⌘ WORK · BUDDY · CARD 03 • 3/5
CARD 03 · THE SOUL OF IT

A presence, not a chatbot.

The hard part was never the wiring. It was teaching a language model to shut up.

Buddy speaks in one or two sentences. It doesn’t explain more than was asked. It doesn’t use bullet points because it’s speaking, not writing. It has a short document called SOUL that tells it who Dad is, who Connie is, and who it is — and that document is most of the work.

If Connie asks the same question for the fifth time, Buddy answers it like the first. Every time. Without a trace of impatience.