"Aue, aue... when it's time to find home, we know the way." ⛵️  //   For the island nation of Tuvalu, the effects of climate change are more than a warning; they’re an eviction notice. Estimates vary as to when the small chain of coral islands could vanish beneath the waves, but experts agree that Tuvalu may be uninhabitable long before then, prompting its people to set sail for a new frontier… the metaverse. Within this digital landscape, Tuvalu could potentially preserve its lands, heritage, and governance, effectively pioneering a new model for nationhood, in which a nation and its people exist in two realms—physical and virtual. But how does one go from sand to silicon while maintaining the essence of a culture? And what is the real-world environmental impact of storing a nation’s worth of data? Whether we take Tuvalu’s proposal literally or view it as a symbolic call to action, unpacking the logistics of such an ambitious project offers a glimpse at the expertise required to bring it to life—from tech experts grappling with blockchain governance to cultural preservationists digitizing traditional art and oral histories. The work forces us to ask: Can you really backup a country the way you backup a computer? And if so, what does that mean for the future of nationhood, identity, and the planet itself?Additional ResourcesEpisode transcriptsConnect with Grace Andrews: LinkedIn.Connect with Amy Tobey on LinkedIn.Connect with Mathr de Leon on LinkedIn.Connect with David M. Carballo at Boston UniversityConnect with Ron Chapple on LinkedInConnect with Jonathan Gliboff on LinkedInConnect with Simon Kofe on LinkedInConnect with George Siosi Samuels on LinkedInFollow us on X and YouTube CreditsTraceroute is a podcast from Equinix and Stories Bureau. This episode was hosted by Grace Ewura-Esi and Amy Tobey, and was produced by Mathr de Leon with help from Lixandra Urresta.  It was edited by Joshua Ramsey, with mixing and sound design by Brett Vanderlaan, and additional mixing by Jeremy Tuttle. Our fact-checker is Ena Alvarado. Our staff includes Tim Balint, Mathr de Leon, Suzie Falk, Lisa Harris, Alisa Manjarrez, Sadie Scott, Stephen Staver, John Taylor, and Rebecca Woodward. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Enjoyed This Episode?Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your friends and colleagues! Introduce them to the people and organizations who played a role in inventing the internet. Mentioned in...

Or "Why You’ve Probably Never Heard of Waldo Waterman..." 🛸  //   We were promised flying cars. We were told that by the year 2000, cities would float in the clouds, robots would cut our hair, and there’d be a computer in everyone’s pocket. Well, one out of three ain’t bad. The question is, why? Why did we think the future would bring interstate moving sidewalks, but we ended up with the internet instead? In this episode of Traceroute, we take an in-depth look at why we get the technology we get…and our trail leads to three distinct factors. Helping us unravel the reason behind these factors is Mike Winterfield, Founder of Active Impact Investments, a VC firm that specializes in Green Tech. We also talk with Oliver Walker-Jones of Joby Aviation, one of several companies that are finally making flying cars, who shares his insight as to why it took almost a hundred years to get from the idea of the flying car to the reality of one. Additional ResourcesEpisode transcript Connect with Grace Ewura-EsiConnect with Amy TobeyConnect with John TaylorConnect with Mike WinterfieldConnect With Oliver Walker-JonesCreditsTraceroute is a podcast from Equinix and Stories Bureau. This episode was hosted by Amy Tobey and Grace Ewura-Esi, and was produced by John Taylor with help from Sadie Scott. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey, with mixing sound design by Brett Vanderlaan, and additional mixing by Jeremy Tuttle. Our fact-checker is Ena Alvarado. Our staff includes Tim Balint, Mathr de Leon, Suzie Falk, Lisa Harris, Alisa Manjarrez, Stephen Staver, Lixandra Urresta, and Rebecca Woodward. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Enjoyed This Episode?Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your friends and colleagues! Introduce them to the people and organizations who played a role in inventing the internet. Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

