Microsoft’s wandering eyes, data labeling duties for senior devs at Meta, and prod is the new source code

This week on the Friday Deploy, Ben and Andrew unpack the sudden disappearance of Fable 5 and discuss whether Meta's aggressive pivot to AI data labeling is destroying its legendary engineering culture. The hosts also explore the rise of highly capable open source Chinese models like GLM 5.2 and why tech giants are considering them to slash skyrocketing inference bills. Finally, they dive into new research proving that as AI execution takes over, human domain expertise and strict production observability are more critical than ever. Register here: for the June 25th workshop, Life Beyond Tokenmaxxing, to learn how to measure real AI impact and ROI across the SDLC.Follow the show:Subscribe to our Substack Follow us on LinkedInSubscribe to our YouTube ChannelLeave us a ReviewFollow the hosts:Follow AndrewFollow BenFollow DanFollow today's stories:KayfableWhy is Meta destroying its engineering organization?AI demands more engineering discipline. Not lessZ.ai’s open-weights GLM-5.2 beats GPT-5.5 on multiple long-horizon coding benchmarks for 1/6th the costMicrosoft Mulls China’s DeepSeek for Copilot, Probably to Trump’s ChagrinAgentic coding and persistent returns to expertiseOFFERSStart Free Trial: Get started with LinearB's AI productivity platform for free.Book a Demo: Learn how you can ship faster, improve DevEx, and lead with confidence in the AI era.LEARN ABOUT LINEARBAI Code Reviews: Automate reviews to catch bugs, security risks, and performance issues before they hit production.AI & Productivity Insights: Go beyond DORA with AI-powered recommendations and dashboards to measure and improve performance.AI-Powered Workflow Automations: Use AI-generated PR descriptions, smart routing, and other automations to reduce developer toil.MCP Server: Interact with your engineering data using natural language to build custom reports and get answers on the fly.