The new programming language: English

In case you haven't noticed, the pedantic annoying colleagues around you who constantly correct your grammar mid-speech are having a moment.

- Shweta Taneja

As AI models become a big part of our work and personal lives, all of us have realized the one thing we absolutely need to prompt an AI model to do our bidding is absolute command over plain old English. An ability to express what we want, in words, phrases and complete sentences, in brief, with clarity. The more specific your prompt, the more likely it is that you will be able to cajole the right answer, the right image and video, or as software programmers are realizing, the right code from an AI model.

This is dramatically different from what computer programming used to be five years ago. For the longest time, interacting with machines was through a special programming language that the machine could understand and humans had to learn. It was based in mathematics, a set of instructions, zeros and ones, syntax, data, variables, functions and code that a computer could understand and execute to perform specific tasks. In the 1960s, engineers instructed computers using COBOL and BASIC which quickly consolidated into C+ in the 1980s, giving way to Internet languages of Python and Java. Computer engineers spent years learning these syntaxes and functions, excelling in the logical art of conversing with a computer to create software, websites, applications, and other technologies.

STEM universities focused all their energies in educating their students in these languages so they could join the workforce to interact with computers, to build digital systems as we know it. So much so that the programming language training global market ballooned from $3.32 billion in 2018, to a projected $8.53 billion in 2028, an increase of around 10% year-on-year, according to a Technavio report.