Selected mentions.

MLOps Community #373: The Creator of Superpowers — Why Real Agentic Engineering Beats Vibe Coding

“Jesse Vincent is the Founder & CEO of Prime Radiant and creator of Superpowers — the most-used Claude Code plugin in the world. He built the first agentic software development methodology from scratch while managing MIT interns in the early 2000s, and hasn't written a line of code manually since October.”

Open Source Ready Ep. 36: Managing AI Coding Agents with Jesse Vincent

“Nobody had done actual prompt engineering. I took it from a thing that ran in 15 seconds and generated a very reasonable looking to-do app that wouldn't save a to-do if you hit reload to something that was a five phase project that took 25 minutes to execute, did full red green TDD, and cost about $20 in tokens. That was sort of the basis of actually engineering how to get Claude to reliably build the thing you want it to build.”

Rebuild #424: Waterfall But Really Fast (obra)

“The things that used to be impossible are easy. Things that, when you're doing them by hand, are really easy are nearly impossible. Every month it's different — but all of the tools are getting better, and you still need to break down problems. It's basically waterfall, but really fast.”

A Rave Review of Superpowers (for Claude Code)

“I have no connection to the authors of the Superpowers plugin for Claude Code, but I have been raving about it to everyone I talk to. Using Claude Code with Superpowers is so much more productive and the features it builds are so much more correct than with stock Claude Code. I cannot recommend it enough.”

Two Thousand Tokens of Discipline

“The thread is toolmaking. Jesse builds things that give people structure for doing hard things — tracking bugs, managing email, typing comfortably, finding vaccines. Superpowers is a plugin that doesn't give Claude new capabilities. It gives Claude discipline.”

The Superpowers Plugin for Claude Code: The Structured Workflow That Actually Works

“Undisciplined AI coding is slow. That's the problem. The spec is the source of truth for all decisions, and cheaper to make on paper than to undo in code. ”

Jesse Vincent on LinkedIn: This Just Fixed 90% of AI Coding Errors

“I'm really bad at watching YouTube videos, but multiple people have told me that this intro to Superpowers is pretty good.”

Superpowers: The Technology to 'Persuade' AI Agents — Why Psychological Principles Change Code Quality

“Claude went hard. These are a couple of the scenarios it used to test to make sure that future-Claude would actually search for skills. ”

Jesse Vincent hasn't written a line of code since October

“Jesse Vincent hasn't written a line of code since October. His Claude Code plugin Superpowers hit 140,000 developers in months, and his entire workflow runs on specs, sub-agents, and review loops. The spec is your leverage now — learn to write clearly, decompose problems well, and let the agents grind.”

Anthropic Claude Plugins: Superpowers

“Superpowers is a comprehensive skills framework that teaches Claude structured software development methodologies. It provides composable skills for test-driven development (TDD), systematic debugging, brainstorming, subagent-driven development with built-in code review, and the ability to author new skills.”

A developer on GitHub just built a full development methodology

“The bottleneck in AI-assisted development right now is not model capability — models lack discipline, often skipping specifications and tests. Jesse Vincent created Request Tracker, led Perl, co-founded Keyboardio, and helped start VaccinateCA — all projects about how people organize complex work. Superpowers is the same idea, applied to agents.”

Stop Babysitting Your AI Agents: The Superpowers Breakthrough

“Skills are executable knowledge — they're instructions that Claude Code agents must follow when they apply to the task at hand. This is a fundamental shift in how we work with AI coding assistants — from supervision to systematic workflows. ”

Fixing Claude Code's amnesia (Episodic Memory)

Jesse's release post for episodic-memory — a plugin that gives Claude Code semantic search across all past sessions.

When it comes to MCPs, everything we know about API design is wrong

“Build your tools like they're a set of scripts you're handing to that undertrained kid who just got hired in the NOC. They are going to page you at 2AM.”

Simon Willison: Embracing the parallel coding agent lifestyle

“Jesse Vincent wrote How I'm using coding agents in September, 2025 which describes his workflow for parallel agents in detail, including having an architect agent iterate on a plan which is then reviewed and implemented by fresh instances of Claude Code.”

Techdirt Podcast Episode 416: How Tariffs Are Impacting One Small Business

“Jesse Vincent of Keyboardio walks Mike Masnick through how rapidly shifting US tariff rules are disrupting global supply chains and small-business planning, on the heels of Keyboardio's open letter to US customers.”

