The Beer Driven Devs

Episodes

• 51: Estimation lies we tell ourselves

  August 6, 2025 | 47min

  Why do we keep getting estimates wrong? We explore the psychology behind estimation, planning fallacies, and the real reasons tasks feel harder than they should.

• 50: Return of the Mac: Part 2

  July 23, 2025 | 46min

  In Part 2 of our chat with Ulysses Maclaren, we dive deeper into AI, agency, and the big existential questions — with plenty of laughs along the way.

• 49: Return of the Mac: Part 1

  July 9, 2025 | 58min

  In part 1 of this 2-part series, we welcome back Ulysses Maclaren to discuss AI, agency, and the big existential questions — with plenty of laughs along the way.

• 48: Built by Mums, for Mums: The Villey Story

  June 25, 2025 | 57min

  Lucy Quinlan shares the story of Villey — building a tech company without a tech background, bootstrapping, and the power of trust and community support.

• 47: F U Money, Tank Sims, and Rethinking Merit

  June 11, 2025 | 1hr

  Fresh from /NEW conference, we explore financial independence, Aussie defense tech, merit narratives, and how to back founders who’ve overcome more.

• 46: When It’s Your Job to Stay Calm

  May 28, 2025 | 55min

  A vulnerable chat on leadership under pressure, balancing empathy and steadiness, and what it really means to be the calm center of a team storm.

• 45: Brand or Be Branded

  May 14, 2025 | 1hr 20min

  With guest Sarah Kenyon, we break down personal branding myths, navigating LinkedIn noise, and why 'just let the work speak' isn’t always enough.

• 44: Why Matt Believes a Man Can Fly

  April 30, 2025 | 58min

  Matt gets personal on Superman, hope, and why stories matter — plus reflections on practical effects, mythology, and backyard birthday laser tag.

• 43: Is AI Marketing Full of It?

  April 15, 2025 | 45min

  We unpack the hype and snake oil behind AI marketing, questioning authenticity and what real, trustworthy engagement should look like.

• 42: Is the .NET ecosystem in crisis?

  April 4, 2025 | 44min

  We tackle the wave of open-source projects going commercial in .NET, community trust, and what it means for the future of the ecosystem.

• 41: Conventions? Give it a REST!

  April 2, 2025 | 51min

  A fiery debate on REST conventions, idempotence, and when breaking the 'rules' of API design is genius — or just lazy.

• 40: Why a 75 year old car will outlive your app

  March 19, 2025 | 1hr4min

  Drawing lessons from classic cars and modular design, we explore why software ages so quickly — and whether truly timeless apps are even possible.

• 39: What does open-source owe you?

  March 5, 2025 | 58min

  A candid discussion on entitlement, burnout, and the blurred lines between community and commerce in the open-source ecosystem.

• 38: Is the career ladder a lie?

  February 19, 2025 | 50min

  We challenge the traditional linear career path, exploring staff engineering roles, motivation, and how 'moving back' can actually be moving forward.

• 37: Has JavaScript outstayed its welcome?

  February 5, 2025 | 54min

  A passionate rant on the quirks and limitations of JavaScript, and whether emerging tech (like WASI and Rust) might finally set us free from it.

• 36: Championing the Road Less Travelled

  January 22, 2025 | 41min

  We celebrate those brave enough to change careers later in life, unpacking privilege, resilience, and the value of diverse perspectives in tech and beyond.

• 35: New Year, new tools, new goals

  January 8, 2025 | 57min

  A New Year’s chat on setting realistic goals, exploring new dev tools, and balancing growth with maintaining foundational skills.

• 34: Merry Christmas from the Beer Driven Devs

  December 25, 2024 | 20min

  A short, festive wrap-up to close the year — looking back with gratitude and raising a glass to all our listeners. Cheers!

• 33: Drowning in Tech Debt?

  December 11, 2024 | 57min

  We unpack the hidden dangers of tech debt, why it's like financial debt, and how to communicate its impact to non-technical stakeholders before it sinks your project.

• 32: Why?

  November 27, 2024 | 57min

  A reflective episode on Simon Sinek’s 'Start with Why', personal motivations, and how thinking strategically can transform careers and team dynamics.

• 31: [BONUS] A Day of Decisions - Part 2

  November 20, 2024 | 35min

  Wrapping up ADAConf highlights, hallway chats, and what we’re taking into next year’s events — plus bonus stories from the flight home.

• 30: A Day of Decisions - Part 1

  November 13, 2024 | 38min

  A recap of ADAConf Melbourne — standout talks, decision-making in architecture and teams, and why this conference left such an impression.

• 29: What do you know about auth?

  October 29, 2024 | 1hr 13min

  A practical, approachable guide to authentication and authorisation — demystifying OIDC, OAuth, PKCE, and helping you finally understand those tokens and cookies.

• 28: Open Source, Closed Wallet, Questionable Ethics?

  October 16, 2024 | 57min

  We unpack the ethics of open source, corporate freeloading, and how maintainers balance community goodwill with burnout and business realities.

• 27: Are we wrong about EVERYTHING?

  October 2, 2024 | 47min

  A no-holds-barred debate on best practices — DDD, TDD, Agile, layered architectures — and whether we’ve been getting it all hilariously wrong.

• 26: Unity, One Year On: BDD’s Full Circle

  September 18, 2024 | 45min

  A year after Unity’s big fee fiasco, we reflect on game dev, community backlash, and what we’ve learned after 12 months of podcasting.

