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The Joe Reis Show

Joe Reis

I’m Joe Reis, co-author of Fundamentals of Data Engineering, creator of Mixed Model Arts, international speaker, and long-time observer of the tech industry’s favorite recurring mistakes.

Weekly broadcasts from somewhere on the road. Expect raw solo rants and long-form conversations with the engineers and leaders actually building things. I dive into data, AI, architecture, and career survival.

This podcast is invitation-only. Unsolicited guest pitches and PR outreach are not considered.

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  • 28 episodes
  • Avg 32 min
  • English

Episodes 28

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  • Friday · 19 min

    Agents, Self-Service BI Redux, and "Death of Data Teams"

    AI agents are being pitched as the “death of the data team,” with CEOs supposedly able to do the work themselves. We’ve heard versions of this promise before, from self-service BI to low-code analytics. In this episode, I revisit that history and ask what agents actually change. Who prepares the data, resolves conflicting definitions, and checks the answers? What does the hiring research tell us about demand for experienced people and opportunities for juniors?

  • Tuesday · 52 min

    Bringing Distributed Compute & AI to the Edge w/ David Aronchick (CEO of Expanso)

    In this episode of the Joe Reis Show, I sit down with David Aronchick, co-founder of Expanso and one of the early pioneers behind Kubernetes, Kubeflow, and the CNCF. We dive deep into the evolving data landscape and discuss why the architectural pendulum is swinging back from pure cloud centralization toward distributed edge compute. David breaks down the real operational nightmares of edge data collection, why treating your bronze tier as a "toxic waste dump" breaks downstream pipelines, and how applying schema and context upstream makes your data truly AI-ready. We also get into the critical need for data provenance, data bills of materials, and what agents actually need to communicate reliably.Website: https://expanso.io

  • August 28 · 24 min

    Are You Still Hands-On?

    I get asked all the time whether I’m still “hands-on.” The short answer: not in the traditional sense. My work has shifted toward writing, teaching, advising, investing, building companies, and working with the people building what comes next. In this episode, I argue that technical relevance isn’t about staying trapped in the same operating mode forever, and that AI is drastically changing what “hands-on” even means. ------------------------ Sponsor: Fivetran With the rise of AI and agents, having centralized, trustworthy data is the absolute foundation for building tools and training models. Fivetran automates your data pipelines, removing the need to build fragile connectors so your data arrives clean and reliable. By handling the messy infrastructure behind the scenes, Fivetran allows your team to focus on building the future. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠fivetran.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to learn more. The Joe Reis Show is invitation-only. Unsolicited guest pitches and PR outreach are not considered.

  • August 27 · 52 min

    Building with AI, DuckDB + RDF, and the Semantic Future w/ Dan Bennett (Head of Tech @ S&P Global)

    On this episode of The Joe Reis Show, I’m joined by Dan Bennett, Head of Technology for the Enterprise Data Organization at S&P Global.We get into what it actually looks like to build with modern AI coding tools like Claude Code. Not just as a toy, but for writing production-grade C++. Dan walks through how he built an open-source RDF extension for DuckDB, why rock-solid test coverage is non-negotiable when working with LLMs, and why engineering leaders need to keep their hands dirty to understand where this tech is headed. We also react to the breaking news of AWS acquiring DuckDB Labs, talk through the shift from "human-in-the-loop" to autonomous agents running in headless VMs, and dive into why data semantics across organizational boundaries remains one of the hardest - and most important - unsolved problems in our industry.Website: https://nonodename.com/

  • August 19 · 1 hr 4 min

    Agentic Analytics and the Death of Dashboards? | Oliver Laslett (CTO of Lightdash)

    Will AI agents solve the data industry's hardest challenges, or are we just amplifying existing chaos?In this episode, I chat with Oliver Laslett, Co-founder and CTO at Lightdash, to explore the frontier of agentic analytics, data modeling, and modern software engineering practices. We dive deep into how AI is shifting daily workflows from writing SQL and DBT models to higher-order system thinking, why the hardest data problems remain human and organizational, and the cultural differences in tech optimism between London and San Francisco.Oliver also breaks down why permissions, curation, and data lineage are still the true bottlenecks, and why high-ownership communication matters more than ever in an era of AI slop.

  • August 14 · 21 min

    The Great Recomposition: Why Everything is Blurring Together

    It feels like everything is converging right now. Data forms and systems are converging. Agile and Waterfall are starting to look strangely compatible. Software engineering, data engineering, and AI engineering are bleeding into each other. In this episode, I explore why AI is collapsing boundaries we spent decades creating, and why semantics, architecture, specification, and judgment may matter more as a result. ----------------------- Sponsor: Fivetran With the rise of AI and agents, having centralized, trustworthy data is the absolute foundation for building tools and training models. Fivetran automates your data pipelines, removing the need to build fragile connectors so your data arrives clean and reliable. By handling the messy infrastructure behind the scenes, Fivetran allows your team to focus on building the future. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠fivetran.com⁠⁠⁠⁠ to learn more. The Joe Reis Show is invitation-only. Unsolicited guest pitches and PR outreach are not considered.

