Yes, I think this shift is real. Most people are still stuck in the “chat window” stage while the real gains come when AI sits inside the workflow rather than beside it.
It reminds me of the early cloud era. Gartner reported that by 2025 over 80% of enterprises will have integrated AI into at least one core business process, yet most professionals still use it as a standalone assistant rather than part of their systems.
My main issue with Claude Cowork is that it's buggy, it works on local file folders, and some MCP connections are unreliable. I've already had to uninstall and reinstall Todoist three times. And Claude simply refuses to see any spreadsheets on Google Drive.
I loved this post so much. And I agree with you on level 1 and I notice that a lot of people get stuck there which is fine, because that's an opportunity to have them stop optimizing the copy paste and just collapse the distance :) most people want a better bucket to carry water!
I also notice that a lot of these new systems and AI tools help us shift our thinking from "this is a tool" to "this is a colleague who's read our files". It's been some time since I thought of them as tools!
Of course Notion roles out agents the week after you write your article on Obsidian! Do you think it changes anything for you, though? I've looked at the agents a bit, but given how much they will end up costing and the fact that I don't think Notion's AI (or at least the personal assistant agent they've had for a few months now) is that good, I don't think I'll use them. I'd rather use agents in Claude Code and have it work in Notion via the MCP.
I don't think I will move to Notion mainly because two things:
1. I'm currently on Claude Max Plan because I need to use it for vibe-coding as well as I just "Opus" everything now for all my work request lol, so it doesn't make sense to add more cost just to manage my project that can be managed by Obsidian + Claude Code
2. Unless I work in a team, then maybe I will consider. If I just work solo most of the time, there's no strong reason to overcomplicate more stuffs with Notion agents.
Yes agree with your point, even though the MCP experience is not that smooth but it does the job.
And also I already have OpenClaw tied with my Claude account, so more reasons not to use Notion.
The MCP situation seems to be getting better. I don't run into issues all that often.
To be fair, not everything is stored in Notion, just certain things that are DB driven.
I think I use VS Code in a similar way to how you use Obsidian. A lot offline MD files life on my computer and I just view and edit them in there. Adding Obsidian seems like an extra stretch for me.
I WANT an OpenClaw-like agent, but I'm not ready to go down that rabbit hole just yet.
I decided to start doing all of this in Claude Cowork. Now I’m wondering if Claude Code would be stronger - and what is the difference if any? But I could absolutely resonate with all of your article. The blood, sweat and tears of it all!
Claude Code is much faster than Cowork because it lives inside your folder, while Cowork requires you to attach the folder. The general features are the same, but using CC makes context management easier, since you can mention files, edit them directly, and clearly see the changes.
The copy-paste tax framing nails something I felt before I had words for it.
The question 'where should my AI live?' is actually the wrong first question though - before location, you need to decide what the AI should *know* about you permanently.
I found that even a perfectly integrated workspace still produced generic outputs until I built an explicit identity layer: preferences, recurring failure patterns, how I make decisions.
Once that existed as a persistent file, the integration stopped mattering as much. The AI knew *how* to use the workspace rather than just having access to it.
Have you run into the same problem - good integration, still generic outputs?
The bit about Google Workspace being the natural path for people already deep in that ecosystem landed for me. There's a new piece to that puzzle this week: Google open-sourced `gws`, a single CLI for Gmail, Drive, Calendar, Sheets and the rest. Ships with 100+ agent skills and a built-in MCP server, so Claude Code can read your inbox or create calendar events without you wrestling with OAuth. Wrote it up here if it's relevant to your Level 2 to 3 journey: https://reading.sh/google-workspace-finally-has-a-cli-and-its-built-for-agents-5f5fe87d0425
Yes, I think this shift is real. Most people are still stuck in the “chat window” stage while the real gains come when AI sits inside the workflow rather than beside it.
It reminds me of the early cloud era. Gartner reported that by 2025 over 80% of enterprises will have integrated AI into at least one core business process, yet most professionals still use it as a standalone assistant rather than part of their systems.
Yes most of us are still stuck on copy-paste tax. No wonder AI adoption is very slow because it’s not well integrated into our natural workflow.
