IT Horror Stories with Jack Smith
by Jack Smith
Is this your podcast?Insights from recent episode analysis
Audience Interest
Podcast Focus
Publishing Consistency
Platform Reach
Insights are generated by CastFox AI using publicly available data, episode content, and proprietary models.
Most discussed topics
Brands & references
Total monthly reach
Estimated from 1 chart position in 1 market.
By chart position
- 🇵🇹PT · Technology#175500 to 3K
- Per-Episode Audience
Est. listeners per new episode within ~30 days
250 to 1.5K🎙 ~2x weekly·15 episodes·Last published 3d ago - Monthly Reach
Unique listeners across all episodes (30 days)
500 to 3K🇵🇹100% - Active Followers
Loyal subscribers who consistently listen
150 to 900
Market Insights
Platform Distribution
Reach across major podcast platforms, updated hourly
Total Followers
—
Total Plays
—
Total Reviews
—
* Data sourced directly from platform APIs and aggregated hourly across all major podcast directories.
On the show
From 18 epsHost
Recent guests
Recent episodes
Jack's Rants - Why You Need to Reboot : Why Rebooting Your Computer Actually Fixes Problems
Aug 31, 2026
Unknown duration
Testing Software Properly : Software Testing Done Right – Where, When and What Should You Test?
Aug 24, 2026
Unknown duration
Microcode Mayhem : How a Mainframe Timer Bug Slowed an Entire Development Team
Aug 17, 2026
Unknown duration
Jack's Rants - AI Is The New Shadow IT : Why Employees Are Quietly Building the Next IT Risk
Aug 10, 2026
Unknown duration
Melbourne Cup Meltdown : How a Betting System Crashed at the Worst Possible Moment
Aug 3, 2026
Unknown duration
Social Links & Contact
Official channels & resources
Official Website
Login
RSS Feed
Login
| Date | Episode | Topics | Guests | Brands | Places | Keywords | Sponsor | Length | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8/31/26 |  Jack's Rants - Why You Need to Reboot : Why Rebooting Your Computer Actually Fixes Problems | Jack's Rants - Why You Need to Reboot : Why Rebooting Your Computer Actually Fixes Problems "Have you tried turning it off and on again ?" became an IT cliché for a reason. Rebooting clears accumulated state, resets resources, and fixes a surprising number of problems. From Unix uptime bragging rights to mainframe IPLs and Windows servers nobody is allowed to restart, every system has its own relationship with rebooting. Maybe what we really need is a reboot SLA. Want even more info ? Read our show notes and related blog post related to this episode : https://blog.ithorrorstories.eu/jacks-rants-can-i-keep-your-id/ 00:00 Introduction 02:17 Developer Habits 04:01 Mainframes & Servers 06:18 Reboot Realities 08:19 Conclusion | — | ||||||
| 8/24/26 |  Testing Software Properly : Software Testing Done Right – Where, When and What Should You Test? | Testing software sounds simple enough. But what exactly should you test, where should those tests happen, and how do you decide which parts of a complex system need the most attention? Jack talks with Mooly Beeri about software testing from a developer's perspective: identifying the right test points, understanding how different parts of a system interact, and building testing into the development process rather than treating it as something that happens at the end. A practical look at what it actually means to test software properly. You can read more from Mooly at https://www.bettersoftware.dev/ Want even more info ? Read our show notes and related blog post related to this episode : https://blog.ithorrorstories.eu/episode-21-testing-software-properly/ 00:00 Introduction 01:05 Mooly's Background 01:43 Automotive Software 04:01 Software Challenges 06:21 Bug Management 12:11 Improving Processes 15:42 Communication Importance 28:07 Summary | — | ||||||
