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Who should be held liable when AI fails? Who is liable when an AI system "breaks into" a network or system, causing a major breach? Listen in as Tom and Russ discuss two articles covering these topics on this roundtable episode of the Hedge.

Just about everyone is watching the financial markets, either wondering how much better they can get, or when the AI financing bubble is going to crash. Dough Dawson, from POTs and PANs, joins Tom and Russ to talk about the logic of a coming crash, and consider where engineers should be looking for potential future career fields to weather the storm.   https://media.blubrry.com/hedge/content.blubrry.com/hedge/hedge-322.mp3   download

There are many "unsung technologies" in the Internet. While we often think of TCP/IP, various models, Ethernet, and DNS, we don't often think about the lowly socket interface. What is the history of the socket, and why is it important in the world of the Internet? George Michaelson joins Colin Doyle and Russ White to discuss the history and importance of sockets.   https://media.blubrry.com/hedge/media.blubrry.com/hedge/content.blubrry.com/hedge/hedge-321.mp3

Over time, services like DNS and email have been centralized, leaving the Internet itself much more centralized. In this episode of the Hedge, Doug Jacobson joins Tom Ammon and Russ White to discuss centralization and service consolidation.   https://media.blubrry.com/hedge/content.blubrry.com/hedge/hedge-320.mp3   download

AI is everywhere. While there are many questions about whether AI is a bubble, the ethics of AI, and the cultural impact of AI, in this episode of the Hedge Mike Bushong joins Eyvonne, Tom, and Russ to talk about how network engineers can use AI. Are some use cases better than others? Are there pitfalls network engineers should avoid? Listen in and find out.   https://media.blubrry.com/hedge/media.blubrry.com/hedge/content.blubrry.com/hedge/hedge-319.mp3   download

It's time for Eyvonne, Tom, and Russ to gather round the hedge and talk about various items of interest. In this roundtable, we consider what we can learn about product development from Bastiat, and the various ins and outs of Parkinson's Law.   https://media.blubrry.com/hedge/media.blubrry.com/hedge/content.blubrry.com/hedge/hedge-318.mp3   download

How effective are AI tools--even agentic AI tools placed into a system--at building and testing software? Derick Winkworth and Donald Sharp Join Russ to discuss various projects they've worked on using AI tools, lessons they've learned, and how developers can make effective use of AI.

Deploying AI for AI Ops, or even just for general use in your network, is very simple--but we often forget that these kinds of new technologies need to be governed. From privacy through cost, operators need to decide how to govern their AI deployments to control costs, ensure accuracy, measure productivity, and make certain these systems are being used effectively. Colin Cosgrove joins Russ and Tom to look at AI governance.

We often talk about "human infrastructure" in network engineering--but what does this mean, and how do we help engineers "produce" while helping them to flourish as individuals? Catherine Hicks joins Tom and Russ to discuss the psychology of software engineering, and how the lessons learned apply to network engineering.   https://media.blubrry.com/hedge/media.blubrry.com/hedge/content.blubrry.com/hedge/hedge-315.mp3   download   You can find Catherine's new book on the psychology of software engineering here. If you would like to follow Catherine's writing in this area, including the impact of AI on work, you can find her blog here. You can connect with Catherine on LinkedIn.

Sometimes we can be so focused on the problems in front of us that we forget the people who are following in our footsteps. Michael McCollum, a new network engineer, joins Tom and Russ to ask questions about life as a network engineer.

Most designers and operators default to carrying all traffic--including network management traffic--across the same paths as application data, or in band. Is this the right choice, or should operators seriously consider creating an out-of-band network just for network management? If you decide to build an out-of-band network, what are some of the considerations and lessons learned? Daryll Swer joins Tom and Russ to discuss.

The entire technology world has, for decades, treated the IP address as a shorthand host identifier. This is clearly not the way IP was designed, but what are our other choices? In this episode of the Hedge, Scott Robohn joins Russ And Tom to discuss a recent paper arguing cryptographic keys should be the primary host identifier, and another article on the centrality of DNS to the Internet.

We are often told that if engineers who don't go "all in" on AI will be left behind. While there are a few voices who argue that AI can be a dangerous tool, impacting not only the quality of our work, but the very quality of our thinking skills. Doug Smith, a critic of using AI for engineering, joins this episode of the Hedge to argue the contrary view of AI. What are the dangers of relying on AI?

What is AI Ops, and how can it be useful for your network? Akshay Balaganur and Sushanth Mascaren join Tom and Russ to discuss various aspects of AI Ops.

As DNS is more widely used to distribute certificate information, proving ownership of a resource becomes more critical. The constant challenges required to prove resource ownership, however, increase delay in connecting or using a resource. DNS persists--as the name implies--creates a persistent connection between a resource and a certificate authority. Henry Birge-Lee, Michael Slaughter, and Shiloh Heurich join Russ and Tom to explain how this new record type works and it's importance to DNS.