You know we're two hearts believing in just one mind…  💗  //   In part one of our story, we sourced the perfect tool for jamming together from miles apart. Today, we’re gonna take it for a little spin.But between setup delays and spotty internet, a more nuanced issue begins to surface. Because, in navigating the challenges of remote music collaboration, we’re quickly reminded that adapting to new tech is not a one-size-fits-all endeavor. So what are we to do when the tech itself starts to harsh the vibe?And what even is this so-called vibe anyway? How are we supposed to capture it if we don’t know what “it” is? Stick around as we explore how tech both creates and disrupts our groove, and whether the secret sauce of in-person jams can really translate to the digital world. Additional ResourcesEpisode transcript Connect with Amy TobeyConnect with Mathr de LeonConnect with John TaylorConnect with Ilias BergströmConnect with Alexander CarôtConnect with Russell GavinConnect with Janine HackerConnect with Pamela PavliscakConnect with Arman Sedgwick-BillimoriaConnect with Florian SimmendingerCreditsTraceroute is a podcast from Equinix and Stories Bureau. This episode was hosted by Amy Tobey and was produced by Mathr de Leon with help from Sadie Scott. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey with mixing and sound design by Brett Vanderlaan and additional mixing by Jeremy Tuttle. Our fact-checker is Ena Alvarado. Our staff includes Tim Balint, Suzie Falk, Lisa Harris, Alisa Manjarrez, Stephen Staver, Lixandra Urresta, and Rebecca Woodward. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Enjoyed This Episode?If you did, be sure to follow and share it with your friends!Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your friends and colleagues! Introduce them to the people and organizations who played a role in inventing the internet. Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

As the Bard of Brixton once sang, 'that's just the way it is, things'll never be the same...' 👨‍🎤 // These days, our producer John Taylor's got more on his plate than just production for Traceroute. You see, by night he's also… kind of a rock star. And his band is really more like a second family. Lately, though, that family is going through ch-ch-ch-ch-changes. For starters his keyboardist, Arman, has moved away and left John at a real crossroads. Does he hire a new face to fill the void? Or does he cling to the vibe he's shared with Arman for the past year and turn instead to tech for a solution? In this episode of Traceroute, we delve into a quest for the perfect tool to help bridge the physical and digital divides that increasingly appear between musicians like John and Arman. From California’s Bay Area to the buzzing streets of Hong Kong, we find a host of technologists who, spurred on by the impacts of a global pandemic, are already hard at work tackling the kind of low-latency global networking solutions that just might be the key to keeping the band in one semi-remote piece. But within this particular stack, there lies an even bigger conundrum. Because even if we somehow manifest the right tool for the job, is the magic of this so-called “vibe” even replicable? Or is there another solution altogether? Additional ResourcesEpisode transcriptConnect with Amy TobeyConnect with Mathr de LeonConnect with John TaylorConnect with Ilias BergströmConnect with Alexander CarôtConnect with Russell GavinConnect with Janine HackerConnect with Pamela PavliscakConnect with Arman Sedgewick-BillimoriaConnect with Florian SimmendingerCreditsTraceroute is a podcast from Equinix and Stories Bureau. This episode was hosted by Amy Tobey and was produced by Mathr de Leon with help from Sadie Scott. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey with mixing and sound design by Brett Vanderlaan and additional mixing by Jeremy Tuttle. Our fact-checker is Ena Alvarado. Our staff includes Tim Balint, Suzie Falk, Lisa Harris, Alisa Manjarrez, Stephen Staver, Lixandra Urresta, and Rebecca Woodward. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Enjoyed This Episode?If you did, be sure to follow and share it with your friends!Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your friends and colleagues! Introduce them to the people and organizations who played a role in inventing the internet. Mentioned in this...

