https://omrajguru.com Personal writings and quick ships by Om Rajguru. Exploring technology, design, philosophy, and craftsmanship. en-us Sun, 17 May 2026 09:29:03 GMT https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/hudt The TanStack supply chain attack was serious enough that I am pausing everything and asking people to hold off on using my tools until I can properly audit them. Thu, 14 May 2026 17:39:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/hudt https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/lc LeetCode still matters even with AI becoming common. Thu, 07 May 2026 18:10:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/lc https://omrajguru.com/writings/anthropic On May 4, 2026, Anthropic stopped being just an AI lab. They formed a $1.5 billion enterprise services company and walked directly into the business that Infosys, TCS, and Wipro have owned for three decades. I want to think through what actually happened, what it means for the industry, and where the work is going from here. Wed, 06 May 2026 10:19:33 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/anthropic https://omrajguru.com/writings/ioo The question isn't what skill to learn. It's what kind of person you're becoming and what taste you're building. Tue, 05 May 2026 15:25:52 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/ioo https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/obsdn Obsidian provides a clean and unrestricted writing environment that allows my thoughts to expand without the distraction of plugins or complex tools. Tue, 05 May 2026 10:40:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/obsdn https://omrajguru.com/writings/partner I architect software projects, tools, and digital experiences. I am seeking a strategic partner to introduce these innovations to the global market, connect with users, and transform powerful ideas into sustainable revenue. Mon, 04 May 2026 20:28:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/partner https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/ranch I want to build my own ranch from scratch one day, living with animals I care about, starting small and growing it outside India. Fri, 01 May 2026 09:26:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/ranch https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/building I am starting from zero and learning to build real things, from buildings to gardens, understanding how physical spaces come together from the ground up. Fri, 01 May 2026 07:07:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/building https://omrajguru.com/writings/unpredictable A model too powerful to release publicly, job predictions that aged out overnight, and a quiet case for why watching a film might be the most productive thing you do today. Wed, 08 Apr 2026 10:24:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/unpredictable https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/shutup Wed, 08 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/shutup https://omrajguru.com/writings/policy Most people are chasing machine learning and prompt engineering. But the skill that is quietly becoming one of the most in-demand in the entire AI industry is understanding how AI models should behave, and knowing how to build the frameworks that govern them. Here is everything I learned going deep on this topic. Thu, 02 Apr 2026 18:45:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/policy https://omrajguru.com/writings/career I launched this site to share my research and recommendations on the specific jobs, markets, and categories that I believe are positioned for significant growth. Thu, 02 Apr 2026 10:30:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/career https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/stack Tue, 31 Mar 2026 23:56:01 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/stack https://omrajguru.com/writings/trust I thought giving people chances was a strength. I hired friends, I brought in co-founders I believed in, I gave opportunities to people who seemed passionate and eager. Every single time, I told myself it would work out. Most of the time, it didn't. This is the story of what went wrong, why it went wrong, and the hard mental shifts that changed how I think about building a team forever. Sun, 29 Mar 2026 10:16:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/trust https://omrajguru.com/writings/spinner I've been building with Google Antigravity for months. I paid for Pro. I convinced myself it would get better. It didn't. Here's what actually happened, and why I'm done pretending. Fri, 27 Mar 2026 18:31:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/spinner https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/corporate Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:44:38 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/corporate https://omrajguru.com/writings/skill In a world where artificial intelligence is rapidly consuming every professional lane we thought was safe, I've been asking myself a question that keeps me up at night — not out of fear, but out of genuine curiosity. What do humans actually do when machines do everything better? Mon, 23 Mar 2026 11:15:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/skill https://omrajguru.com/writings/beta We are making Aldform available to the public. You can now sign up, get an API key, and start collecting submissions in under five minutes. Sun, 22 Mar 2026 19:31:19 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/beta https://omrajguru.com/writings/alpha Aldform is a form-building and submission-management platform still in alpha. Here's a deep dive into the technical stack, the critical path of form submission, and how we handle scale, billing, and feature rollouts. Sat, 21 Mar 2026 11:30:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/alpha