Life Is But A Stream

AI isn’t just evolving—it’s reshaping who your customers are, how systems operate, and what real time really means. From machines making purchase decisions to agents increasing query volume across databases, the realities of 2026  are forcing leaders to rethink data architecture and governance strategies at a fundamental level. 
In this episode, Joseph is joined by Will LaForest (Field CTO, Confluent), Adi Polak (Director of Developer Advocacy & Experience, Confluent), and independent analyst, Sanjeev Mohan, to break down critical insights from  Confluent’s 2026 Predictions Report. 
Together, they explore how agentic AI will transform digital commerce, why Model Context Protocol  is quickly becoming table stakes, and how context engineering is emerging as the next major unlock for AI systems. The conversation also dives into the acceleration of AI-enabled cybercrime, why enterprises can no longer dismiss data governance, how Apache Iceberg™ is quickly becoming the standard in cold data management, and much more.
If you’re navigating AI and data streaming, this episode offers a grounded, opinionated take on what’s coming next—and how technologies like Apache Kafka® and Apache Flink® will shape what you need to do now. 
About the Guests:
Will LaForest
Will is Field CTO for Confluent. Will works with customers across a broad spectrum of industries and government, enabling them to realize the benefits of a data in motion architecture with event streaming. He is  passionate about data technology innovation and has spent 26 years helping customers wrangle data at massive scale.  His technical career spans diverse areas from software engineering, NoSQL, data science, cloud computing, machine learning, and building statistical visualization software but began with code slinging at DARPA as a teenager. Will holds degrees in mathematics and physics from the University of Virginia. 

Adi Polak
Adi is the Director of Advocacy and Developer Experience Engineering at Confluent. For most of her professional life, she has worked with data and machine learning for operations and analytics. As a data practitioner, she developed algorithms to solve real-world problems using machine learning techniques and expertise in Apache Spark, Kafka, HDFS, and distributed large-scale systems.
Adi has taught how to scale machine learning systems to thousands of practitioners, and is the author of successful books: Scaling Machine Learning with Spark and High Performance Spark 2nd Edition.
Sanjeev Mohan
Sanjeev is a recognized thought leader in cloud technologies, modern data architectures, analytics, and artificial intelligence. With a keen focus on emerging trends and technologies, Sanjeev hosts It Depends podcast and authors regular Medium blogs. He is also the author of Data Product for Dummies.
Formerly a Vice President at Gartner, Sanjeev was renowned for his in-depth research and strategic insights, shaping the research agenda for data and analytics globally. Over the past three years, he has led SanjMo, a consultancy specializing in technical advisory services that elevate category and brand awareness for clients.
Guest Highlights:
“There was already an asymmetric relationship between attackers and defenders. This just increases that, because it’s easier to use AI to attack than it is to use it to defend.” — Will LaForest
“We’re about to accidentally DDoS our software and databases, because we’re giving a tool to automate things without thinking if our systems are actually ready for it.” — Adi Polak
“Your proprietary data is your only moat. Everything else—models, performance, tooling—will keep changing.” — Sanjeev Mohan
Episode Timestamps: 
03:40 – Predictions Report Overview
05:05 – Prediction 1: The Rise of Agentic Commerce: Machines Are Your New Customers
12:45 – Prediction 2: Leading Platforms Will Offer Model Context Protocol
18:00 – Prediction 3: Context Engineering Is the Next AI Unlock
24:15 – Prediction 4: AI Will Apply Increased Pressure to Existing Databases
30:10 – Prediction 5: AI Will Drive Cyber Crime to Unprecedented Levels
36:15 – Prediction 6: AI Will Accelerate Enterprise Investment in Data Governance
43:25 – Prediction 7: Apache Iceberg™ Will Become the Standard for Cost-Effective Cold Data Management
49:20 – Prediction 8: Your AI Strategy Will Need an Independent Data Plane to Avoid Overcommitting
55:00 – Prediction 9: Early Adopters of Durable Execution Engines Will Gain a Competitive AI Edge
1:00:01 – Prediction 10: Improvements in Generative AI Will Help Businesses Finally Address Legacy Tech Debt
Dive Deeper into Data Streaming:
EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation With Data Streaming | Life Is But A Stream
EP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A Stream
EP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to Turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A Stream
Links & Resources:
Confluent’s 2026 Predictions Report: [link here]
Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiant
Joseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiant
Will’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/willlaforest
Adi’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/polak-adi
Sanjeev’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/sanjmo
Listen to Podcast: https://pod.link/1792991234
Learn more at Confluent.io
Our Sponsor:  
Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Legacy systems don’t have to hold you back. In high-volume markets where milliseconds matter, MarketAxess—an electronic trading platform for institutional investors—needed a way to scale trade data reliably across on-prem systems and the cloud. That journey—from self-managed Apache Kafka® to MSK to Confluent Cloud—reshaped how their engineering teams build, scale, and govern real-time infrastructure.