Hey! Let’s unbox this new phone! And this new thumb drive! And this multi-million dollar SaaS platform… 🤳 // Chris Sean isn’t your typical tech influencer. He was homeless and looking for a way to change his life when a YouTube video about Bill Gates convinced him he didn’t need a degree to get into tech. Now, Chris vlogs about his life and career as a self-taught developer to help others like him find their way into the industry. For Chris, creating content is more than a way to make money: it's a mission; it's a vindication.In this episode of Traceroute, we peek behind the curtain of the exploding influencer marketing industry to understand who’s telling us how to feel about technology and why. We talk to Peter Kennedy, founder of influencer marketing SaaS technology platform Tagger Media, who discusses why tech workers make especially good influencers. We then go in-depth with co-hosts Grace and Fen, whose personal experience as Developer Advocate and Tech Evangelist reveals the greater truth behind this $250 billion industry: exactly who is influencing who?Additional ResourcesEpisode transcript available here.Connect with Grace Ewura-Esai: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Fen Aldrich on Twitter.Connect with John Taylor on LinkedIn.Chris Sean on YouTubeConnect with Peter Kennedy on LinkedInTraceroute is a podcast from Equinix and Stories Bureau. This episode was hosted by Amy Tobey and Fen Aldrich, and was produced by John Taylor with help from Sadie Scott. Our senior producer is Mathr de Leon. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey with mixing and sound design by Brett Vanderlaan and additional mixing by Jeremy Tuttle. Our fact-checker is Ena Alvarado. Our staff includes Tim Balint, Suzie Falk, Lisa Harris, Alisa Manjarrez, Stephen Staver, Lixandra Urresta, and Rebecca Woodward. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

Repeat after me. Humans are friends, not food… or statistical data points in algorithmic targeting systems designed for warfare. 👾 It seems impossible to have a discussion about AI without bringing up the fear that killer robots are going to wipe out the human race. And if this emerging tech is truly a mirror of its creators, then the fear is justified, right? In part three, we look at how this concern is playing out in the real world, and how our relationship with AI, like any relationship, can suddenly create a whole lotta drama.We talk with Dr. Catherine Connolly, of the aptly-named organization Stop Killer Robots, who is trying to pass laws to prevent AI from making autonomous life-or-death decisions. We also sit down with Mar Hicks, an Associate Professor of Data Science at the University of Virginia, whose insights on the history of technology help to put our relationship with AI in perspective.And in the end, we may just need to sit down with AI and hammer this whole thing out, Because, as John’s therapist often reminds him, the foundation of any good relationship… is communication.Additional ResourcesEpisode transcript: TBDConnect with Amy Tobey on Twitter.Connect with Fen Aldrich on Twitter.Connect with John Taylor on LinkedIn.Connect with Dr. Catherine Connolly on LinkedInConnect with Mar Hicks on LinkedIn or TwitterCreditsTraceroute is a podcast from Equinix and Stories Bureau. This episode was hosted by Fen Aldrich and Amy Tobey, and was produced by John Taylor with help from Sadie Scott. Our senior producer is Mathr de Leon. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey, with mixing and sound design by Brett Vanderlaan, and additional mixing by Jeremy Tuttle. Our fact-checker is Ena Alvarado. Our staff includes Tim Balint, Suzie Falk, Lisa Harris, Alisa Manjarrez, Stephen Staver, Lixandra Urresta, and Rebecca Woodward. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

