Episode 59: Jenn Schiffer on Satire, Coding, Why Teaching OSS Is Super Important

Panelists Eric Berry | Justin Dorfman | Richard Littauer Guest Jenn Schiffer Show Notes Hello and welcome to Sustain! Our special guest today is Jenn Schiffer, Director of Community at Glitch. Today, we will learn all about how cool Glitch really is and it’s free! Also, they are one of the first platforms that let you view source of server-side code. Jenn tells us her internet humor variety show called “Hoobastank2 on Twitch, why she started her satire blog post on Medium when she entered the tech industry, how Glitch is used in the academic areas, and how licensing and sharing should be better communicated in schools. Download this episode to find out more! \ [00:01:05] Jenn tells us all about what Glitch is. [00:02:11] Richard wonders if this is largely for art projects and is there any functional code that’s being used to run businesses on Glitch. [00:04:45] Jenn talks about having live code on Glitch. We also learn about her internet humor variety show called “Hoobastank2 on Twitch. [00:07:39] Jenn tells us about when she entered the tech industry, teaching computer science, working at NBA, rude blog comments about women in tech, writing satire blog posts on Medium, and “gotchas.” [00:12:11] We find out about the archetype of the users of Glitch. Also, we learn about using Glitch in the academic area, Girls Who Code, and artists and entertainers bringing their exhibitions to Glitch virtually since they can’t run in person safely right now. [00:18:21] Richard wonders if there are any difficulties in using Glitch, how is it hard to use Glitch, and what could be better for teaching open source in general. Jenn shares when she was first introduced to open source. [00:24:50] Justin brings up a point about licensing in open source and not understanding the license and how it should be better communicated in schools in terms of sharing, and Jenn shares her view. [00:31:43] Jenn lets us know where we can find her on the web. Spotlight [00:32:50] Justin’s spotlight is make8bitart.com. [00:33:50] Eric’s spotlights are The Spaghetti Detective and Thingiverse. [00:36:05] Richard’s spotlight is Jim Kang and his website Smidgeo.com [00:36:54] Jenn’s spotlight is the jQuery Project. Quotes [00:07:39] “So around the time Medium had started, 2013(ish), whatever, I just entered actually the tech industry, because I was in Academia, teaching computer science, and I was like, now I want to build computer science.” [00:08:10] “The way that people try to prove that women in tech don’t belong there are with gotchas, like pointing things out that they think are wrong, or maybe they are wrong because we’re not allowed to be wrong.” [00:16:34] “We’re seeing a lot of artists and entertainers that are realizing because of the pandemic and quarantine that they have to think of new, virtual ways to bring their art to the masses.” [00:19:27] “I’ve had a lot of really interesting conversations with a lot of young developers who are in high school, with Discord exploding there are so many gamers that are learning to code because they’re building bots for Discord.” Links Jen Schiffer Linkedin Jen Schiffer Twitter Glitch Hoobastank2 on Twitch Hoobastank2 on Twitch Twitter Jenmoney.biz Livelaugh Blog Girls Who Code Make8bitart The Spaghetti Detective Thingiverse Eric Berry Twitter Smidgeo Smidgeo Twitter jQuery Credits Produced by Richard Littauer Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound Show notes by DeAnn Bahr at Peachtree Sound Special Guest: Jenn Schiffer.