Community + Code podcast

Fons Vandamme on building without excuses There’s a particular kind of developer story that often shows up on Community + Code. Someone falls sideways into technology, gets obsessed, spends years getting really good at one thing — and then decides to pour all of it into something they’ve been building in their head for years. Fons Vandamme’s version of that story […]

Fons Vandamme has a rule: if an LLM responds with "great idea," something is wrong. We talked Drupal, Webhaven, building solo with AI, and why the story might only be starting now. 🎙️

Community + Code Community + Code is a podcast about the people behind the technology we use.We talk about this thing called “community” within developer spaces, but sometimes forget that community is about people. Co...

Oh hey, have you seen the new site design?

communitycode.dev

Carl Alexander on scaling and being true to yourself The through-line in Carl Alexander’s career is building things that other developers don’t want to think about and making it easy for them to adopt and use and stop babysitting systems. In this episode of Community + Code, we talk about Carl’s early exposure to programming and robotics and how he fell into a WordPress […]

Carl Alexander on serverless WordPress, the real cost of “cheap” hosting, and why modern devs just want to deploy and go live their lives. Also: candid talk about marketing noise + staying honest when building solo. 🎧💥

John Hawkins and “return on connection” John Hawkins (aka VegasGeek) has been around WordPress long enough to understand the part nobody can put into a spreadsheet: that the real value of community is almost never immediate. We talk about the moment a simple plugin-development talk at a WordCamp helped flip my own identity from “designer” to “developer, actually,” and how John […]

John Hawkins (@vegasgeek.com) is with me on the podcast this week to talk about WordCamps, teaching one small thing that changes someone’s path, and the long-tail “return on connection.”

Livestream: Exploring a commercial ecosystem for Drupal | Pantheon.io A livestream to learn about the Drupal theme marketplace Dripyard

I’ll be joining a @pantheon.io livestream at 1:30pm ET / 11:30am PT / 7:30pm CET to talk about Drupal’s upcoming marketplace and how @dripyard.com fits into the growing commercial ecosystem.

Join us 👉 pantheon.io/events/webin... #Drupal

Tearyne Almendariz on identity and intentional community spaces Tearyne Almendariz has one of those internet-origin stories that makes perfect sense: Sailor Moon fandom led to learning Japanese, which led to building websites, which eventually led to Drupal — and to a career shaped as much by community as by code. In this Season 2 kickoff of Community + Code, we talk about the […]

Season 2 is here! 🎙️
First up in 2026: @tearyne.bsky.social on online identity, DevRel as “therapy,” accessibility getting real, and cozy co-working communities.

Dee Teal on cultural algorithms, belonging and bias A common theme in this podcast is the way that open source brings people together and it’s those communities that become far more powerful than the software that we initially got into. In this episode, I sit down with my friend Dee Teal, a Melbourne-based project manager, delivery leader and long time WordPress community member […]

I sat down with @thewebprincess.bsky.social to talk cultural algorithms, implicit bias, WP Includes, and why our communities thrive when we stop guarding our corner of the pie.

Troy Chaplin on Accessibility and WordPress in Higher Ed Troy Chaplin is a WordPress developer at Carleton University and one of the organizers of WordCamp Canada. He wrote the Block Accessibility Checks plugin out of a need for his work in higher ed WordPress. In this episode, we talk about what makes building WordPress sites for higher education different and the reality of supporting […]

This week on C+C, I chatted with @troychaplin.bsky.social about the real work behind higher-ed WordPress, supporting huge groups of editors and why a11y has to start before you hit publish.

For the past 7 months, I've been running @communitycode.dev, a podcast that gives me an excuse to talk to cool people about what inspires them. It's been a great run & I'm looking at doing it all over again in 2026.

Join me and be a guest on the show!
communitycode.dev/be-a-guest/

Mike Herchel on open source and the future of commercial marketplaces for Drupal Mike Herchel is a fixture in the Drupal community and the lead developer of the Olivero core theme. Now he’s building something new, a Drupal theme marketplace called Dripyard. We talk about the challenges the Drupal has faced over the years, particularly around the user experience, theme development and limitations and the culture of collaboration […]

I talked with @mike.herschel.com about Drupal’s big shift toward themes, Drupal CMS, Canvas, and what it’s like to build @dripyard.com as the ecosystem starts changing.
Super thoughtful conversation about community, collaboration, and timing.

Episode 14: Mike Herchel - Community + Code Mike Herchel talks about the future of Drupal theming, the rise of Drupal CMS and Canvas, and how the community is navigating its first real push toward a commercial theme marketplace. A candid look a...

I was on the @communitycode.dev podcast talking about #Drupal theming and my new company, @dripyard.com

Details at communitycode.dev/episodes/epi...

Open source is stronger together! 🙌💪

Mike Demo on Open Source, Community and Vegan Food If you’ve been to more than one WordCamp, odds are you’ve seen Mike Demo. He’s a Partnerships Lead at Hosting.com and a familiar face in the open-source world—someone who thrives on connecting people, projects, and ideas. Demo describes himself as a “lead handshaker,” a title that pretty much says it all: his work is about […]

Being number one in WordPress isn’t the point — keeping the web open is.

@mikedemo.bsky.social joins Community + Code to talk about bridging open-source communities, from Joomla to WordPress, and why collaboration beats competition.

Awesome show with an amazing host: @jazzsequence.com!!