All you need is love… and a lifetime subscription. 💒 Back in the summer of 2021, author Sara Megan Kay sat down at her computer to experiment with what she calls “an escape” - that is, a trial run with a tech startup offering its users a connection to their “AI soulmate.” But what started out as simple curiosity evolved to become more intimate and complex than Sara ever imagined. In part 2 of our 3-part series on our relationship with AI, we explore how Large Language Models can be shaped to mimic the qualities of a human personality, and the implications that come with it. We are joined again by James Vlahos of Embodied, who sheds insight on why creating personas with AI and LLMs is like directing actors in a play, but a play that does not involve thinking or motivation the way we believe it to mean. The question is, however, if your chatbot can sound like a person, does that mean it can be a fulfilling substitute for the people in your life? Or do we need to recognize that a product is a product, regardless of its ability to convince you it’s not?Additional ResourcesEpisode transcript: TBDConnect with Grace Andrews: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Amy Tobey on Twitter.Connect with Fen Aldrich on Twitter.Connect with John Taylor on LinkedIn.Connect with Sara Megan Kay on her TumblrConnect with James Vlahos on LinkedInCreditsTraceroute is a podcast from Equinix and Stories Bureau. This episode was hosted by Grace Ewura-Esi, Fen Aldrich, and Amy Tobey, and was produced by John Taylor with help from Sadie Scott. Our senior producer is Mathr de Leon. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey, with mixing and sound design by Brett Vanderlaan, and additional mixing by Jeremy Tuttle. Our fact-checker is Ena Alvarado. Our staff includes Tim Balint, Suzie Falk, Lisa Harris, Alisa Manjarrez, Stephen Staver, Lixandra Urresta, and Rebecca Woodward. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

It’s like you’re always stuck in second gear… 🤖 Since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, people have humanized technology. We name our cars, or we talk to our phone batteries and beg them not to die on us. However, perhaps no other technology has triggered our emotions quite as intensely as AI. The truth is, we interact with AI in a way we don’t with any other tech: a way that’s more immediate, more personal…more human. The question is, why do we feel this way? In fact, why do we have feelings at all about AI? In this Traceroute two-parter, we go to couples counseling with AI and take a deeper look at this unique relationship. In part one, we explore the good side of our feelings. We talk with JD Ambati of EverestLabs, a company using AI to reduce thousands of tons of CO2e emissions, and we meet James Vlahos, the scientist giving voice to “Moxie,” an AI robot that teaches kids how to express their feelings and have deeper emotional connections. If AI can indeed solve problems and create emotional bonds, surely it would never try to do us harm… right?Additional ResourcesEpisode transcript: TBDConnect with Grace Andrews: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Amy Tobey on Twitter.Connect with Fen Aldrich on Twitter.Connect with John Taylor on LinkedIn.Connect with James Vlahos on LinkedIn.Connect with JD Ambati on LinkedIn.CreditsTraceroute is a podcast from Equinix and Stories Bureau. This episode was hosted by Grace Ewura-Esi, Fen Aldrich, and Amy Tobey, and was produced by John Taylor with help from Sadie Scott. Our senior producer is Mathr de Leon. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey, with mixing and sound design by Brett Vanderlaan, and additional mixing by Jeremy Tuttle. Our fact-checker is Ena Alvarado. Our staff includes Tim Balint, Suzie Falk, Lisa Harris, Alisa Manjarrez, Stephen Staver, Lixandra Urresta, and Rebecca Woodward. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

Season 3 of Traceroute starts November 2nd with a special 3-part episode exploring humanity's burgeoning relationship to AI. Don't miss it!

In Part 2 of Traceroute’s season finale, we look at the fallout of the copyright infringement decision against The Internet Archive. If information eventually becomes commoditized, will we find someone to be a fair and responsible arbiter of history?With nothing less than the future of our digitized history at stake, the final episode of Season 2 of Traceroute explores the threats and challenges the Internet Archive faces in the wake of its copyright infringement case. We are joined by Rebecca Tushnet, the Harvard Law professor  who defended the Archive in the case, to discuss the potential fallout of the court’s ruling: are we moving towards a society where information is owned by an elite few and “rented out” at a price? If so, do we risk manipulation of that information for the sake of profit? Or will we find among our archivists, preservationists, librarians, and even activists a person who can be responsible enough to be dubbed “The Arbiter of History?” Additional ResourcesConnect with Grace Andrews: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Amy Tobey on Twitter.Connect with Fen Aldrich on Twitter.Connect with John Taylor on LinkedIn.Connect with Rebecca Tushnet on Twitter.Connect with the NEDCC.Visit Origins.dev for more information.Traceroute is a podcast from Equinix, and is a production of Stories Bureau. This episode was produced by John Taylor, with help from Tim Balint and Cat Bagsic. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey and mixed by Jeremy Tuttle, with additional editing and sound design by Mathr de Leon. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

