Building the Backbone of AI Agents: Telemetry, Open Source, and the Future of Developer Infrastructure with Brian Douglas

AI agents are moving fast,  but the infrastructure behind them is still catching up. In this episode of Screaming in the Cloud, Corey Quinn sits down with Paper Compute CEO Brian “B Dougie” Douglas to explore building telemetry for AI agents, open-source infrastructure, token economics, and what it takes to create developer tooling in the AI era. From local-first observability to agent runtimes and the future of AI workflows, this conversation dives into what’s next for AI-powered development.

Show highlights:

(00:00) Open Source Trust Signal

(00:16) Show Intro and Sponsor

(01:07) What Paper Compute Builds

(01:55) Telemetry for Agents Explained

(04:10) Local First Data and Sharing

(06:18) Second Time Founder Story

(09:06) Token Costs and Pricing Psychology

(14:20) Stereos VM and Safer Runtimes

(20:34) Open Source Strategy and Vibe Coding

(24:54) Whats Next and Wrap Up