"copy and paste tax" 🤣 so so true 👏
We are just a middleman after all :)
My main issue with Claude Cowork is that it's buggy, it works on local file folders, and some MCP connections are unreliable. I've already had to uninstall and reinstall Todoist three times. And Claude simply refuses to see any spreadsheets on Google Drive.
yeah happens to me as well, especially with MCP.
That’s why I’m still heavily on Claude Code right now — way smoother.
GOOD NEWS. I just moved to Obsidian today!!!!! :D
I loved this post so much. And I agree with you on level 1 and I notice that a lot of people get stuck there which is fine, because that's an opportunity to have them stop optimizing the copy paste and just collapse the distance :) most people want a better bucket to carry water!
I also notice that a lot of these new systems and AI tools help us shift our thinking from "this is a tool" to "this is a colleague who's read our files". It's been some time since I thought of them as tools!
I love when more people announce their move to Obsidian haha :)
This is one of biggest shift in how I work with AI!
Yes the shift requires a mindset change between “AI is just a tool” vs “AI as coworker.”
When we think that way, our minds will start to figure out ways how to integrate them altogether so we can be more effective at work.
Of course Notion roles out agents the week after you write your article on Obsidian! Do you think it changes anything for you, though? I've looked at the agents a bit, but given how much they will end up costing and the fact that I don't think Notion's AI (or at least the personal assistant agent they've had for a few months now) is that good, I don't think I'll use them. I'd rather use agents in Claude Code and have it work in Notion via the MCP.
haha yeah! :)
I don't think I will move to Notion mainly because two things:
1. I'm currently on Claude Max Plan because I need to use it for vibe-coding as well as I just "Opus" everything now for all my work request lol, so it doesn't make sense to add more cost just to manage my project that can be managed by Obsidian + Claude Code
2. Unless I work in a team, then maybe I will consider. If I just work solo most of the time, there's no strong reason to overcomplicate more stuffs with Notion agents.
Yes agree with your point, even though the MCP experience is not that smooth but it does the job.
And also I already have OpenClaw tied with my Claude account, so more reasons not to use Notion.
The MCP situation seems to be getting better. I don't run into issues all that often.
To be fair, not everything is stored in Notion, just certain things that are DB driven.
I think I use VS Code in a similar way to how you use Obsidian. A lot offline MD files life on my computer and I just view and edit them in there. Adding Obsidian seems like an extra stretch for me.
I WANT an OpenClaw-like agent, but I'm not ready to go down that rabbit hole just yet.
that makes sense, so fewer reasons to move to Notion entirely and pay for a subscription there.
I think using VS Code is already doing the job for the most part, so there’s no need to actually use Obsidian.
OpenClaw is definitely risky, but it’s the closest I’ve gotten to the feeling of a real agent.
I decided to start doing all of this in Claude Cowork. Now I’m wondering if Claude Code would be stronger - and what is the difference if any? But I could absolutely resonate with all of your article. The blood, sweat and tears of it all!
Glad it resonated with you :)
Claude Code is much faster than Cowork because it lives inside your folder, while Cowork requires you to attach the folder. The general features are the same, but using CC makes context management easier, since you can mention files, edit them directly, and clearly see the changes.
The copy-paste tax framing nails something I felt before I had words for it.
The question 'where should my AI live?' is actually the wrong first question though - before location, you need to decide what the AI should *know* about you permanently.
I found that even a perfectly integrated workspace still produced generic outputs until I built an explicit identity layer: preferences, recurring failure patterns, how I make decisions.
Once that existed as a persistent file, the integration stopped mattering as much. The AI knew *how* to use the workspace rather than just having access to it.
Have you run into the same problem - good integration, still generic outputs?
The bit about Google Workspace being the natural path for people already deep in that ecosystem landed for me. There's a new piece to that puzzle this week: Google open-sourced `gws`, a single CLI for Gmail, Drive, Calendar, Sheets and the rest. Ships with 100+ agent skills and a built-in MCP server, so Claude Code can read your inbox or create calendar events without you wrestling with OAuth. Wrote it up here if it's relevant to your Level 2 to 3 journey: https://reading.sh/google-workspace-finally-has-a-cli-and-its-built-for-agents-5f5fe87d0425