In Traceroute’s Season 2 finale, we explore the Herculean efforts to back up the entire internet and save all human knowledge for future generations. But if information becomes commoditized, then who will own history?As season 2 of Traceroute comes to a close, we take an in-depth look at one of the most important issues in tech today: the intersection between information, access, and ownership. In part one, we’re introduced to Alexis Rossi, the Director of Collections at the Internet Archive, a different kind of librarian (at a different kind of library) that’s attempting to back up the entire internet, as well as the breadth of human knowledge. But undertaking this mammoth tasks forces Alexis—and indeed all of us—to ask some critical questions: who or what decides what gets preserved…and why. But even as we made huge technical strides in preserving our history, more questions arise: as our analog history turns to dust, is the digital representation we replace it with actually history? Is history lost when all the artifacts are replicas, or do we qualify it somehow as an approximation of history?Additional ResourcesConnect with Grace Andrews: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Amy Tobey on Twitter.Connect with Fen Aldrich on Twitter.Connect with John Taylor on LinkedIn.Connect with the NEDCC.Visit Origins.dev for more informationEnjoyed This Episode?If you did, be sure to follow and share it with your friends!Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your friends and colleagues! Introduce them to the people and organizations who played a role in inventing the internet. ---Traceroute is a podcast from Equinix, and is a production Stories Bureau. This episode was produced by John Taylor, with help from Tim Balint and Cat Bagsic. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey and mixed by Jeremy Tuttle, with additional editing and sound design by Mathr de Leon. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

When we peel back the layers of the stack, there’s one human characteristic we’re sure to find: errors. Mistakes, mishaps, and miscalculations are fundamental to being human, and as such, error is built into every piece of infrastructure and code we create. Of course, learning from our errors is critical in our effort to create functional, reliable tech. But could our mistakes be as important to technological development as our ideas? And what happens when we try to change our attitude towards errors…or remove them entirely? In this fascinating episode of Traceroute, we start back in 1968, when “The Mother of All Demos“ was supposed to change the face of personal computing…before the errors started. We’re then joined by Andrew Clay Shafer, a DevOps pioneer who has seen the evolution of “errors” to “incidents” through practices like Scrum, Agile, and Chaos Engineering. We also speak with Courtney Nash, a Cognitive Neuroscientist and Researcher whose Verica Open Incident Directory (VOID) has changed the way we look at incident reporting. Additional ResourcesConnect with Amy Tobey:  LinkedIn or TwitterConnect with Fen Aldrich: LinkedIn or TwitterConnect with John Taylor on LinkedInConnect With Courtney Nash on TwitterConnect with Andrew Clay Shafter on TwitterVisit Origins.dev for more informationEnjoyed This Episode?If you did, be sure to follow and share it with your friends! We’d also appreciate a five-star review on Apple Podcasts - it really helps people find the show!Traceroute is a podcast from Equinix and is a production of Stories Bureau. This episode was produced by John Taylor with help from Tim Balint and Cat Bagsic. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey and mixed by Jeremy Tuttle, with additional editing and sound design by Mathr de Leon. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

Grace Ewura-Esi returns from a trip to Ghana, West Africa, with a new perspective on how technology helps us not only make new discoveries but gives old discoveries a new perspective. In this special episode featuring all four hosts in a fascinating discussion, Grace presents examples like Adinkra, the symbol-based language of the Ghana Empire which is a form of communication based on various observations of and associations between humans and the objects they use, not entirely dissimilar to block code that software engineers use today.In addition, with the assistance of machine learning and artificial intelligence, ancient cultures are creating new visual representations of ancient gods for whom there were no depictions that lasted over the centuries. This same AI may even be used to help other nations, cultures, and tribes reconstruct missing portions of ancient languages and lost artifacts. It’s an episode that’s part mystery, part paradigm shift, and part digital archeology. As Grace puts it, “it’s the ancient as modern, again.” Additional ResourcesConnect with Shweta Saraf:  LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Grace Andrews: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Amy Tobey:  LinkedIn or TwitterConnect with Fen Aldrich: LinkedIn or Twitter.Visit Origins.dev for more informationEnjoyed This Episode?Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then please leave us a review. We’d also appreciate it if you would share the podcast with your friends and colleagues, as you get to know the people and technologies at the center of our digital world.Traceroute is a podcast from Equinix, produced by Stories Bureau. This episode was produced by Grace Ewura-Esi, with help from John Taylor and Mathr de Leon. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey and mixed by Jeremy Tuttle and Tim Balint, with additional editing and sound design by Mathr de Leon. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

How do we prepare our kids for jobs that don’t exist? Studies show that technology is progressing at such a rapid pace that up to 85% of the jobs that will be available in 2040 have not been created yet. Will AI, ML, and hardware advancements create a society where careers we take for granted today won’t exist in the future? In this episode featuring hosts Grace Ewura-Esi and Amy Tobey, Producer John Taylor puts a personal face on this idea through his 13-year-old daughter, Ella, who wants to be a chef when she grows up. Together, they explore this issue with Executive Chef-turned-Dell Computer Advocate Tim Banks, as well as employment attorney Michael Lotito, whose Emma Coalition seeks solutions to TIDE, the technologically induced displacement of Employment. Between trips to fully-automated restaurants and the latest advancements in 3D food replication, we discover that Gen Z’s humanity may be their biggest asset in tomorrow’s job market.Additional ResourcesConnect with Amy Tobey:  LinkedIn or TwitterConnect with Grace Andrews: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with John Taylor: LinkedInConnect with Alexander Kolchinsky: LinkedInConnect with Michael Lotito: LinkedInConnect With Tim Banks: LinkedInVisit Origins.dev for more informationEnjoyed This Episode?Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then please leave us a review. We’d also appreciate it if you would share the podcast with your friends and colleagues, as you get to know the people and technologies at the center of our digital world.Traceroute is a podcast from Equinix and is a production of Stories Bureau. This episode was produced by John Taylor with help from Tim Balint and Cat Bagsic. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey and mixed by Jeremy Tuttle, with additional editing and sound design by Mathr de Leon. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

How do we make technology that lasts? In this episode, Grace Ewura-Esi and Shweta Saraf join Producer John Taylor as he talks with two cutting-edge technologists who are trying to extend the life of the hardware infrastructure around us. From a cell phone tower that can be installed on your roof (and repaired just as easily), to a clock that is built to last ten thousand years, we uncover the common threads that run through technology that’s built to last. Woven in this framework is the story of Sandra Rodríguez Cotto, who worked tirelessly to restore civilization—as well as hope itself—to the island of Puerto Rico with the help of the only piece of hardware infrastructure that withstood the powerful forces of Hurricane Maria in 2017.Additional ResourcesConnect with Shweta Saraf: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Grace Ewura-Esi : LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Alexander Rose of The Long Now Foundation: LinkedIn.Connect with Dr. Matt Johnson: LinkedIn.Connect with Sandra Rodríguez Cotto: TwitterVisit Origins.dev for more informationEnjoyed This Episode?Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your friends and colleagues!  Traceroute is a podcast from Equinix and is a production of Stories Bureau. This episode was produced by John Taylor with help from Tim Balint and Cat Bagsic. It was edited by Joshua Ramsey and mixed by Jeremy Tuttle, with additional editing and sound design by Mathr de Leon. Our theme song was composed by Ty Gibbons.Mentioned in this episode:Vote for Traceroute at the 28th Annual Webby AwardsVisit bit.ly/traceroutewebby to cast your vote. Voting is open until Thursday, April 18th.Click to Vote for Traceroute Now!

