E183: Why English Isn't a Programming Language - the BAML Story

This episode dives into why code quality still matters in the age of AI , and why English - no matter how good models get - won’t replace programming . Our guest is Co-Founder of Boundary , Vaibhav Gupta , and he shares the journey behind BAML , a new programming language to write and manage AI logic. After 12 pivots and 3.5 years, the team realized something simple but powerful: AI tools were evolving fast, but the code was ugly . Most AI generated code was unnecessarily long and messy. For builders who viewed code as artistic expression , that was painful. Once they tried BAML , everything changed. It was clean, elegant - completely the opposite of AI slop. It wasn’t an overnight success. It took nine months to reach ten users — but the early ones stayed because of thoughtful design: Easy model swapping Full visibility into every prompt and test case A workflow so simple that non-technical users (even lawyers!) could test code BAML was built with a philosophy that code is the source of truth , not the docs. The conversation touches on how LLM observability and thoughtfully designed code make BAML unique. It’s inspired by the same thinking that made React sticky - beauty and composability. Pretty code, the founder believes, isn’t vanity - it’s a functional advantage : Fewer bugs Easier to reason about Friendlier for AI-generated systems

You can listen to E183: Why English Isn't a Programming Language - the BAML Story online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

E183: Why English Isn't a Programming Language - the BAML Story is an episode from The OSS Startup Podcast by Robby (MTF); Tim (Essence VC).

This episode is 00:37:26 long.

This episode was published on Oct 20, 2025.

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