Dev Interrupted

Dev Interrupted is the go-to podcast for software engineering leadership. Each week, hosts Andrew Zigler, Ben Lloyd Pearson, and Dan Lines sit down with industry experts to explore the strategies, struggles, and stories behind high-performing software teams. Paired with weekly industry news coverage, the conversations dive deep into the real challenges that define excellence in modern tech.

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Dev Interrupted

Making tech literacy irrelevant | Infactory’s Ken Kocienda

September 23, 2025 • LinearB • Season 5 • Episode 38

What do you learn after spending 15 years at Apple and demoing your work directly to Steve Jobs? Ken Kocienda, Co-founder of Infactory AI and author of Creative Selection, joins us to share the answer. As a former Principal Engineer at Apple who helped create the iPhone keyboard and autocorrect, Ken discusses his incredible journey from a history major to a key figure in building technology used by billions. He explains his core philosophy of bridging the gap between the liberal arts and technology to create meaningful products, and why he believes AI is the next frontier for this mission. (BTW – we sat down with his co-founder Brooke, so if you like this episode be sure to check that one out!)

The conversation dives into his disciplined, spec-driven approach to coding with AI and the power of "extractive AI" to unlock hidden value in data. Ken reveals the crucial lesson he learned from Steve Jobs—that "everything is provisional"—and how his "evolutionary design" process is perfectly suited for today's AI challenges. This episode is a deep dive into the timeless principles of design and a powerful argument for why the best technology is so intuitive, it makes technical literacy irrelevant.

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