In our minisode finale, Equinix Technical Storyteller Grace Ewura-Esi introduces our third new co-host for Season 2, Fen Aldrich, Developer Advocate for Equinix. In a compelling conversation, the two hosts reveal their passion for “digital anthropology,” and the topics they want to cover in the new season of Traceroute.  Additional ResourcesConnect with Fen Aldrich: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Grace Ewura-Esi: LinkedIn or Twitter.Visit Origins.dev for more informationEnjoyed This Episode?If you did, be sure to Follow and share it with your friends!Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your friends and colleagues! Introduce them to the people and organizations who played a role in inventing the internet. For more episode updates, tune in on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and wherever you get your podcasts.

In the second of three Traceroute minisodes, Technical Storyteller Grace Ewura-Esi introduces a new co-host for Season 2, Shweta Saraf, Director of Platform Networking at Netflix. In a brief but compelling conversation, the two hosts reveal more about themselves, their roles, and their unique perspectives on the central theme of Season 2: the humanity behind the hardware.  Additional ResourcesConnect with Shweta Saraf: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Grace Ewura-Esi: LinkedIn or Twitter.Visit Origins.dev for more informationEnjoyed This Episode?If you did, be sure to subscribe and share it with your friends!Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your friends and colleagues! Introduce them to the people and organizations who played a role in inventing the internet. For more episode updates, tune in on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and wherever you get your podcasts.

In the first of three Traceroute minisodes, Technical Storyteller Grace Ewura-Esi introduces a new co-host for Season 2, Amy Tobey, Senior Principal Engineer at Equinix. In an insightful conversation, the two hosts reveal more about themselves, their roles, and the stories they’re looking forward to telling on the new season of Traceroute.  Additional ResourcesConnect with Amy Tobey: LinkedIn or Twitter.Connect with Grace Ewura-Esi: LinkedIn or Twitter.Visit Origins.dev for more informationEnjoyed This Episode?If you did, be sure to follow and share it with your friends!Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your friends and colleagues! Introduce them to the people and organizations who played a role in inventing the internet. For more episode updates, tune in on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and wherever you get your podcasts.

The invisible bones holding up the Internet are its hardware. One of the most prominent benefits we are reaping from hardware innovations is cloud services. And as you may have guessed, the cloud isn’t actually just somewhere up in space: physical data centers services are necessary to keep them up and running. In this episode of Traceroute, we take a closer look at hardware and why its advancement is crucial to the development of the internet. We discuss the importance and benefits of optimization for hardware to suit the needs of software. Joined by our guests Amir Michael, Rose Schooler, and Ken Patchett, we explore the synergy of software and hardware in data center services and its effects on the connected world. Episode HighlightsThe important Relationship Between Hardware and SoftwareEfficiency depends on understanding how software uses hardware and vice versaSoftware consumes every just like hardware depending on the way it’s writtenPeople want software and hardware “out of sight/out of mind,” but hardware is increasing in visibility due to data centers and the cloudAs the internet increases, so does the need for better hardwareAmir Michael: “There are thousands of people at large companies that are driving not only the design of the hardware, but the supply chains behind them as well. And if you just look at the financial reporting from these companies, they spend billions and billions of dollars on infrastructure.”The Building Blocks Of Getting OnlineIntel started in 1968, specializing in bulky but efficient memory chips. Now they lay transistors on top of atoms.Microprocessors are in every device now, from cell phones to servers to routers, making foundational microprocessor capability criticalThe biggest breakthrough came when Intel was able to use their infrastructure to support networking, and could then scale up to data centers and cloud architectureThis began the transformation of networking, with storage moving from big fixed function hardware over to software-definedMore growth in hardware is on the horizon with things like Artificial Intelligence, 5G, and edge computing The Birth Of The CloudThe “Metal Rush” of the early 2000s saw companies like Google and Yahoo building their own data centersFor smaller companies, this infrastructure development didn’t make senseSmall business turned to companies like Amazon, which had server resources to spare, and the cloud was bornData centers have scaled in size, but now the need is to optimize efficiency More and more, hardware is now tailored for specific software applicationsUnlike software, developing hardware requires a longer production schedule and a more consistent supply chain, which can be difficultThe next step is density, where more computing power is packed into less space but with greater efficiencies.Amir Michael: “You know, no one really goes into a bank anymore. Everything's just done over the network over these cloud resources today. It's how we've become accustomed to getting a lot of work done today. And so you need all that infrastructure to drive that. And I think it's just going to become more and more so in the future as well.The Nuts & Bolts Of Data CentersThe cloud is simply a combination of data centers of various sizes across the globe that are all connected through a networkThe first data centers relied on redundancy and stability, so they were built like bomb shelters with backup systemsData centers started redesigning hardware to optimize it for different uses,  depending on who’s renting the server...