In this episode, Andy Steinmann, Software Engineering Manager at MarketAxess, breaks down how his team evolved from a monolithic, socket-driven architecture to a streaming-first platform. He shares why Kafka became the foundation of their 2.0 strategy, how Confluent Cloud eliminated operational drag during peak trading windows, and what it takes to modernize without disrupting a mission-critical financial ecosystem. 
You’ll learn:
How MarketAxess scaled real-time trade flows across on-prem and the cloud
How Confluent Cloud eliminated outages and operational bottlenecks
How to approach modernization through iterative “2.0” patterns and dark deployments
If you’re ready to explore hybrid connectivity, governance, performance tuning, and the operational realities of scaling market-data workloads, this is the episode for you.
About the Guest:
Andy Steinmann, Software Engineering Manager at MarketAxess, is a seasoned software engineer with 20+ years of experience in web, mobile, and backend technologies delivering proven solutions to thousands of users. Andy has been the technical lead/architect on many teams and participated in implementing and adapting agile methodologies to improve productivity.
Guest Highlights:
“One of the big benefits of the partnership with Confluent has not only been the zero cluster outages—but the bigger side of it was really the access to the experts… Somebody to walk that journey with you as opposed to just starting with a Google search or a ChatGPT question.”
Episode Timestamps: 
3:20 – Data Streaming Goodness
20:20 – Beyond the Stream 
36:15 – Quick Bytes
43:15 – Joseph’s Top Takeaways
Dive Deeper into Data Streaming:
EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation With Data Streaming | Life Is But A Stream
EP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A Stream
EP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to Turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A Stream
Links & Resources:
Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiant
Joseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiant
Learn more at Confluent.io
Our Sponsor:  
Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In 2025, real-time data moved from important to mission-critical. From billion-event pipelines to AI agents reasoning over fresh data streams, the conversations this year revealed just how fast organizations are rethinking their data infrastructure and what’s possible when data streaming becomes the foundation.
In this episode, Joseph Morais curates standout moments from the year: the stakes of real-time data, the architectural decisions behind enterprise-grade streaming, and how AI strategy is shifting toward agentic, event-driven systems. You’ll hear leaders discuss architectures designed for zero data loss, solid governance, multi-agent orchestration, and why organizations choose Confluent as the data streaming platform for data streaming at scale.
