Angie Jones on Goose, MCP, and the future of AI agents | Episode 9 | The GitHub Podcast

Quick Overview

Abby Cabunoc Mayes and Angie Jones discuss the impact of AI agents like GitHub Copilot and the open-source nature of Goose, emphasizing that while AI is powerful, human oversight and collaboration remain crucial for navigating complex areas like finance and security, and they encourage new developers to engage with open-source projects.

Key Points: Angie Jones is the VP of Engineering, AI Tools & Enablement at Block, Inc., and works with the open-source AI agent Goose, which Block released in January 2025. Goose was developed as the reference implementation for the MCP protocol with Anthropic, and it supports multi-agent workflows for tasks like finance, marketing, sales, and executive assistance. The open-source nature of Goose allows the community to contribute, see what's happening under the hood, and use the tool for complex tasks like triaging PRs or building applications. Jones notes that developers are becoming comfortable using AI tools like Copilot to write code, but they are still hesitant about giving AI access to local machines due to the non-deterministic nature of the software. The discussion highlights that while AI accelerates processes (like reducing a week-long task to an hour), it doesn't replace the need for human expertise, vision, and context setting. Jones shares that her personal history includes teaching test automation at Applitools and starting an initiative to teach resilient coders, highlighting the importance of human mentorship alongside AI tools. The interview concludes with a shout-out to the Selenium Cypress project and its contributors, emphasizing the value of community collaboration in open source.

Context: This is an interview segment from The GitHub Podcast, featuring host Abby Cabunoc Mayes and guest Angie Jones, VP of Engineering, AI Tools & Enablement at Block, Inc. The discussion focuses on the practical application and cultural impact of AI agents, specifically highlighting Block's open-source project named Goose, and how these tools are changing software development practices, particularly regarding testing and security, while still requiring human oversight.