• 25: The Art of Problem solving

  September 4, 2024 | 1hr05min

  From technical puzzles to life’s big challenges — we explore mindsets, DDD, YAGNI, and whether every problem really needs a solution at all.

• 24: Burndown burnout

  August 21, 2024 | 1hr03min

  Matt shares the hard lessons of juggling multiple roles, avoiding burnout, and why sometimes your own wellbeing deserves a place on the backlog.

• 23: Is Grace Ace?

  August 7, 2024 | 1hr10min

  Scott Arbeit joins to discuss Grace, a potential Git alternative — merging philosophy, cleaner code, and whether the industry is really ready for change.

• 22: The CrowdStrikes Back

  July 23, 2024 | 57min

  We unpack the largest IT outage in history, explore how tech debt and leadership contributed, and discuss what it means for trust and resilience in ops.

• 21: Is Git shit?

  July 10, 2024 | 57min

  Matt vents about Git — from its toxic roots to painful UX — and we debate whether it’s an industry standard or an outdated pain machine that needs to evolve.

• 20: Nobody cares about your privacy: Adobe, Apple, Microsoft trampling your rights?

  June 26, 2024 | 1hr

  A spicy chat on privacy, monopolies, AI overload, and whether you can really trust big tech with your data (and your kids’ photos).

• 19: Can you afford a tech startup?

  June 12, 2024 | 55min

  We break down the real costs (and hidden costs) of starting a tech business, from MVPs to incubators to the reality of throwing away your first version.

• 18: Is it time to end the remote work experiment?

  May 29, 2024 | 55min

  A candid look at return-to-office trends, the value of in-person collaboration, productivity myths, and whether remote work’s golden age is truly over.

• 17: Diving into DDD

  May 15, 2024 | 1hr00min

  We celebrate Matt’s birthday with a deep dive into Domain-Driven Design — what it is, why language matters, and whether it’s the key to long-term software success.

• 16: The "Netflix problem"

  May 1, 2024 | 53min

  From streaming wars to piracy and licensing headaches — a business-focused yarn on how convenience and vertical integration shape the media landscape.

• 15: Golden hammers and doing nothing

  April 17, 2024 | 46min

  When is the best solution doing nothing at all? We talk golden hammers, consulting mindsets, and how to resist the urge to always 'just build'.

• 14: The past, present, and future of designing and building apps with Nick Randolph

  April 2, 2024 | 46min

  Nick Randolph shares how design, tooling, and AI are shaping modern app development — plus lessons from Uno Platform and bridging dev-design gaps.

• 13: TDD & DDD from the ground up with Chris Simon

  March 20, 2024 | 1hr 5min

  Chris Simon joins for a deep, practical discussion on Test-Driven Development, Domain-Driven Design, and building adaptive, modern teams.

• 12: AWS, Serverless, .NET MAUI and async/await with Brandon Minnick

  March 7, 2024 | 59min

  Brandon Minnick joins to talk AWS, .NET MAUI, serverless architectures, and best practices for modern async code — plus a few fun side tangents.

• 11: BDD @ NDC

  February 21, 2024 | 43min

  A live catch-up from NDC Sydney — highlights, favourite talks, and the social side of one of Australia’s biggest dev conferences.

• 10: A Brief history of UI in .NET

  February 7, 2024 | 43min

  Matt takes us on a fast-paced history lesson through .NET UI frameworks, from WinForms to MAUI — and what it all means for cross-platform devs today.

• 9: Leaning into the Lean Startup

  January 17, 2024 | 53min

  A practical chat about Lean Startup principles — MVPs, validated learning, pivots, and whether anyone should really worry about someone 'stealing' ideas.

• 8: 2023 Retro

  January 3, 2024 | 35min

  Matt and Liam reflect on a huge year: favourite episodes, professional highlights, personal growth, and what they’re excited for next.

• 7: Nobody cares about your code

  December 20, 2023 | 42min

  We explore why perfect code doesn't matter as much as you think — covering tech debt, customer value, communication, and the real priorities in software.

• 6: Unpacking the 2023 Australian Cybersecurity Strategy

  December 6, 2023 | 48min

  Cybersecurity expert Nick Ellsmore joins to break down Australia’s national strategy, from professionalisation to data risks and future tech threats.

• 5: Opening the lid on OpenAI

  November 21, 2023 | 51min

  Special guest Uly Maclaren joins to unpack the OpenAI board drama, AGI speculation, AI safety, and what the future might hold for humanity.

• 4: About your hosts

  November 8, 2023 | 46min

  Get to know Matt and Liam — their journeys into tech, life lessons, and why they believe in tackling big challenges (and drinking good beer).

• 3: VR - The past, present and future

  October 25, 2023 | 1hr 03min

  Matt shares his passion for VR, from its early days to the Quest 3 and beyond — plus some wild predictions about where immersive tech is heading.

• 2: Revisiting The Phoenix Project

  October 11, 2023 | 49min

  A deep dive into The Phoenix Project 13 years on — is DevOps still relevant, and what can we learn about leadership, culture, and delivery today?

• 1: Welcome to the BDD Podcast

  September 27, 2023 | 1hr 5min

  Matt and Liam kick off the podcast with a look at Unity's pricing controversy, leadership lessons, and what it all means for devs and the industry.