When OpenClaw was having its moment in February I couldn’t resist trying it myself.
I still had a VPS from back then, so the thought was simple: let me get this thing running and see what it can actually do.
The setup itself was part of the fun. API keys, configuration, getting everything running on the VPS, and then connecting it to Telegram. Once messages started flowing through the system, it suddenly felt much more real than just another AI tool.
I created a Telegram setup where I could route messages across different areas and started experimenting with how much of my everyday productivity could actually be handled this way.
The toil of setting it all up was almost as interesting as using it. You weren’t just opening an app and clicking around. You had the VPS, the keys, the configuration, the APIs and the freedom to shape the system yourself.
One feature that particularly stood out to me was the database capability in Hermes. That quickly became one of my favourite parts of the whole experience.
Of course, products like Grokbot eventually solved much of the same problem with a full-fledged application. But there was something different about running an agent on your own VPS and having that level of control.
Maybe that’s what made OpenClaw particularly interesting to me.
It wasn’t just about using an AI assistant.
It was about building your own little AI system and figuring out what you could make it do.