AI Can Make Software Now. That Changes Everything, with Paul Ford

Learn to code, they told us. Then the computers went and learned to code. Now anyone can do it, in theory, courtesy of Claude Code and other vibe coding apps. Tech people I talk to are very, very excited about this. But they often have a hard time explaining to me, a non-coder, why AI-powered coding is such a big deal. And whether it’s a big deal to everyone who already codes or deals with software for a living — or whether it’s a big deal for everyone who uses software. All of us, that is. Here to the rescue is Paul Ford, a guy who learned to code and who also learned to write and talk, like a human. Paul is the guy who wrote an entire issue of Businessweek dedicated to a single question — What is Code? — and blogs at Ftrain.com; but his day job is making software, which he does at Aboard. Paul is not the guy who can tell you what’s going to happen to Saas stocks, or if AI is going to wipe out all the jobs, some jobs or will create a gazillion new jobs. Anyone who tells you any of those answers with confidence, he says, is making it up. But he can tell you and me why the recent change in AI-produced software — something that really kicked in over the last few months — is changing his life, and why it’s going to change software for good. And he’ll help you think about what that means for you, a normal person. You’ll like this one. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices