Phoenix

Our Illustrious Presenters

Each of our events has between 8 and 12 sessions. We update our presenter information regularly. We usually save a few details to give you some surprises on the day of the event, including the order of the sessions.

HalfStack
2025 lineup
This is our 2025 lineup. We will announce our 2026 presenters closer to the event.

Jen Looper
Cultural heritage and AI
Jen delivered some of the most amazing HalfStack talks in New York and online, and will join us in Phoenix to share a much different take on AI. Jen has done amazing work over the years supporting communities at Telerik, Microsoft and AWS, and is passionate about supporting new engineers in their quest to learn more about web technologies.


William Blankenship
To be revealed
William wowed us in 2022 with an incredible JS & AI talk when that was a new topic. Last year William showed us the idea of building an easy to use peer-to-peer social network. We can't wait to reveal what William has planned for 2025!


Luis Montes
JS Games on Retro Handheld Devices
The Nintendo Game Boy brought significant joy to the world in the 1990s. Today, Anberic, Miyoo, Powkiddy and others are creating super affordable handheld retro gaming devices. But any good web engineer would of course look at these devices and think, how do we create games for these devices using JS and web tech? Luis will show and tell us about this adventure!


Malak Janus
How to Train Your Dragon
While we've become exceptionally good at creating junior engineers through bootcamps and university programs, we're not as skilled at helping them grow into confident mid-level developers. This talk explores practical strategies for engineering teams to nurture junior developers, from implementing structured daily routines to embracing the "absurdity" of real-world software development constraints.

Bekah Rice
To be revealed
Bekah will do a music related performance... that's all we're saying for now!

Rene Rubalcava
Map Along a Beat Path
Rene has wowed us with his combination of maps, music, and data viz. We'll soon share what he's planning for HalfStack Phoenix!


Luke Karrys
Performing Laparoscopic Lockfile Surgery
Find out more at HalfStack on January 31st!


Dylan Schiemann
When JavaScript Engineers do DIY Projects
A look at how HalfStack founder Dylan Schiemann tackled a new frontier: An indoor soccer DIY project.


Mariko Kosaka
Baseline - New web features you can use today
Knowing what new features and APIs you can safely use can be a challenge, will it work in the browsers you need to support? Baseline helps with that, giving developers a way to know whether a feature is ready to use. We will dive into what it means for a feature to be Baseline, and cover some of the key features now included in Baseline, helping you create more beautiful and capable sites and applications.


Niels Leenheer
To be revealed
Niels has shown some of the most amazing web API with hardware demos over the years at HalfStack. He's back again to share something fun with us.


Olu Ayandosu
Begin
Embracing imperfection leads to real progress. There's a special kind of irony in watching smart people wait for the perfect moment to start. We optimize our lives down to the minute. Automating bills, planning schedules, finding the fastest route to work. Yet we hesitate at the edge of beginning something new.


HalfStack
Afterparty (Dinner, JS Pub Quiz, Retro Tech movie, and Karaoke)
We will kick off the afterparty with Battledecks, a tech improv game. You have 5 minutes to pitch a fake tech startup from a randomly generated slide deck. Then we'll proceed in teams with our unique JS Pub Quiz and prizes! Then we'll have dinner and watch a retro tech movie, and we'll conclude with karaoke!