  • August 13 · 51 min

    Stop Overpaying for AI! The Rise of Small Open-Source Models w/ Daniel Svonava (Superlinked)

    Are massive frontier AI models actually worth the cost?In this episode, I sit down with Daniel Svonava, Founder of Superlinked, to break down where AI is actually heading in production. We dive into why the hype around massive frontier models is shifting toward targeted, small open-source models, and how to orchestrate smart agents without blowing through your budget.Daniel shares how Superlinked is building open-source inference infrastructure, why small models are rapidly closing the performance gap, and how you can engineer faster, cheaper, and more control-driven AI systems.

  • August 7 · 18 min

    The "X Is Dead" Fallacy

    Every so often, the tech industry declares something dead. Data warehousing is dead. Data modeling is dead. Semantic layers are dead. SQL is dead. Now AI is supposedly making entire professions obsolete. I get it. Ragebait gets the clicks and comments. But it's also lame and disingenuous. In this Freestyle Friday, I unpack the logical fallacies behind these claims, why technology almost always evolves instead of replaces, and how separating fundamentals from shapeshifting implementations gives you a much clearer view of where the industry is actually headed. ----------------------- Sponsor: Fivetran With the rise of AI and agents, having centralized, trustworthy data is the absolute foundation for building tools and training models. Fivetran automates your data pipelines, removing the need to build fragile connectors so your data arrives clean and reliable. By handling the messy infrastructure behind the scenes, Fivetran allows your team to focus on building the future. Visit ⁠⁠⁠fivetran.com⁠⁠⁠ to learn more. The Joe Reis Show is invitation-only. Unsolicited guest pitches and PR outreach are not considered.

  • August 5 · 48 min

    Building Real AI Systems: Inside "Architected Intelligence" with Jacob Miller and Jeremy Mumford

    In this episode, I crashed Pattern's office to sit down with Jacob Miller (VP of Platform Intelligence) and Jeremy Mumford (Lead AI Engineer) from Pattern to discuss their newly co-authored book, "Architected Intelligence." We dive deep into the reality of building scalable AI systems, explaining why companies cannot simply put an LLM in front of everything. We also explore the importance of curating data to avoid the "semantic swamp," the reality of adapting organizational structures to external marketplace algorithms, and the collaborative process of writing a tech book using AI as an "anti-sycophantic" sparring partner. We also discuss the booming tech and startup scene in Utah, the future of autonomous cloud agents powered by budget-friendly AI models, and more.Buy Architected Intelligence: https://amzn.to/4haOqAr The Joe Reis Show is invitation-only. Unsolicited guest pitches and PR outreach are not considered.

  • August 3 · 1 min

    My Podcast is Invitation Only. Please Stop Spamming Me.

    I'm getting a ton of emails from individuals and PR agencies asking to be on my podcast. Almost all of it is AI slop spam of the most bland and uninteresting kind. "I have an AI startup solving X." Yeah, you and everybody else... my Goldendoodle also has an AI startup. As a reminder my podcast is invite-only. If you or your PR agency sends me these types of messages, I will ignore them or berate you for spamming me with this nonsensical and offensive slop.

  • July 31 · 26 min

    The Post-Literate Engineer

    Marshall McLuhan predicted a post-literate world in The Gutenberg Galaxy. That world may now be arriving: humans are reading less, AI is reading more, and engineers can increasingly produce code, schemas, documentation, and infrastructure without fully understanding what they created. Perhaps this describes you? ;) In this Freestyle Friday, I look at the gap between production and comprehension, why judgment is becoming more valuable than cranking out code and diagrams, and how software and data engineers may evolve from writing code, shipping widgets, and building pipelines to creating the context and semantic infrastructure that machines need to act. ----------------------- Sponsor: Fivetran With the rise of AI and agents, having centralized, trustworthy data is the absolute foundation for building tools and training models. Fivetran automates your data pipelines, removing the need to build fragile connectors so your data arrives clean and reliable. By handling the messy infrastructure behind the scenes, Fivetran allows your team to focus on building the future. Visit ⁠⁠fivetran.com⁠⁠ to learn more. The Joe Reis Show is invitation-only. Unsolicited guest pitches and PR outreach are not considered.

  • July 30 · 58 min

    The AI Backlash Is Real! - AI Journalist Sharon Goldman on Data Centers, Hype, the Future of Writing

    I sat down with Sharon Goldman - AI journalist, formerly at VentureBeat and Fortune, now running her own platform, Ground Level AI on Substack - for a conversation that went a lot further than I expected.We cover a lot of ground about the AI backlash, data centers, AI hype vs. reality, and the future of writing. Check out Ground Level AI: https://www.groundlevel-ai.com/ The Joe Reis Show is invitation-only. Unsolicited guest pitches and PR outreach are not considered.

  • July 27 · 9 min

    The Data Engineering Lifecycle & Undercurrents - Mental Model Mondays

    It's been four years and a day since the Fundamentals of Data Engineering was published. The big mental models of the book are the Data Engineering Lifecycle and its Undercurrents. I also discuss what would change about the book if I write it again today. Thanks to everybody who has supported the Fundamentals of Data Engineering over the years. It's super cool to see the massive impact that the book has had on the data industry and its practitioners around the world.