Screaming in the Cloud: The Maestro of the Keyboards with Jesse Vincent

“It's not actually about them being loud, or it doesn't have to be. Mechanical keyboards can be dead silent. For many, many people, it's about comfort, it is about the key feel. A keyboard is supposed to have a certain feeling and these flat rectangles that feel like you're typing on glass, they don't have that feeling and they're not good for your fingers.”

Jesse Vincent of Keyboardio (Model 100 interview)

“I had the pleasure of interviewing Jesse Vincent, the creator of the Keyboardio Model 01, the Keyboardio Atreus and now the forthcoming Keyboardio Model 100.”

Legacy Code Rocks: Geeking Out About Keyboards with Jesse Vincent

“Jesse doesn't hold back. He reveals many secrets of modern hardware manufacturing and how to use your software experience to organize your production process.”

Simon Willison: Trying to end the pandemic a little earlier with VaccinateCA

“Jesse Vincent convinced me to get involved. It turns out to be a perfect fit for both my interests and my skills and experience. I've built crowdsourcing platforms before — for MP's expense reports at the Guardian, and then for conference and event listings with our startup, Lanyrd.”

Keyboardio's Model 100, the Successor to Its Model 01 Open-Hardware Split Keyboard, Hits Kickstarter

“For the past year and a half, we've been working to reengineer and upgrade every aspect of the Model 01.”

Jesse Vincent (Keyboardio) interview

Short late-2019 video interview (9:40) covering Jesse's full project arc — Request Tracker (1996), K-9 Mail for Android, and Keyboardio. Uploaded by the 鍵人谷 ("Keyboard Valley") YouTube channel on December 20, 2019.

The Making of a Keyboard

“Jessie Vincent, cofounder of Keyboardio, looks back at the process of designing an efficient and comfortable keyboard and some of the design decisions and challenges involved.”

Manufacturing in China — Hack Chat with Jesse Vincent (Keyboardio)

Live group-chat Q&A with Jesse on Hackaday.io covering perils, pitfalls, and rewards of manufacturing in China — drawing on six years of Keyboardio experience. Substantive transcript captured in two parts on Hackaday.io. Companion to the Hackaday article at press/2019-07-08-hackaday-manufacturing-china (the announcement/recap).

The Amp Hour #450: Stories from Teardown 2019

“Recorded at Teardown 2019, the Crowd Supply hardware conference in Portland — Jesse Vincent of Keyboardio is the lead interview, covering ergonomic keyboard manufacturing, the Atreus, and the realities of running a small hardware company.”

Manufacturing In China Hack Chat

“Open source developer Jesse Vincent decided that messing around with a new keyboard design was a better thing to spend time on than whatever he was supposed to be doing, and thus Keyboardio was born.”

Comparative analysis of bug tracking tools

“Request Tracker is an open source tool written in Perl that was developed in 1996 by Jesse Vincent. ”

Hacker News: What $50 buys you at Huaqiangbei electronics market in Shenzhen

“Front-page Hacker News discussion of Jesse Vincent's viral Keyboardio Medium post on the Huaqiangbei electronics market in Shenzhen — 358 points and 118 comments deep on the economics, supply chains, and culture of Chinese electronics manufacturing.”

Geekuni Interview: Perl's Pumpking Ricardo Signes

“Jesse Vincent and I were lodging together at YAPC::Asia in 2011. One morning, we went out and got breakfast, and he said, "Do you think that someday in the future, if I retire, you'd be willing to take over?" Then he handed it to me about two weeks later. ”

An Interview with Jesse Vincent, CTO & Co-Founder of Keyboardio

Long-form on-camera interview (1:11:45) with Jesse Vincent during the Model 01 production push, recorded April 20, 2016 (uploaded December 15, 2017). Covers the Keyboardio origin story, Jesse's transition from software (Request Tracker, K-9 Mail) to hardware, and the work of building an heirloom-grade keyboard with his wife Kaia.

Hacker News: Interview with Jesse Vincent, Co-Founder and CTO of Keyboardio

“Jesse from Keyboardio here — We'll be releasing enclosure CAD so you can build your own enclosure that feels different or better fits your own aesthetics. We made a very conscious choice to go for something on the more organic and designy end of the spectrum as a counterpoint to most other ergonomic keyboards.”

