Developer on Fire
Developer on Fire
Episode 155 | Ben Balter - Moving the World Forward at GitHub
Guest:
Ben Balter talks with Dave Rael about progress in making government work better with technology, big benefits from GitHub teams, and loving software and openness
Over his career, Ben has been named one of the top 25 most influential people in government and technology and Fed 50’s Disruptor of the Year, was described by the US Chief Technology Officer as one of “the baddest of the badass innovators,” and was the winner of the Open Source People’s Choice Award. Previously, Ben served as GitHub’s Government Evangelist, leading the efforts to encourage government at all levels to adopt open source philosophies for code, for data, and for policy development.
Chapters:
- - Dave introduces the show and Ben Balter
- - How Ben the law student became involved in open source software
- - Software as fun rather than a serious career opportunity
- - The joy of being an attorney in a software world
- - Ben's life as a GitHub product manager and the teams with which he is involved
- - Ben's and GitHub's contributions to making open source licensing better and easier
- - Ben's life in govenment and his move from government into GitHub
- - The nature of software development and progress in the US government
- - GitHub and governments outside the United States of America and open sourcing legislation
- - GitHub and children
- - The things that "light Ben up"
- - The purpose and value of emoji
- - Ben's story of failure - inability to change a culture with a technology-focused solution
- - Ben's success story - moving government toward openness with culture movement in addition to technology advancement
- - How Ben stays current with what he needs to know
- - Ben's book recommendation
- - The things that have Ben most excited
- - GitHub is also for non-programmers
- - Ben's top 3 tips for delivering more value
- - Keeping up with Ben Balter
Resources:
Ben's book recommendation:
Ben's top 3 tips for delivering more value:
- Ship the smallest thing possible - just get it out the door and get feedback
- Focus on end user value and not the technical challenge
- Build what 80% of your user base will use rather than focusing on the vocal minority