  • July 23 · 50 min

    Why AI Agents Are Replacing Traditional Data Engineering w/ Matt Glickman

    Are AI agents replacing traditional data engineering tasks? I sat down with Matt Glickman, CEO & Co-founder of Genesis Computing and former Snowflake and Goldman Sachs executive, for a conversation about where data engineering is actually heading. Most organizations today are stuck in "demo mode" or using LLMs as expensive code completers, simply writing code faster to feed legacy data architectures. But if you look at the industry from first principles, humans were never meant to be data machinery. In this episode, Matt and I break down how true agentic data systems work, why current enterprise architectures will fail under agent-scale query volumes, and what it really takes to capture institutional knowledge before it leaves the building. We also cover Matt’s front-row seat at Goldman Sachs during the 2008 financial crisis, his early days turning Snowflake into an enterprise giant, and how AI-native companies will outpace traditional enterprises. If you're building, architecting, or leading teams in the AI and data space, this is a conversation you don't want to miss. The Joe Reis Show is invitation-only. Unsolicited guest pitches and PR outreach are not considered.

  • July 20 · 4 min

    Conway's Law - Mental Model Mondays

    Here's a new show where I quickly cover a mental model that applies to your work as a data leader or practitioner. Kicking things off is Conway's Law.

  • July 17 · 27 min

    Party's Over. The AI Market Is Entering Its Accountability Phase

    It's been a crazy summer for AI. AI enthusiasm remains high, but the market is starting to ask far harder questions. Semiconductor stocks are in a bear market. IBM’s shares fell sharply. Data-center projects are facing political and community resistance. Enterprises are adopting AI, but many are struggling to turn experimentation into measurable returns. In this Freestyle Friday episode, I look at why these signals do not necessarily mean an AI winter. Instead, they suggest that AI is moving from a "possibility market" into an "accountability market", where capability, economics, infrastructure, and organizational reality finally have to reconcile. Put another way, things are going to get real. ----------------------- Sponsor: Fivetran With the rise of AI and agents, having centralized, trustworthy data is the absolute foundation for building tools and training models. Fivetran automates your data pipelines, removing the need to build fragile connectors so your data arrives clean and reliable. By handling the messy infrastructure behind the scenes, Fivetran allows your team to focus on building the future. Visit ⁠fivetran.com⁠ to learn more. ----------------------- Sponsor: Revefi Save serious money on your cloud costs with Revefi’s new autonomous AI DBA, a tool built to handle the gritty reality of cloud data management so you can stop babysitting your infrastructure. Start saving money today at ⁠⁠revefi.com/ai-dba

  • July 16 · 12 min

    The Database Is Not the Data Model

    A short rant based on my new article this week, "The Database Is Not the Data Model" "In discussions with data practitioners, I keep seeing the same confusion. Someone pulls up a DDL file, a folder of dbt or SQL, or an ERD reverse-engineered from a Postgres instance and says: “Here’s our data model.” Not to be pedantic, but that’s a schema. Schemas are great. But data modeling is more than just schema design." Let’s dive into the difference in this podcast and the article. Article: https://practicaldatamodeling.substack.com/p/the-database-is-not-the-data-model

  • July 16 · 54 min

    Why 80% of AI Projects Fail & How to Build an AI-First Company - Steve Brown (AI Futurist)

    In this episode, I chat with Steve Brown, an AI futurist, independent consultant, and former professional at Intel and Google DeepMind. Steve shares his insights on helping global leadership teams decode the future of artificial intelligence. We dive into the common pitfalls of corporate AI adoption, including why so many AI initiatives fail due to poor communication and a lack of cultural integration. Steve outlines a definitive three-step path to AI transformation, emphasizing the critical difference between 20th-century cost-cutting and 21st-century labor amplification. The conversation also explores how AI is reshaping middle management, the distinct differences between "AI-first" and "AI-native" businesses, and the staggering acceleration of physical AI and humanoid robotics.

  • July 10 · 27 min

    The Data Anarchy Tax: Why No One Owns Your Data

    In this Freestyle Friday episode, I break down results from the June 2026 Pulse Survey on organizational dysfunction among data engineers. I also dig into why data product ownership (or lack thereof) is one of the fundamental issues standing between companies and success with data and AI. ----------------------- Sponsor: Fivetran With the rise of AI and agents, having centralized, trustworthy data is the absolute foundation for building tools and training models. Fivetran automates your data pipelines, removing the need to build fragile connectors so your data arrives clean and reliable. By handling the messy infrastructure behind the scenes, Fivetran allows your team to focus on building the future. Visit fivetran.com to learn more. ----------------------- Sponsor: Revefi Save serious money on your cloud costs with Revefi’s new autonomous AI DBA, a tool built to handle the gritty reality of cloud data management so you can stop babysitting your infrastructure. Start saving money today at ⁠revefi.com/ai-dba

Showing 1–20 of 28 episodes