| 8/17/26 |  Microcode Mayhem : How a Mainframe Timer Bug Slowed an Entire Development Team | One day, a busy IBM-compatible mainframe began slowing to a crawl. Hundreds of programmers noticed immediately—some even resorted to banging on the server room window whenever the system became unusable. The problem appeared after a microcode upgrade, but nothing pointed to an obvious cause. In this episode, Jack Smith talks to Matt about an extraordinary piece of low-level troubleshooting that led deep into the internals of VM, interrupt handling and timer queues. Armed with nothing more than hex dumps, careful reasoning and a willingness to modify live memory, Matt uncovered a vendor bug and devised a temporary workaround that kept the system running until a permanent fix arrived. It's a fascinating story of how understanding a system at its lowest levels can solve problems that no diagnostic tool could explain. Want even more info ? Read our show notes and related blog post related to this episode : https://blog.ithorrorstories.eu/episode-20-microcode-mayhem/ 00:00 Introduction 01:07 Mainframe Tech 04:38 Microcode Issues 07:19 Timer Interrupts 15:02 Modern Comparisons 19:44 Final Insights 22:18 Conclusion | — | ||||||
| 8/10/26 |  Jack's Rants - AI Is The New Shadow IT : Why Employees Are Quietly Building the Next IT Risk | Artificial intelligence didn't invent Shadow IT—it made it invisible. In this Jack's Rant, Jack Smith explores how AI tools like ChatGPT, Copilot and Claude have fundamentally changed the way employees solve problems. No servers under desks. No rogue software installations. Just a browser tab and a prompt. From confidential data and AI-generated scripts to fragmented workflows and "ChatGPT says..." becoming the new expert opinion, this episode examines why AI has lowered the barrier to creating business-critical systems outside IT's view. But this isn't a rant against AI. It's a reminder that Shadow IT has always been a symptom, not the disease. Employees don't create workarounds because they enjoy breaking policy—they do it because they're trying to get their jobs done. Instead of asking how to stop people from using AI, perhaps IT should be asking why they felt the need to use it in the first place. Because the organizations that succeed won't be the ones with the strictest AI policy, but the ones that make the secure, supported way the easiest way. Want even more info ? Read our show notes and related blog post related to this episode : https://blog.ithorrorstories.eu/jacks-rants-ai-is-the-new-shadow-it/ 00:00 Introduction 01:11 Shadow IT Explained 02:43 Feedback Loops 04:01 Modern Shadow IT 06:24 Trust in AI 08:25 AI Fragmentation 10:08 Leadership Solutions | — | ||||||
| 8/3/26 |  Melbourne Cup Meltdown : How a Betting System Crashed at the Worst Possible Moment | Every year, the Melbourne Cup pushes Australia's betting infrastructure to its limits. In 1991, a known software bug turned one of the busiest days of the year into an IT disaster. As millions of bets poured in, CPU utilisation unexpectedly collapsed and the betting system ground to a halt at the worst possible moment. Jack Smith is joined by veteran mainframe specialist Neale to revisit the incident, explain why the bug had been accepted for so long, how the team recovered, and what modern IT professionals can learn about technical debt, capacity planning, and the risks of carrying known defects into critical production systems. Want even more info ? Read our show notes and related blog post related to this episode : https://blog.ithorrorstories.eu/episode-19-melbourne-cup-meltdown/ 00:00 Introduction 00:53 Mainframe Basics 02:01 Melbourne Cup Explained 05:01 System Failure 09:06 Aftermath & Reflection 17:03 Learning from Errors 21:53 Modern Vs. Past Tech 29:51 Conclusion | — | ||||||
| 7/27/26 |  Jack's Rants - The Missing Five Minutes : Why scambaiting videos leave security professionals with more questions than answers | Scambaiters like Kitboga, Jim Browning and Pierogi educate millions, waste scammers' time, and undoubtedly prevent people from becoming victims. As a security professional, I genuinely appreciate what they do. But every time I watch one of these videos, I find myself asking the same question: What happened in the missing five minutes? How does a legitimate remote support session suddenly become full control over the scammer's computer? Is it a vulnerability? Poor operational security? Social engineering? Or simply the part of the story that gets left on the cutting room floor? This isn't a criticism of scambaiters. It's an exploration of the unanswered security questions that every IT professional should be asking, and why understanding how something happened can be just as important as enjoying the outcome. Want even more info ? Read our show notes and related blog post related to this episode : https://blog.ithorrorstories.eu/jacks-rants-the-missing-five-minutes/ 00:00 Introduction 00:22 Scambaiter Styles 02:01 The IT Dilemma 04:23 Compromised Systems 06:48 The Editing Reality 09:00 Seeking Security Answers 09:59 Closing Thoughts | — | ||||||
