Software

Sector journalism and trade press.

• The Information $
  Subscription tech newsroom focused on Big Tech, AI, and the cloud.
• Stratechery $
  Ben Thompson's analysis of strategy and structure in tech.
• Pragmatic Engineer $
  Gergely Orosz on how Big Tech and scale-ups actually run engineering.
• TechCrunch
  Startup news, funding rounds, product launches.
• VentureBeat
  Enterprise tech, AI, and cloud — operator-focused.
• The New Stack
  Cloud-native, DevOps, infrastructure software.
• InfoQ
  Software architecture and dev practices, conference talks.
• SiliconANGLE
  Enterprise IT and cloud news; theCUBE video interviews.
• SD Times
  Software development industry news for technical leaders.
• SaaStr
  Jason Lemkin on building and scaling SaaS companies.

Membership bodies, advocacy, standards.

• SIIA (Software & Info Industry)
  Trade association for software and content businesses; D&I, advocacy.
• BSA — The Software Alliance
  Global advocacy for the enterprise software industry; policy, IP enforcement.
• CompTIA $
  IT industry association; certifications, advocacy, research.
• ITI (Information Tech Industry Council)
  Policy advocacy for global tech companies; trade, security, privacy.
• Linux Foundation
  Hosts Linux, Kubernetes, Node.js; convenes open-source projects.
• Cloud Native Computing Foundation
  Home of Kubernetes, Prometheus, Envoy — cloud-native ecosystem.
• Open Source Initiative (OSI)
  Stewards the Open Source Definition and approved licenses.
• Software Freedom Conservancy
  Nonprofit home for FOSS projects; copyleft compliance enforcement.

Where deals get done and announcements happen.

• AWS re:Invent
  AWS's annual cloud conference, late November — major product launches.
• Google Cloud Next
  Google Cloud's annual conference; multi-cloud, AI, data.
• Microsoft Ignite / Build
  Ignite (IT pros, fall) and Build (developers, spring) — Azure, M365, AI.
• Dreamforce
  Salesforce's annual mega-event, San Francisco, September.
• KubeCon + CloudNativeCon
  Cloud-native ecosystem flagship; spring NA, fall EU.
• SaaStr Annual
  Largest dedicated SaaS executive event.
• GitHub Universe
  Developer-platform conference; Copilot, Actions, security.
• HashiConf
  HashiCorp infra-as-code, secrets, and platform engineering.
• Snowflake Summit
  Data platform conference; data sharing, AI/ML on warehouse.
• Databricks Data + AI Summit
  Lakehouse architecture, MLflow, Delta Lake.
• NVIDIA GTC
  AI compute and accelerated computing; spring SJC, fall events.
• Apple WWDC
  Apple's developer conference; OS, dev tooling, frameworks (June).

Sector-specialist analysts and data providers.

• Gartner Magic Quadrants $
  Sector-by-sector vendor positioning across hundreds of software markets.
• Forrester Wave $
  Forrester's competitive vendor evaluation methodology.
• IDC Software Trackers $
  Quarterly market sizing and share data by software category.
• Synergy Research Group
  Cloud and data-center market sizing; tracks hyperscaler shares.
• S&P Global / 451 Research $
  Enterprise IT and emerging-tech research.
• OpenView SaaS Benchmarks
  Annual SaaS metrics report — NRR, growth, efficiency.
• SaaS Capital Index
  Private SaaS valuations and operating benchmarks.
• Bessemer State of the Cloud
  Annual data on public cloud-software growth, efficiency, public-market multiples.
• BVP Cloud 100
  Annual ranking of top 100 private cloud companies.
• Stack Overflow Developer Survey
  Annual snapshot of developer tools, tech, salaries — N>70k.
• JetBrains Developer Ecosystem
  Annual developer survey covering languages, tools, AI usage.
• State of DevOps (DORA)
  Google's annual DORA report on engineering performance.

Agencies that govern the sector.

• FTC — Federal Trade Commission
  Antitrust and consumer protection; tech-platform actions and merger reviews.
• DOJ Antitrust Division
  US antitrust enforcement; the active Big Tech docket.
• SEC — Securities & Exchange Commission
  Disclosure regime for public software companies; cyber rules.
• European Commission DG-COMP
  EU competition authority; DMA / DSA enforcement on platform gatekeepers.
• European Data Protection Board
  GDPR coordinator across EU member-state DPAs.
• California Privacy Protection Agency
  CPRA enforcement — the de facto US privacy regulator.
• CISA
  US cybersecurity advisories, KEV catalog, secure-by-design.
• NIST
  Cybersecurity Framework, AI Risk Management Framework, NVD.
• UK Competition & Markets Authority
  UK CMA — increasingly active on cloud, AI, and platform reviews.
• State AGs (NAAG)
  Multi-state coalitions on privacy, antitrust, and AI.

Bellwethers and notable executives.

• Microsoft
  Satya Nadella, CEO. Cloud (Azure), productivity, dev tools, Copilot.
• Apple
  Tim Cook, CEO. Operating systems, App Store, services.
• Alphabet (Google)
  Sundar Pichai, CEO. Search, Cloud, Workspace, YouTube, Android, AI.
• Meta
  Mark Zuckerberg, CEO. Family of Apps, Reality Labs, AI infra.
• Amazon (AWS)
  Andy Jassy, CEO; Matt Garman runs AWS. The dominant cloud.
• NVIDIA
  Jensen Huang, CEO. AI accelerators, CUDA, networking.
• Oracle
  Safra Catz, CEO. Database, OCI cloud, ERP.
• Salesforce
  Marc Benioff, CEO. CRM, Slack, Tableau, Data Cloud.
• Adobe
  Shantanu Narayen, CEO. Creative Cloud, Document Cloud, Experience.
• SAP
  Christian Klein, CEO. ERP, supply chain, BTP.
• ServiceNow
  Bill McDermott, CEO. Workflow platform; ITSM, HR, customer.
• IBM
  Arvind Krishna, CEO. Hybrid cloud (Red Hat), consulting, mainframe.
• Workday
  Carl Eschenbach, CEO. HCM and Financials SaaS for the enterprise.
• Snowflake
  Sridhar Ramaswamy, CEO. Cloud data platform.
• Databricks
  Ali Ghodsi, CEO. Lakehouse, MLflow; the largest private SaaS.
• Stripe
  Patrick & John Collison. Payments infra, billing, treasury.
• OpenAI
  Sam Altman, CEO. Foundation models, ChatGPT, API platform.
• Anthropic
  Dario Amodei, CEO. Claude foundation models, safety research.

Formal credentials and professional learning.

• AWS Certifications
  Solutions Architect, Developer, SysOps, specialty paths.
• Microsoft Learn
  Azure, M365, Power Platform certifications and learning paths.
• Google Cloud Certifications
  Cloud Architect, Data Engineer, ML Engineer paths.
• Linux Foundation Training $
  CKA, CKAD, CKS Kubernetes certs; Linux sysadmin tracks.
• CompTIA Certifications $
  A+, Network+, Security+ — vendor-neutral IT foundations.
• MIT OpenCourseWare CS
  Free MIT computer science courses, full lecture series.
• Stanford Online CS $
  Graduate certificate programs in CS, AI, and ML.
• Coursera CS & Cloud
  University & vendor courses; some are free, professional certs paid.