
GeekWire's 2021 News Quiz
December 30, 2021 17:53 - 23 minutes - 21.6 MBThis year was a bit of a blur — fighting through waves of Delta and Omicron. But there was other important news this year, too. And before we wave goodbye to 2021, we thought it would be fun to test your geek knowledge. Spoiler alert: we give the answers as we go, so if you want to test your knowledge first, you can take an interactive version of the quiz in the post for this episode at geekwire.com, then come back here and listen. Edited by Curt Milton; theme music by Daniel L.K. Caldwel...
Top Stories of 2021: Amazon, Microsoft, Meta, and more
December 23, 2021 15:43 - 50 minutes - 46.6 MBLooking at GeekWire’s most-read stories for 2021, this series of headlines stands out as a symbol of the past year, not just for Amazon but for the world at large. March 31, 2021: Amazon updates remote work guidance, plans to ‘return to an office-centric culture as our baseline’ June 10, 2021: Amazon adjusts return-to-office guidance, says employees can work two days a week remotely October 11, 2021: Amazon will leave remote work decisions to individual team leaders in new policy twist I...
The new era of work, with Qualtrics CEO Zig Serafin
December 18, 2021 14:00 - 34 minutes - 31.4 MBThis week on the GeekWire Podcast: How the pandemic is changing attitudes toward work, jobs, geography. Plus, the market for IPOs and acquisitions, and the future of downtown Seattle from the perspective of a newly public company. Our guest, Zig Serafin, has a unique window into all of these topics as the CEO of Qualtrics, the experience management technology company based in Seattle and Provo, Utah. Qualtrics’ technology helps companies survey employees, customers and other stakeholders, a...
AWS outage, AI quiz, and Amazon's Halo View
December 11, 2021 17:47 - 29 minutes - 27.4 MBThis week on the GeekWire Podcast: Is the world relying too much on Amazon Web Services? We assess the fallout from the big AWS outage, which was the subject of a detailed explanation from the company Friday night. Plus, what's your AI IQ? We test our own artificial intelligence literacy in a new online quiz from the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence in Seattle. Read more in this story by our colleague Alan Boyle. And finally, we try on Amazon's new Halo View, and explain what's ...
Immigration and tech: New realities, old problems, and what's at stake for the future
December 04, 2021 16:29 - 41 minutes - 37.8 MBThis week: how the pandemic, politics, labor shortages, and the rise of remote work are impacting U.S. immigration in the tech industry and beyond — and how ongoing challenges in the system could be putting the country's future at risk. Our guest is Xiao Wang, CEO and co-founder of Boundless, a Seattle technology company that streamlines the immigration process. Related Stories and Links GeekWire: Immigration startup Boundless raises $25M, eyes opportunity with ‘pro-immigrant administrat...
What we're thankful for in tech, science, and innovation
November 27, 2021 15:12 - 32 minutes - 29.6 MBThis was a week when many of us in the U.S. paused to reflect and give thanks. We're keeping the tradition on the GeekWire Podcast. On this special holiday episode, we offer our gratitude for some of the technologies, trends and hopeful developments of the past year, as reflected in news coverage on GeekWire. Hosted by GeekWire co-founders Todd Bishop and John Cook. Produced and edited by Curt Milton. Theme music by Daniel L.K. Caldwell. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Robbie Bach on 20 years of Xbox, and his debut novel, 'The Wilkes Insurrection'
November 20, 2021 15:40 - 47 minutes - 43.6 MBCan you believe Xbox has been around for 20 years? Our guest on this week's GeekWire Podcast, Robbie Bach, was there at the beginning, and led Microsoft’s gaming business for many years as Chief Xbox Officer and President of the company's Entertainment & Devices Division. These days, Bach is board chair of the Bipartisan Policy Center, a Washington, D.C.–based think tank that promotes bipartisanship. He serves on the national board of governors for Boys and Girls Clubs of America and is on...
Zillow, Amazon, Facebook and the pitfalls of rampant automation
November 13, 2021 16:17 - 29 minutes - 27.3 MBThe downfall of Zillow's iBuying business is a reminder of the downsides of relying too much on automation and machine learning algorithms at this stage in the evolution of technology. A conversation about the pitfalls of real estate valuations leads John Cook and Todd Bishop into a larger discussion about the continued importance of human judgment and attention in the modern world. Plus, cat vs. coyote: the crazy scene on Todd's Ring camera this week. And in our final segment, we test a ...
Jane Park on SPACs, the immigrant ethos, and brands in the Amazon era
November 06, 2021 13:28 - 49 minutes - 45.6 MBJane Park, the CEO of newly public Athena Consumer Acquisition Corp., hadn't imagined herself leading a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, before accepting the job. She decided to consider the pitch from venture capitalist Isabelle Freidheim for one reason. “It took some convincing, a little bit. I wasn’t sure if I had the right capabilities. I have always sat on the entrepreneur side. So to be on the acquiring/money side is a new perspective and vantage point for me,” she said. ...
Amazon's new reality, Facebook's virtual reality, and Microsoft's big milestone
October 30, 2021 16:21 - 40 minutes - 36.7 MBThis week on the GeekWire Podcast ... We dissect Amazon's earnings, offering our take on Andy Jassy's take on the company's latest predicament. We assess a major Microsoft milestone, as the Redmond company surpasses Apple to become the world's most valuable company again. We look forward to the Metaverse, but question whether Mark Zuckerberg and his Facebook friends are the right people to take us there. And finally, by popular demand, for one show only, we bring back one of our most bel...