Ten Years as an AWS Community Hero

In September 2014, I received an email from Rei Biermann at AWS asking if I wanted to be part of a new program they were launching: the AWS Community Heroes. I had no idea what I’d be required to do, but promotion is promotion. “Sure!” I said, thinking they probably asked hundreds of people.

Imagine my surprise when Werner Vogels, the CTO of Amazon, introduced the program and there were only six of us!

I was honored and humbled to be included amongst some amazing people I’d been learning from. Never did I think I’d be in such esteemed company.

Over the next few years, I watched the program grow, and got invited to secret underground cloud-computing groups, NDA briefings and amazing rooftop parties during our annual pilgrimage to AWS re:invent. The caliber of people I met was astounding.

During 2020, we couldn’t meet in person, so AWS shipped us VR headsets and we met up in a custom built world just for AWS Community Heroes and a few AWS execs. It was epic.

I have continued to make it to re:invent every year (except for 2019 due to a family emergency), and have made some great friends through the program.

This year at the Heroes Summit in Seattle, we celebrated 10 years of the program, and also 10 years of AWS Lambda. I love what Ross Barich and his team have built over the last decade, and I’m proud to have been part of the community that helped make it happen.

Here’s to the next 10 years, and see you all at re:invent 2024! 🥂