Tools for Conviviality (Ivan Illich) has this idea about the two watersheds of new technology.
During the first watershed, it solves an actual problem + improves the lives of those who adopt it.
During the second watershed, it gets institutionalized and the technology shifts into something that requires people serve it rather than serving those it’s intended to help.
His examples are all old technologies like modern medicine, non party line wired phones, the radio, etc. but the ideas fit the shape of the technological advances we’re seeing in our lifetimes as well.
Venkatesh Rao had this idea about matching the type of work you choose at a given time to the mood state you are currently in (or finding cues to shift yourself into the mood state that best matches the kind of work you need to be doing).
Pick a few personas to develop that match different aspects of your personality and map to different mood states you might be in. Not so much defining roles, but different work styles that you work in. Write prompts for each of them.
Keep a task list your agent has access to. Feed it your personas as well.
Have an agent pick one task and to frame the work through the lens of each of your personas and to ask it to ask you to choose which one you would like to pick.
Schedule it to run each morning and trust your gut with whichever one you pick.
You have now put yourself on the opposite end of the prompt response loop and the agent is prompting you for a response.
I think it was actually just a straight mobile clone as I see "WigglyPaint" in the screenshots and the original Android app was called WigglyPaint as well based on the url (/apps/details?id=io.wigglypaint.android). Probably got more popular than they were expecting and decided to pivot a bit.
I have two problems with that. One is, you can do what you like quietly and without disturbing anyone around you. Second is the Dunning Kruger effect: witnessing it first hand is never fun.
During the first watershed, it solves an actual problem + improves the lives of those who adopt it.
During the second watershed, it gets institutionalized and the technology shifts into something that requires people serve it rather than serving those it’s intended to help.
His examples are all old technologies like modern medicine, non party line wired phones, the radio, etc. but the ideas fit the shape of the technological advances we’re seeing in our lifetimes as well.