Hello! It’s probably been a minute since you last heard from me. I assumed you’d appreciate being one of the seed subscribers to this new blog, but I won’t be offended if you unsubscribe.
Catching you up: I worked at Stripe for most of my adult life. Then I left to start a company with a friend, perceptnet (who built Substack). I’m taking a break now, but Zo is still going strong. I decided to move to Puerto Rico with tiff huang, and venture into the unknown.
I chose the moniker Hraness recently, inspired by the agent harness. It’s really quite astonishing that a simple perceive-act loop can elicit such useful lifelike behaviors from LLMs.
Hraness also means “Ra-ness”. Ra called all forms of life into existence by uttering their secret names. Every evening, Ra journeys into the underworld, transforms into his ram-headed form, and is joined by his buddies Sia (perception), Hu (command), and Heka (magic power). He defeats the snake god of chaos Apophis, and returns at dawn to triumphantly light the day.
I developed a severe case of AI psychosis recently; it was so severe that I had to take a serious break and move to the tropics. Since Fable & Sol, I’ve become convinced that the laws of physics in software have changed, and we must all change our ways. Building a software factory is like tending to a fertile plot of land: gently coaxing agents until the land blooms into a verdant jungle.
I sincerely believe that now is the time to venture out into the latent space as a fearless explorer, savoring that nebulous new air. We’re entering a brave new world in which magician-explorers can shine a light on dark terrain, re-wilding our digital environment into something much more strange and vibrant. Stay tuned, and I’ll do my best to teach you the Way of Hra.
Until next time,
Ben | hraness.com
PS – I’m making music again. Keeping it simple for now, just saw waves and 707. Some loops from this past week:
Jungle ⌁ 2. NMQC (Bad Bunny) ⌁ 3. Beach ⌁ 4. Lagoon
Scenes from my life
What I’m consuming
Sunshine, salt water, smoothies, chili, and mamey sapote (h/t Bill & Alexa)
Permutation City by Greg Egan (h/t Ian)
27a Pitfield St by Bassvictim (h/t Ryaan)
The Coward Forgets His Nightmare by Chanel Beads (h/t Dan)
Once (or if you ever feel like), it would be interesting to hear more about the impact of AI on your life. Not just how you think about it, but how it has personally changed you.
I feel like the same thing has happened to me, but I'm not sure when an inflection point is going to happen when I'll articulate it.
Permutation City 👏 feels like where it’s all going
Check out Accelerando by Stross too, Zero Person Companies