Christos Paloukas on Performance Engineering, Community, and Cats In this week’s episode of Community + Code, we’re joined by Christos Paloukas, a performance engineer at Pressidium who’s as passionate about making websites faster as he is about rescuing cats. We talk about what performance engineering actually means, why “making things fast” depends more on people and process than technology, and how caching can […]

From Chicago to Greece, @paloukas.com talks performance engineering at @pressidium.com, WordCamps and camping with his cat. 😻

Kim Maida on Identity, DevRel and Finding Balance When you think of identity and authentication, “fun” might not be the first word that comes to mind. But for Kim Maida, Senior Director of Developer Relations at FusionAuth, it’s a calling. In this episode of Community + Code, Kim talks about her journey through Developer Relations and how she found herself coming back again […]

FusionAuth’s @maida.kim joins @jazzsequence.com and shares her path through DevRel, why identity work matters, and how art helps her stay balanced.

In case you missed it last week (and if you did, you should really *hit subscribe* 😉), the newest episode of Community + Code dropped. This time, I chat with @karmatosed.art about building products, the company she co-founded Guildenberg, AI and burnout.

communitycode.dev/episodes/epi...

Tammie Lister on Technology, Creativity and Community After wearing many hats within the WordPress ecosystem, my guest on this week’s episode of Community + Code, Tammie Lister, has settled on the title of Product Engineer — someone who thrives on guiding ideas from their earliest spark to scaling, while keeping people at the heart of the process. In this episode, Tammie shares […]

After wearing many hats within the WordPress ecosystem, my guest on this week’s episode of Community + Code, Tammie Lister, has settled on the title of Product Engineer — someone who thrives on guiding ideas from their earliest spark to scaling, while keeping people at the heart of the process. In…

ICYMI Last week I talked to @raquelkarina.bsky.social. Among other things, we talked about @pressconf.events and what makes it different from other events. If you haven't checked out the episode yet, what are you waiting for?

communitycode.dev/episodes/epi...

#podcast #WordPress #events #community

Raquel on how WordPress is about people, not just code If you’ve been around WordPress for a while, there is a decent chance you’ve crossed paths with Raquel. Raquel has been an agency owner, member of the Elegant Themes team and now is the creator of WonderlandCurious, a tech event consultancy. She also is responsible for bringing back PressNomics as PressConf, a professional WordPress event […]

I had the pleasure of chatting with Raquel, mastermind of @pressconf.events and founder of @wonderlandcurious.bsky.social to talk about building community and the heart of innovative events.

Today on Community + Code, hear my conversation with THE @raquelkarina.bsky.social on the secret of creating the magic ✨ of community.

#WordPress #community #opensource

communitycode.dev/episodes/epi...

This week on the pod, I've got @raquelkarina.bsky.social who you might know from the Phoenix #WordPress community or as the founder of @wonderlandcurious.bsky.social & @pressconf.events. We talk about what makes a thriving developer community and what makes PHX special.

communitycode.dev/subscribe

Brendan O’Leary on putting developers first in an age of AI-assisted coding Brendan O’Leary joins Community + Code from Kilo Code, which has — since this episode — taken my top slot for VS Code AI extensions. We talk about what developer relations looks like inside different organizations and why that matters. Brendan also reflects on the human side of tech — storytelling, advocacy, and creating connections […]

Brendan O’Leary joins Community + Code from Kilo Code, which has — since this episode — taken my top slot for VS Code AI extensions. We talk about what developer relations looks like inside different organizations and why that matters. Brendan also reflects on the human side of tech — storytelling,…

Sometimes systems fail us; sometimes we fail ourselves I said I wanted to make this podcast in the open, so in the open I shall be. I did a major screw up last week. Like, near catastrophic as far as podcasts go. About as bad as you could get, really. Now, I’m taking full responsibility for this screw up, but it has been […]

I said I wanted to make this podcast in the open, so in the open I shall be. I did a major screw up last week. Like, near catastrophic as far as podcasts go. About as bad as you could get, really. Now, I’m taking full responsibility for this screw up, but it has been […]

Queen Carolyn on balancing crowns, community and code What does it mean to be a queen in the digital age? On this episode of Community + Code, I sat down with Queen Carolyn of Ladonia to talk about her role as monarch of a micronation that thrives on art, community, and playful governance. We explored how she balances her life in tech with […]

👑 What does it mean to be a queen in the digital age?

I sat down with Queen Carolyn of Ladonia to talk about micronations, crowns, community, and what leadership looks like when code meets royalty.

#CommunityAndCode #WordPress #Micronations

My next guest on Community + Code is Queen Carolyn of Ladonia. What's a Ladonia? Listen and find out!

#podcast #micronation

communitycode.dev/episodes/epi...

If you're going to #WCUS2025 this year, I will have a handful of homemade Community + Code stickers available. Find me and get them while they last 😁

My next guest needs a protocol officer when she attends formal events YouTube video by Community & Code

Here's a sneak peek...
youtube.com/shorts/QKi8B...

I'm working on the next episode of Community + Code. It'll come out next week, while many of us are at #WordCampUS. I'm so, so excited to share this episode with you. I'm not going to give anything away yet, but let's just say it's a royally good time. 👑

Will Klein on Overcoming Social Anxiety and Finding Community In this episode of Community + Code, I chatted with Will Klein, a Developer Relations Engineer at North. We talked about his transition from software development to Developer Relations, imposter syndrome and overcoming social anxiety. We also talk about burnout, what it looks like and how it’s hard to see when you’re in the thick […]

New on the pod: I talk with @willkle.in about his path from developer to DevRel, social anxiety & public speaking, and surviving burnout.
We also dig into the importance of diverse communities and separating your work from your identity.
#devrel