HWTrek: Interview with Jesse Vincent, Co-Founder and CTO of Keyboardio

“Folks coming from the software world often describe hardware as being difficult. Hardware isn't hard, it's just slow. In the software world, we've gotten used to being able to iterate through a dozen prototypes in a day. In the hardware world, a prototype might take a week or two to put together.”

Keyboardio joins Arduino AtHeart Program

“Kaia Dekker and Jesse Vincent have launched Keyboardio Model 01 on Kickstarter: an heirloom-grade mechanical keyboard designed for serious typists.”

Keyboardio Model 01 presales begin on Kickstarter

“Keyboardio creators Jesse Vincent and Kaia Dekker were in Austin, TX, last weekend at the ATX Hackerspace, as a part of a whirlwind tour of 23 cities to get the keyboard in as many hands as possible.”

Uses This: Jesse Vincent

“I'm Jesse Vincent, and I make stuff. I've spent most of my career writing software of one kind or another, though for the past two years, I've primarily been working on hardware. I'm co-founder and CTO of Keyboardio, a boutique keyboard startup. We're making a gorgeous hackable ergonomic keyboard, the Model 01.”

SolidSmack Sessions: Interview with Keyboardio Founder Jesse Vincent

“I'm a software guy by trade. I've had bad wrists and RSI issues since college and have been through just about every alternative keyboard out there. At some point, knowing nothing about hardware design, I decided to try to build myself a keyboard. I figured it might take me a month and then I'd get back to software.”

Keyboardio

“Jesse started building keyboards as a hobby — he had bad wrists since he was a teenager and was always trying different ergonomic keyboards.”

From Prototype to Product

“Keyboardio began as the hobby of Jesse Vincent, the other Keyboardio founder, in an effort to find a keyboard for his bad wrists.”

Jesse Vincent & Kaia Dekker (Keyboardio) — OSCON 2014 Hardware Showcase Interview

“From the OSCON 2014 Hardware Showcase, an interview with Jesse Vincent and Kaia Dekker about the ergonomic keyboard created using open-source elements.”

Hacker News: Prototype ergonomic mechanical keyboards

“Front-page Hacker News discussion of Jesse Vincent's prototype ergonomic keyboards (227 points, 142 comments) — with Jesse himself fielding questions on PCB sourcing, columnar splay, thumb-key placement, and the manufacturability tradeoffs that pushed the design from split toward unified hardware. ”

Rebuild #9: Making your own keyboard

“I've always used an external keyboard because my very first job out of university — actually I was a student — the company gave me a chair with ergonomic arms, and the desk with a drawer that had the keyboard at the perfect height. But all these ergonomic things they gave me made my arms... gave me really bad RSI.”

The Perl 5 release process

“The first Pumpking to take on this responsibility was Jesse Vincent.”

Jesse Vincent interviewed at Android Open 2011

“O'Reilly's on-floor interview with Jesse Vincent of Best Practical at Android Open 2011, recorded as K-9 Mail had become the leading third-party email client on Android.”

Vincent: Perl 5.16 and Beyond

“I've been thinking a lot about where Perl 5 is headed since way back in 2005 or 2006 when I was the Perl 6 project manager.”

Why Perl 5.11.0 Matters

“Jesse's announcement explains that the intent of the new development model is to avoid burning out the brilliant, dedicated, and valuable people who've been pumpkings before. ”

Perlcast Interview #27: Jesse Vincent on Jifty

Second Perlcast appearance. Jesse Vincent of Best Practical interviewed about Jifty, the Perl web application framework built at Best Practical. Distinct from the 2005-09-29 Perlcast appearance about RT Essentials.

Perlcast: Interview with Jesse Vincent

“For this interview I speak with Jesse Vincent of Best Practical about his ticketing system, RT, and his new book, RT Essentials.”

OpenCulture.org — About (Wayback snapshot)

“OpenCulture is a new way to make books and music freely available online, while making sure that artists get fairly compensated. Using the Internet to let sponsors pool their resources, we purchase the right to enjoy and redistribute works of art on behalf of the public. Art should be free. Artists should be paid.”

OpenCulture.org: A new way to distribute music and books online

“It's my hope that things are going to ramp back up again now that we have public charity status. Most of the folks we've talked to are very positive about it, especially smaller artists. They want us to get going so they can start using the system.”