You’ll learn:
How enterprises use Apache Kafka® and Apache Flink® to meet mission-critical guarantees like reliability and data integrity
Why real-time pipelines matter for agentic AI and fresh-signal reasoning
What leaders evaluate when choosing a data streaming platform
How to prepare architectures for multi-agent systems and 2026 AI roadmaps
The Guests:
Cosmo Wolfe, CTO, Metronome 
Chris Kapp, Software Architect, HS1 (Henry Schein One)
Alex Haugland , Cursor Engineer, Anysphere
Steffen Hoellinger, Co-Founder & CEO, Airy
Ethan Chan, Co-Founder & CEO, Allium
Joe Pardi, Sr. Director of Global Data Engineering, Covetrus
Rami Al Lolah, Lead Architect - Integration Center of Excellence, Swedbank
Sean Falconer, Sr. Director, Product Management - AI Strategy, Confluent
Jeffrey Jonathan Jennings (J3), Founder, signalRoom
Todd Smitala, Lead Engineer, Association of Professional Flight Attendants
Guest Highlights: 
“We are processing events on a second-level latency end-to-end… it'll show up on your end customer's invoice in sub-seconds, and you're cutting users off for fraud, all done exactly once.” — Cosmo Wolfe, Metronome
“Security loves us, right? Because everything is immutable. We know who did everything and we know who can access what and who has been accessing what.” — Chris Kapp, HS1 (Henry Schein One) 
“These are not dashboards… If you want to transform your business and take a proactive approach, reacting to signals as they’re happening, you need to shift your mindset and move data responsibilities left.” — Sean Falconer, Confluent
Episode Timestamps: 
*(00:00) - Looking Back at Data Streaming in 2025
*(00:38) -  Segment 1: Unique Streaming Use Cases
*(06:05) - Segment 2: The Power of Partnerships 
*(11:23) - Segment 3: Data Streaming and Real-Time AI
Dive Deeper into Data Streaming:
EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A Stream
EP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A Stream
EP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A Stream
Links & Resources:
Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiant
Joseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiant
Learn more at Confluent.io
Our Sponsor:  
Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Saudi Arabia is rapidly emerging as a global AI powerhouse, a transformation fueled by a fundamental shift in how data is managed, processed, and activated. 
Mohamed Ahmed Anwar, General Manager of Presales at (sccc by stc) Saudi Cloud Computing Company, explains why they adopted Confluent’s data streaming platform: cyber resilience and security, strong governance, and scalability paired with simplified operations at enterprise scale. 
Anwar unpacks why data streaming is foundational to modern AI, from launching model-as-a-service offerings to enabling agentic architectures. He highlights how sccc by stcs strategic partnership with Confluent delivers value extending far beyond open source Apache Kafka®, including connectors,  governance with schemas, Kubernetes-based deployment, self-balancing clusters, and Cluster Linking that make enterprise operations tractable without an “army of engineers”.You’ll Learn:
How sccc by stc uses Confluent to deliver a managed data streaming platform that powers AI use cases while maintaining performance, security, and control across public and private sectors 
Why data governance, local compliance, and operational scalability are are critical within Saudi Arabia
What makes real-time platforms indispensable for enhanced customer experience and operational agility
How data streaming transforms traditional batch into dynamic, scalable AI architectures (e.g., RAG and agentic systems) by ensuring fresh, trustworthy data  
About the Guest:
Mohamed Ahmed Anwar is a seasoned technology leader with over 18 years of experience driving innovation across the IT industry. He has held leadership roles at global tech giants including Microsoft, Dell Technologies, and Pure Storage, where he led complex digital transformation initiatives with a focus on delivering business impact. Currently, he serves as the General Manager of Presales at sccc by stc, where he drives strategic efforts to empower Saudi organizations through advanced cloud services, accelerating their growth and digital modernization.
Throughout his career, Anwar has led initiatives in data analytics, cloud adoption, and artificial intelligence, enabling organizations to harness the power of emerging technologies. His passion for mentorship and team development is reflected in his dedication to nurturing talent and building resilient, future-ready teams. Anwar is driven by a belief in the transformative potential of technology, consistently working to bridge strategic vision with practical execution to deliver meaningful, lasting impact.
 
Guest Highlight: 
“Batch computing is like getting your water from a water well. You have a bucket and are governed by the size of the bucket and by the speed and the strength in your arms while in the data stream. On a streaming platform, you have a stream of data. You govern it. You know how exactly you will direct this stream of data, how you will store it and so on. This actually affected the time-to-value for our customers.”
