the goblins
Although I have much disdain of the gen-z-fication of our vocabulary, I am quite fond of the [insert word]-maxxing lexicon of words. Only because I woke up today and thought to myself - “How can I do fun-maxxing today?”.
At the end of the day, I am not sure how much fun I could maximise, but it lead me to some nice reflections. Don’t worry, I am not breaking my vow of not writing about my personal life (see my last post here). But I want to engage in some stochastic thinking and this blog happens to be the dumping ground for some goblins in my head.
goblins
I don’t think there is any timeline where I thought I would read a headline from OpenAI which reads,
“Where the goblins came from”
You can read the blogpost here. Although I highly recommend reading this post, the Tl;Dr of the post is that due to some (explainable) reasons, certain model(s) of OpenAI were incentivised to use ‘goblins’ in their responses. And then OpenAI had to slay the goblins and kill that specific OpenAI model. #freethegoblins
Other than the fact that I liked reading something after a long time - it was exemplary of how complex systems are; and yet still how explaining complex things to normal people is an art.
To me, goblins, became the embodiment of mischievous, fun and interesting things one does in their life. Often as part of their work.
I recently wrote about a tiny goblin I made for myself - an email agent which summarises my inbox and calendar and acts like my chief of staff agent, organising my day for me.
I’ve wanted to vibecode for the longest time. So once I made this, nor only was I very surprised with myself - I also finally boarded the bandwagon of “everybody should code”. It was also affirming of the fact that anyone can code. I encourage you to slay some of your curiosity goblins.
I’m currently thinking of use cases of this newfound low hanging skill. Although I must say I am nowhere, nowhere, nowhere around the real power users. My friend Akhilesh is building one legaltech startup (Paperbook360,) which revolutionises filings before all courts in India. The product is in beta and yet to be released fully, but if you’re a litigator, or have a regulatory practice anywhere in India - definitely check this out. But this is not his coolest trick.
If you’re a lawyer, you know the struggle of finding a house anywhere in this country. Non lawyers are very circumspect of lawyers. They are afraid of their lawyer tenant using some mythical loophole in law to snatch their property from them. Until now - all lawyers have had to start from scratch every time they set to find a house.
Not anymore. My brilliant friend Akhilesh has made PaperSpaces. It allows lawyers to find other lawyers to live with, and more importantly, find lawyer friendly houses to live in. Existing lawyer tenants who are moving out make money by recommending other lawyers who are looking to move into lawyer friendly houses. PaperSpaces is going live pan India very soon.
All in all, Akhilesh is slaying some major goblins. And there are many more like him. Who managed to turn their work into fun. I aspire to be like that.
mischief managed
Going back to fun-maxxing. I am quite keen on figuring out how to do it at work. My boss often says that the idea is to do the job damn well, and have a good time while at it. The best way to have fun while working (to me, at least) is to play around stochastically. some drunkard’s walk simulations.
By the way, many moons ago I used to work on stochastic modelling of DNA replication. This was 7 years ago during my physics degree in University of Delhi. Although I didn’t pursue physics later, I did have a lot fun in that degree (in the little amount I spent in classes hahaha). It was fun because I could watch videos and videos on complicated physics concepts and then also try to figure them out by myself in class. Mind you, I have studied advanced quantum mechanics, and real analysis at one point!
One needs to have some fun in whatever is their craft. Often, a lot of fun comes from the people around. But it is unmatched with the fun that comes from work. so, an open question I aim to ask myself everyday is “How do I make this fun?”.
Do you have any specific things you do to make your work fun? I’d love to hear from you. Some things that have worked for me include:
Working with a colleague who is also a friend on a common project.
Talk about business of law with colleagues.
Think about moonshots within the paradigm of your workplace.
But there’s a ton of work left to be done! Or should I say, ton of fun left to be had!
Some examples of people who (seem) to be having a lot of fund doing their job are Ashish Kulkarni, Pranay Kotasthane, Ajay Shah, Shruti Rajagopalan, Amit Varma (Amit - do you agree?) etc. etc. The common trait is either their skill to tinker around with the newest toy on the block (AI presently) to make fun projects, or, being genuinely spirited about the work they do.
Somebody who is recently having a LOT of fun is ex-Latham associate Will Chen who apparently built an open source competitor to Harvey and Legora in two weeks.
time to slay some goblins hopefully. muahhahahaha.
Having fun while working is a great stress buster but making those fun moments is an art. Wit in day to day conversations can be funny and may create some lighter moments.
Goblins exist only in our imagination.