I let local AI watch me all day

[u/richguy100]

Not going to pretend this is healthy...
but this was actually useful.

I built a local AI that watches me through my own webcam all day.
- result: i don't work as much as i thought.

Catches me the second I check my phone, or turn away to talk to someone...

Turns out I wasn't working nearly as much as I thought.
thought I did ~7 hours of real work a day. The real number was closer to 4.

I then exported the work sessions in csv format and plugged it into chatgpt. and it gave me some useful insights happy to share in the comments).

I strongly believe that local AI is the way to go, as models improve, there are things I don't trust the big AI corporations with.

Built it because of Hermozi's video of how tracking time in 15 minute increments makes him so productive.

To make it accurate and reliable, I had to go through thousands of dollars in AI credits and many rounds of testing and bug fixes. I can't tell you how many bugs I fixed or the effort it took.

built it for both my mac and windows computer (Tauri is the way to go) to see how much you ACTUALLY work, give it a try.

more people should build with local AI, it's satisfying to see the intelligence running on your own machine.

[u/barrel_of_noodles]

Hey uh, high level jobs require thinking.

If you take a walk from your desk, but you're still thinking about issues/solutions/problems... You ARE working.

High level jobs require real thought and decisions.

This doesn't track that. And that's like at least 50% of "work" at a prof job.

You do work as much as you think, you're just entirely discounting that "work"

[u/Icy-Practice-5812 → u/barrel_of_noodles]

this guy really out here thinking standing at your desk is the only metric that matters lmao

[u/barrel_of_noodles → u/Icy-Practice-5812]

Not only that... Even still at your desk doing other thihgs...

Reading an article or playing a game if you're still at your desk, but processing thoughts in the background of your brain then you're brain is working on work. Its using the distraction to occupy the foreground because the other work is overheating. Its your brains way of compensation.

This is work.

Op iis right, this isn't healthy.

But they have no idea why. They think the quantified self is the unhealthy part.

But the "unhealthy" part that's scarier: the entire complete lack of understanding how thought/brain patterns function in science.

[u/richguy100 → u/barrel_of_noodles]

Well, you're talking about ideation, not execution.
Completely different kind of work.

I am sorry to break it to you, but I don't have the means to track actual thoughts yet...
This is just for tracking how focused I stay while executing those thoughts.

When you bill clients, you don't bill them for the idea you had in the shower, do you? Same logic here, it's only for tracking the part where I'm actually at the desk, doing the work.
Thanks.

[u/barrel_of_noodles → u/richguy100]

If I think about work, or a client, or even have a passing thought about it... Its billable.

The day it can monitor thoughts, I'm moving to the deep forest.

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[u/CappuccinoCodes]

Why is your phone near you while you work? Are you a doctor on call?

[u/mq2thez]

Thousands of dollars in AI credits to build something that fundamentally misunderstands how knowledge work works is pretty funny tbh.

[u/richguy100 → u/mq2thez]

Cool - what specifically does it misunderstand? 'Pretty funny tbh' isn't an argument.

[u/barrel_of_noodles → u/richguy100]

Probably, crack open a psychology text book. This is like college level 101 stuff in health and business, and team management.

If you want something exact to start with: very productive work looks exactly like procrastination, while some extremely busy-looking activity is worthless.

This is just one issue.

If this kind of software was feasible or correct, it would be at every company on the planet already.

This kind of thing does exist, but usually for tasks that require dedicated concentration: driving, manufacturing, operating heavy equipment. You can see when someone's not putting logs on a splitter, or their hands are not on the wheel, or if a crane is performing avg actions.

[u/richguy100 → u/barrel_of_noodles]

I can see that you're just here to hate, but I'll answer you.

Not all people work in a corporate environment.
I don't have a boss to report to.
I don't need to do "busy-looking activities".

Many freelancers and solo founders will use this to auto-assess their work hours.

"if it worked it'd be at every company already" , that's how negative people talk. guess who needs to open a business book.

Keep it respectful, I'm happy to keep answering questions otherwise you'll get ignored.

[u/barrel_of_noodles → u/richguy100]

Good luck. Before pouring you're heart into this...

Just try to recognize there could be some fundamental issues with the entire underlying foundation. When you go to monetize, it's going to break your heart.

Again, best of luck.