Finally half unwound from the past 7 days of non-stop pre-bsides, bsides, RSA madness and it makes…
Finally half unwound from the past 7 days of non-stop pre-bsides, bsides, RSA madness and it makes me so glad for the community we have.
Last Friday started with Clint Gibler, Scott Behrens and Travis McPeak dropping loads of knowledge at a tl;dr sec meetup that also happened to have the best food of any meetup ever (Hot chocolate, ice cream and tacos?!) Big shout out to the Semgrep team that helped organize!
Then onto bSidesSF which as always, is such a well run show full of real practitioners sharing what's happening in the trenches. I had so many great conversations on the floor here - Justin Wredberg sharing tips of the trade, talking coding security with James Wickett, volunteering with Aaron Stanley at Code Red Partners' career village to help people switching careers, and chatting business with Gwenyth Castro. If you haven't been to bsidessf before, block the time next year!
Monday led with a breakfast with Alex Stamos, Jack Cable, Joel Wallenstrom where I also had great conversations with Maxwell Nardi and Tobias Boelter (I swear, I'm not following you around!) before hosting a CISO dinner with Scale Venture Partners at Prospect and jamming out with Elliot Colquhoun on automation and his beautiful bike.
Tuesday I met so many great people at the St. Regis - Dan Haagman reminding me of the importance of balance in life, Itai Gafni about to bring his latest creation into the light, and Steve Zalewski cross pollinating people like a matchmaking hummingbird. Then it was off to speak on a panel with Chris Kirschke, Sean Gray, Scott Kisser and John Yeoh before ending the night at Gadi Evron's legendary Old Pharts Party where the density of brilliant people building amazing things at the bleeding edge is unmatched.
Wednesday started with a great panel hosted by Conor Sherman with Amelia Forrest Kaye and Mike Ferrari sharing great views on how GTM orgs need to change in line with what's now possible. I managed to have an ice cream shake for lunch which I thought was a pretty cool thing to do as an adult.
Thursday capped it all off with the CISO Unconference organized by Jadee Hanson and Bryan Payne, an informal gathering where the talks hit at a deeper and much more personal level than you find in more public venues. Hats off to TC Niedzialkowski, Jadee Hanson, Aaron Stanley, Ryan Gurney, Adam Arellano, Assaf Keren, Yaron Levi, Jerry Perullo, Yassir Abousselham, Sara Lazarus and Josh Yavor for their awesome talks!
Clearly I should write this on a daily basis rather than wait until the end of the week next year, I'll file that under to-dos along with booking a room in the city to give myself a few extra hours of sleep time between events!
Until next year...