Episode Timestamps:
1:00 — Guest introduction & company overview
5:55 — Segment 1: Data Streaming Goodness
14:05 — Segment 2: Beyond the Stream
26:50 — Segment 3: Quick Bytes
30:15 — Joseph’s Top Takeaways
Dive Deeper into Data Streaming:
EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming
EP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink®
EP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity
Links & Resources:
Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiant
sccc by stc: https://www.youtube.com/@sccc_bystc/videos
Joseph’s LinkedIn
Anwar’s LinkedIn
Learn more at Confluent.io
Our Sponsor:  
Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

From the heart of the expo hall at Current NOLA, this special episode drops you into the conversations, energy, and the breakthroughs as they happened.
Host, Joseph Morais, and co-host, Adi Polak talk with data streaming leaders and community voices to unpack how teams are using Apache Kafka® and Apache Flink® to power low-latency, AI-ready applications—covering patterns from usage-based billing and hybrid operations to cost efficiency and streaming governance. You’ll also hear how shift-left processing and governance make AI-ready data possible at scale. 
Plus, we break down key launches, including Queues for Kafka, Confluent Private Cloud, the Real-Time Context Engine for AI, and more.
You’ll learn:
How modern architectures power real-time billing, entitlements, and fraud detection
Why exactly-once processing and stateful workloads matter at scale
How Unified Stream Manager and Confluent Private Cloud simplify hybrid, multi-cluster operations with a single pane of glass
How Real-Time Context Engine serves governed, low-latency context to  agentic AI via MCP
The Hosts:
Joseph Morais, Technical Champion, Confluent 
Adi Polak, Director of Advocacy and Developer Experience Engineering, Confluent
The Guests:
Cosmo Wolfe, CTO, Metronome 
 Kevin Balaji, Sr. Director, Product Marketing, Confluent
Adam Bellemare, Principal Technologist, Confluent
Sam Barker, Principal Software Engineer, IBM
Olena Kutsenko, Staff Developer Advocate, Confluent
Scott Haines, O’Reilly Author and OSS Educator
Guest Highlights: 
“If your company is shifting to be more nimble with monetization and especially if you're switching to more of a consumption based model, then the underlying systems have to be real time to support that.” — Cosmo Wolfe, Metronome
“So many customers out there…they are running in Amazon and in their data center and somewhere else. They're all looking for ways to monitor and manage all these different clusters in one way.” — Kevin Balaji, Confluent 
“There's a reason we call it time travel—because we're going back to a prior point in history to replay data and do something else with it.” — Scott Haines, O’Reilly Author and OSS Educator
Episode Timestamps: 
01:00 — Cosmo Wolfe, CTO, Metronome 
17:10 —  Kevin Balaji, Sr. Director, Product Marketing, Confluent
28:40 — Adam Bellemare, Principal Technologist, Confluent
43:15 — Sam Barker, Principal Software Engineer, IBM
50:30 — Olena Kutsenko, Staff Developer Advocate, Confluent
01:05:00 — Scott Haines, O’Reilly Author and OSS Educator
Dive Deeper into Data Streaming:
EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation with Data Streaming | Life Is But A Stream
EP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A Stream
EP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A Stream
Links & Resources:
Connect with Joseph: https://www.youtube.com/@thedatagiant
Joseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiant
Adi’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/polak-adi/
Keynote: Building Intelligent Systems on Real-time Data
Watch Current On Demand: https://current.confluent.io/archive/2025/new-orleans?utm_source=simplecast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_id=tm.content_life-is-but-a-stream
Context-Driven AI Reigned Supreme at Current New Orleans: https://www.confluent.io/blog/context-driven-ai-current-new-orleans/?utm_source=simplecast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_id=tm.content_life-is-but-a-stream
Building Event-Driven Microservice (2E): https://www.confluent.io/resources/ebook/building-event-driven-microservices-2e/?utm_source=simplecast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_id=tm.content_life-is-but-a-stream
Learn more at Confluent.io
Our Sponsor:  
Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.