| 7/20/26 | cybersecuritysmart cities+4 | — | public Wi-Fi | Smart Citymajor metropolitan smart city | cybersecuritysmart city+5 | — | 37m 33s | ||
| 7/13/26 | privacyidentity theft+3 | — | driver's licensenational ID card+1 | — | privacyidentity theft+5 | — | 10m 25s | ||
| 7/6/26 | cybersecuritymanufacturing+3 | Kayne McGladrey | cardboard industrymanufacturing organizations+2 | golf course | cybersecurity incidentcardboard industry+3 | — | 32m 01s | ||
| 6/22/26 | Change ManagementITIL Change Control+3 | — | Change Advisory BoardITIL+1 | — | Change ManagementITIL+5 | — | 12m 46s | ||
Want analysis for the episodes below?Free for Pro Submit a request, we'll have your selected episodes analyzed within an hour. Free, at no cost to you, for Pro users. | |||||||||
| 6/15/26 | data governanceinformation security+3 | — | GDPRlegal | — | GDPRdata breach+3 | — | 14m 57s | ||
| 6/1/26 | enterprise printingIT challenges+3 | — | — | — | printingIT+6 | — | 26m 38s | ||
| 5/18/26 | IT infrastructurewarehouse operations+4 | — | laptopIT Horror Stories | — | laptopwarehouse+5 | — | 23m 13s | ||
| 5/4/26 | ransomwareincident response+4 | — | IT Horror StoriesAI+1 | — | ransomwareincident response+5 | — | 35m 12s | ||
| 4/20/26 | aviation technologylegacy systems+3 | — | Floppy DisksBoeing+1 | 747-400aviation+1 | Boeing 747floppy disks+6 | — | 10m 47s | ||
| 4/6/26 | disaster recoveryfailover test+4 | — | subcontractors | — | failoverdisaster recovery+5 | — | 33m 00s | ||
| 3/12/26 | IT hiringjob market+3 | — | — | — | IT hiringjob market+5 | — | 11m 42s | ||
| 3/2/26 | technologyserver management+3 | — | Raspberry Pi | — | Raspberry Pitemporary server+3 | — | 32m 18s | ||
| 2/10/26 | bankingmainframes+3 | — | banksmainframes | — | mainframesbatch jobs+3 | — | 9m 15s | ||
| 2/9/26 | IT horror storiestechnology+3 | — | — | — | IT horror storiestechnology+3 | — | 0m 57s | ||
| 2/2/26 | DDoS attackAnonymous+4 | — | Anonymous | — | DDoSAnonymous+5 | — | 35m 59s | ||
| 1/7/26 | Shadow ITSales Department+3 | — | — | — | Shadow ITSales Tool+3 | — | 30m 16s | ||
| 12/1/25 | DevOpsdata supplier+3 | — | international burger chain | Finland | DevOpsdata supplier+5 | — | 28m 20s | ||
| 11/3/25 | Y2KY2K38+4 | — | COBOL | UNIX | Y2KY2K38+5 | — | 29m 26s | ||
| 10/6/25 |  SAP Happens : The IBM Spinoff That Is Controlling Global Business And Finance | SAP sits quietly at the heart of most global businesses, running everything from payroll to procurement, logistics to finance. It's the system nobody brags about, but everybody depends on. And when someone says "just check SAP," you know you're in for more than a click or two. In this episode, we explore how SAP became the invisible backbone of enterprise life, why it inspires equal parts respect and frustration, and the strange comfort of knowing it's always there whether you want it to be or not. Because in the end, no matter the industry or the project… SAP happens. Want even more info ? Read our show notes and related blog post related to this episode : https://blog.ithorrorstories.eu/episode-6-sap-happens/ All other links and socials : https://links.ithorrorstories.eu/ 00:00 Welcome Back 01:20 SAP Explained 17:05 Migration Madness 23:22 Digital Twinning 28:31 Real World Stories 33:38 Can You Escape? 41:18 Final Thoughts | — | ||||||
Showing 25 of 30
Pitch Fit is a Pro feature
See how bookable this show is for guests, which brands already advertise, the per-episode ad value, and the best-fit guest and sponsor profile. The numbers are blurred on the free plan.
How readily this show books outside guests like you.
How proven this show is for host-read sponsorships.
For Guests
ProFor Advertisers
ProUpgrade to Pro to unlock guest cadence, sponsor categories, fit scores, and per-episode ad value for this show.
Chart history for IT Horror Stories with Jack Smith
Peaked at #175 in PT, currently #175 in PT.
| Market | Genre | Peak | Current | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PT | — | #175 | #175 | — |
Chart Positions
1 placement across 1 market.
Chart Positions
1 placement across 1 market.