Special Announcement from DEV
Tags: meta, codenewbie
Published: 2020-01-22 14:41:42

We are delighted to share some exciting news — **DEV has made its first acquisition**, and it could not be a more perfect partnership.

We are welcoming in **[CodeNewbie](https://www.codenewbie.org)**, a small company with a huge impact on the software ecosystem. It's an organization that is synonymous with community and inclusion in the software industry. I have personally been involved with CodeNewbie in one way or another since I was a true green newbie myself, and I can't possibly count how many people in our industry have been positively affected by this organization.

CodeNewbie was founded and operated by [Saron Yitbarek](/saronyitbarek), someone whom Jess, Peter and I have come to know well. She is among the most talented and hardest working individuals in all of tech. The organization operates a lively Twitter chat and all-around Twitter presence, along with some of our industry's most finely produced interview-style podcasts, [The CodeNewbie Podcast](https://www.codenewbie.org/podcast), [The Base.cs Podcast](https://www.codenewbie.org/basecs) and other specialty shows. CodeNewbie also runs the best software conference around, [CodeLand](https://codelandconf.com). It is an annual conference hosted in New York City, and I have personally been to every one of them over the years. I can't get enough of the speaker quality, the attention to detail, and the authentic commitment to community.

**_More information on CodeLand 2020 below_**

![Image of Saron](https://breakingintostartups.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Saron.png)

Saron has done a magnificent job building CodeNewbie to date, and we are so happy to welcome her influence into our organization.  She will continue her work producing community-oriented events and podcasts. **Saron will also be joining DEV’s Board of Directors as an observer**.  We look forward to benefiting from Saron’s input at all levels as we grow DEV and CodeNewbie together.


{% link https://dev.to/saronyitbarek/the-codenewbie-journey-continues-3h1n %}

CodeNewbie is an incredible initiative in every way, and our singular focus through this acquisition is to help it thrive. We plan to keep every important part of the CodeNewbie operation humming along, while taking on the kind of new projects that were never feasible while it was just Saron plus one or two additional team members.

## Important to know

Since DEV is already very newbie-friendly, we want to assure you that we are a vibrant ecosystem of developers that span all experience levels. We have product adjustments in mind right now to ensure a more relevant and enriching home feed for all users. You can already adjust your experience level in [/settings/ux](/settings/ux). We have more shipping in the upcoming weeks.

Through CodeNewbie, we also intend to launch new and exciting campaigns designed exclusively for newbies. We expect that this approach will benefit newer folks in our industry, while also allowing us to highlight these activities for exactly who wants to most take part.

Above all, we will focus on keeping things rolling along for both DEV and CodeNewbie, because each initiative already has  a lot going on independently.

## Original podcasts

Our organization is now responsible for producing and releasing the amazing podcasts started by CodeNewbie — [The CodeNewbie Podcast](https://www.codenewbie.org/podcast), [Base.cs](https://www.codenewbie.org/basecs), and other specialty shows. We can't wait to help improve these already awesome shows, and we’re also looking forward to producing new shows for developers of all skill levels. Saron and our new Senior Podcast Producer, Levi Sharpe, have high standards and great taste, and we look forward to making the most of their talents.

For more on Levi, check out his “Welcome” post:

{% link https://dev.to/levisharpe/i-m-levi-your-resident-podcast-producer-and-i-just-joined-the-dev-team-2557 %}

## CodeLand

We are excited to announce that the fourth annual **CodeLand will take place July 23 and 24 of this year, hosted in New York City**. 

### **[🗽 CodeLand NYC Website](https://codelandconf.com) ✨**

![Codeland attendees](https://thepracticaldev.s3.amazonaws.com/i/971l3s5cife07ibtw2ke.png)

CodeLand is a community-first two day conference featuring talks and workshops from some incredible speakers. Having attended each of the previous three events, I can say without a doubt that this is my absolute favorite code conference, and is amazing for developers at every stage of their careers. The talks are mostly technology-agnostic and focus on big ideas and core skills, while the workshops are designed to help attendees stay up-to-date with important movements in the software industry.   They will be led by some of the industry's best teachers.

I know that I’m no longer an unbiased third-party, but I just have to reiterate that the talks are amazing, the workshops are thoughtfully curated, and I've never met anyone who didn't leave inspired and meaningfully educated after attending.

### The CodeLand CFP is open and tickets will be available soon.

We will be releasing tickets in batches, so be sure to enter your email at [CodeLandConf.com](https://codelandconf.com) to get notified as soon as the first early-bird tickets are made available.  If you’re committed to attending this first DEV-driven CodeLand, please don’t wait to grab your ticket once they are made available.  We expect a full house, and we don’t want anyone left disappointed who was dead-set on joining.
## One last note

DEV is built by newbies. Our first hires were all working their first coding job, and we have had many many engineers make DEV their first open source contribution. Every developer was once new, and our career is a windy path where we need all the help we can get. CodeNewbie exists because we need the broader community in order to make strides individually. We cannot wait to hire more newbies in the future on to the DEV Team, and we look forward to helping newbies all over the world shed impostor syndrome and do big things in code.