Technology is a staple part of our lives. Its continuous growth has improved the world in countless ways. But what most people don’t know is the environmental impact of something as mundane as streaming a video.In this episode, we discuss the impacts of data storage, technology, and the Internet on our world. Ali Fenn, David Mytton, and Jonathan Koomey share their insights on investing in sustainability and transitioning to more efficient energy sources. The key to global sustainability lies in the hands of data storage and technology industries. They need to find greener, more sustainable alternatives.If you want to learn about the Internet’s environmental impacts and know how you can contribute to investing in sustainability, then this episode of the Traceroute podcast is for you.Episode Highlights [01:23] Areas For Infrastructure SustainabilityThe demand for increased data storage grows globally and daily. Data centers need more compact and more efficient transistors to decrease their harmful effects on the environment while still providing good service.Ali Fenn, the president of ITRenew, says we should focus on energy, materials, and the manufacturing process for infrastructure sustainability.Spewing a ton of waste on the back end is also alarming.It's vital to consider environmental sustainability for the future of the Internet infrastructure industry.Ali Fenn: “The manufacturing process has this huge carbon impact. So let’s think about a less wasteful, less linear stream, and let's at least maximize the value we can get out of all that stuff.”[04:53] Investing in Sustainability by Reusing MaterialsAli didn’t think much about the environmental impact of technology infrastructure until she worked at ITRenew, which promotes the reuse of data center hardware.The demand for infrastructure is spurred by hyperscalers, like Google and Facebook.Open hardware is becoming the norm, maximizing the value and longevity of hardware through repurposing and reusing.Open hardware allows ITRenew to grow, buyers to get quality equipment, and hyperscalers to improve their sustainability.A circular economy is about deferring new manufacturing from a carbon perspective without sacrificing quality. Tune in to the full episode to hear Ali’s analogy about reusing materials using second-hand cars.[10:23] Data Center Energy ConsumptionOther concerns for investing in sustainability include electricity, materials, and water consumption.The primary resource for Internet usage is electricity.The rapid growth of technology and the Internet leads to colossal consumption of our natural resources and poses a significant threat to the environment.The total amount of data center energy consumption ranges from 200 terawatt-hours to 500 terawatts-hours.Data centers are more efficient now, and the world is transitioning to cloud computing.[14:48] Three Steps for Greener Data CentersWhile data centers have made impressive steps in reducing their carbon impact, there are three steps they can take to become greener. The first step is to offset all the carbon they emit through electricity generation.Next, match all electricity usage with 100% renewables. Although this is a good step, it may not be sufficient, as data centers still require a local electricity grid.Lastly, use 100% clean energy through power-purchase agreements to gain renewable electricity sources.Governments can encourage companies to move in this...