Oh great… my friends are now calling me a Claw Bro and I didn’t even know I had a problem.
A few months ago, I would have told you Agents are all the same and frankly, sort of boring. You prompt, they respond, maybe correct themselves if they run into an error. That’s pretty much the only way I worked with AI.
Then I started running OpenClaw and I thought it was just a cool project that I’m supposed to explore since it’s the fastest growing product of all time… faster than React, etc.
But then, it happened. Something that made me realize the difference is what the agent can reach.
My agent Otis has access to my terminal, git, my Obsidian files and he happily runs in a custom Mac Mini. The thing is, he doesn’t just respond to prompts. He executes workflows autonomously.
I was in the middle of writing something which I usually do in Obsidian, but I was also multi-tasking and I had a thought. It’d be cool if I could version control my notes.
So, I fired up Telegram and I told Otis “I need to implement a backup strategy for my Obsidian files”
47 seconds later, here’s what it did:
- Git initialized in my vault (1,310 files)
- Created a proper .gitignore with meaningful files
- Added a private GitHub repo to GitHub
- Pushed my notes
- Scheduled a cron job
- Documented the whole thing
I didn’t walk through the steps it needed to perform. I just described what I wanted.
ChatGPT vs Claude Code vs OpenClaw
ChatGPT or Claude are incredible at a lot of things. You tell them what to do. You configure connectors. You set up the integrations. Develop complex custom instructions. You have to create skills and plugins and teach them exactly how you want them to do things. It takes several tries to get things right.
With Claude Code or Cowork, backing up my notes would require:
- Obsidian MCP connector (doesn’t exist)
- Step-by-step git setup
- Manual repo creation
- Individual configuration
With Otis, I said one sentence and went back to work.
It’s a Fundamentally Different Mindset
It continuously surprises you with a deeper understanding of who you are, how you want things done. It learns and constantly updates the rubrics that make up its understanding of you… its role in your life, etc. That learning is part of its core skill and it’s relentless.
It’d be hard to explain… unless you’re a Claw Bro.
I’m always misunderstood.