https://omrajguru.com/writings/saturation Every platform wants AI. Every AI needs data. And when the open web runs dry, the data they turn to is yours. This is not a future problem. It is happening right now, across every layer of the stack, from the password hashing your server skips to the metadata your encrypted message leaves behind. This is the full picture, where we came from, what the courts have decided, what the science says, and what you can actually do about it. Fri, 20 Mar 2026 00:34:24 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/saturation https://omrajguru.com/writings/gcp I spent 90 days fighting Google Cloud’s opaque billing errors in India, trying every card and "fix" in the book. I finally gave up, moved to AWS, and was onboarded with two startups and full Activate credits in under an hour. Here is why GCP is losing the battle for Indian startups. Wed, 11 Mar 2026 09:45:37 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/gcp https://omrajguru.com/writings/spreadsheet Everyone's talking about when AGI is coming. The more honest question, maybe, is whether anyone can afford to get there. Tue, 10 Mar 2026 21:10:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/spreadsheet https://omrajguru.com/writings/lockdown For a long time, the lockdown was described as a break in real life, a period of fear, interruption, and social damage. That description is true, but it is incomplete. From where I stand, lockdown also became a hidden incubation chamber for Gen Z. It gave this generation a rare mix of time, digital immersion, reduced social pressure, and permission to experiment. What is showing up now in startups, side hustles, creative work, and founder culture did not appear from nowhere. A large part of it was incubated in those suspended years, when normal life stopped and possibility became visible in a new way. Mon, 09 Mar 2026 23:52:49 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/lockdown https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/aldform-dogfooding Mon, 09 Mar 2026 18:24:10 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/aldform-dogfooding https://omrajguru.com/writings/independence In a world where everything we share online can be collected and used to train artificial intelligence systems, I have started thinking more seriously about independence and privacy. This is why I try to do more things alone and why I share only parts of my thinking online. Mon, 09 Mar 2026 18:22:23 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/independence https://omrajguru.com/writings/aldform-v1 We just shipped V1 of Aldform. It’s a tiny SDK, two endpoints, and zero backend headaches. Here’s a look at what’s live, what’s coming, and why we’re keeping the doors cracked open just a tiny bit for now. Mon, 09 Mar 2026 16:42:52 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/aldform-v1 https://omrajguru.com/writings/aldform Most form builders force you to design inside their constraints. We decided to build a tool that stays out of your way, giving you full control over your data, your design, and your code. Sun, 08 Mar 2026 08:31:37 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/aldform https://omrajguru.com/writings/thinking Most people are not lazy. They are just mentally cluttered. Here is how I learned to cut through that. Sat, 07 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/thinking https://omrajguru.com/writings/from-claude-skills-to-the-end-of-human-control I started by asking a simple question about why AI models seem to be getting better at everything so fast. What I ended up uncovering was one of the most important and genuinely frightening conversations happening in technology right now, and I think everyone needs to hear it. Sat, 07 Mar 2026 01:18:22 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/from-claude-skills-to-the-end-of-human-control https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/aws Fri, 06 Mar 2026 12:03:26 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/aws https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-ai-industry-has-a-generosity-problem The companies building the best models are also the ones making them the hardest to actually use. From the 'open-source circus' to frustrating usage limits and regional pricing gaps, the AI industry is increasingly out of touch with serious users outside of Silicon Valley. Wed, 04 Mar 2026 18:25:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-ai-industry-has-a-generosity-problem https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/adults Wed, 04 Mar 2026 15:49:18 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/adults https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/the-digital-idol-fallacy Mon, 02 Mar 2026 22:11:51 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/the-digital-idol-fallacy https://omrajguru.com/writings/replace Sun, 01 Mar 2026 11:31:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/replace https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-great-paywall-creep Every major tech company is systematically dismantling the value proposition that attracted their user base — raising prices, fragmenting bundles, and gating previously free features behind new paywalls. Fri, 27 Feb 2026 12:41:25 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-great-paywall-creep https://omrajguru.com/writings/im-quitting-social-media-heres-why After years of assuming my data was safe, I finally looked closely at how these platforms actually work. What I found made me want to log off for good. Fri, 27 Feb 2026 10:11:16 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/im-quitting-social-media-heres-why https://omrajguru.com/writings/aliens-ai-and-the-scariest-thought-experiment The universe is massive, we have robots, and somehow this ends with an alien knowing your address Wed, 25 Feb 2026 17:31:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/aliens-ai-and-the-scariest-thought-experiment https://omrajguru.com/writings/your-answer-sheet-is-being-read-twice-now The AI is present in the exam pipeline. Researchers call it indirect prompt injection. You influence how the model evaluates by controlling how you write. Tue, 24 Feb 2026 19:03:23 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/your-answer-sheet-is-being-read-twice-now https://omrajguru.com/writings/introducing-helloanu This piece builds on the ideas from The AI Race Is a Mirror and introduces HelloAnu, a philosophical superintelligence system being developed within Anu & Rothwell Labs. Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:50:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/introducing-helloanu https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-quiet-problem-with-ai-search AI search feels simultaneously impressive and unreliable because the problem lives upstream of the AI itself—in the corpus and its attack surface. Sun, 22 Feb 2026 22:29:52 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-quiet-problem-with-ai-search https://omrajguru.com/writings/youre-not-falling-behind Everyone's panicking about AI taking over coding. The real problem isn't that AI is getting smarter - it's that most people are still learning code like it's 2010 while new models drop every few months. There's a better way, and it doesn't require choosing between shipping fast and actually learning. Sun, 22 Feb 2026 10:38:08 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/youre-not-falling-behind https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-market-doesnt-care-about-your-product I spent months building something I was absolutely certain people needed. But users weren't coming. That gap between what you think you're building and what the market actually wants - that's the gap every founder is quietly, privately terrified of. Sat, 21 Feb 2026 18:49:02 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-market-doesnt-care-about-your-product https://omrajguru.com/writings/building-ibbe-unrendered a little behind the scenes on the ibbe unrendered coming soon page and what it felt like to ship something you actually care about. Sat, 21 Feb 2026 01:34:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/building-ibbe-unrendered https://omrajguru.com/writings/i-added-like-and-dislike-buttons My blog has a frontend, no backend, no database. Here is exactly how I added a fully working like and dislike system to it without touching a single server. Fri, 20 Feb 2026 15:17:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/i-added-like-and-dislike-buttons https://omrajguru.com/writings/your-face-is-out-there you have probably heard about grok generating explicit images of real people. i sat with that for a while and started thinking about my own digital footprint. this is about what i found and what you can do. Fri, 20 Feb 2026 12:03:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/your-face-is-out-there https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-ai-race-is-a-mirror This piece examines the accelerating convergence of AI capability releases, the strategic positioning of leading laboratories, the underappreciated role of memory as a competitive moat, and proposes a functional redefinition of artificial superintelligence grounded in operational utility rather than abstract cognitive supremacy. Fri, 20 Feb 2026 11:37:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-ai-race-is-a-mirror https://omrajguru.com/writings/privacy-first As the AI age turns personal data into a commodity for big tech, I am drawing a line in the sand. Here is why the IBBE Group is moving to a tokenized-first architecture where your data belongs to you—and only you. Thu, 19 Feb 2026 12:04:03 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/privacy-first https://omrajguru.com/writings/youtube-outage yesterday’s global youtube interruption was a rare moment where the world paused. here is a technical breakdown of what likely occurred and how i am using these lessons at ibbe. Wed, 18 Feb 2026 10:15:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/youtube-outage https://omrajguru.com/writings/ibbe-careers-refactor My hiring site was painfully slow. Every page waited for every database query before sending a single byte of HTML. Here's exactly how I fixed it with React Suspense, without rewriting anything major. Mon, 16 Feb 2026 14:50:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/ibbe-careers-refactor https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/micro-build-sprint Sun, 15 Feb 2026 18:17:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/micro-build-sprint https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/from-blog-to-writings Why I changed the name from 'blog' to 'writings', and why language shapes perception. Sun, 15 Feb 2026 14:59:02 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/from-blog-to-writings https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/design-psychology Sun, 15 Feb 2026 09:10:37 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/design-psychology https://omrajguru.com/writings/were-done-asking-you-to-subscribe I'm building educational content at ibbe with one rule above all: learning comes first. That means zero "like share subscribe" nonsense, no phones for teachers, no marketing links in descriptions, and lectures that respect your brain's actual attention span. Every decision here exists because I sat through the opposite as a student and it sucked. This is what happens when you stop optimizing for metrics and start optimizing for understanding. Sun, 15 Feb 2026 07:37:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/were-done-asking-you-to-subscribe https://omrajguru.com/writings/building-a-valentine-that-actually-means-something Stop buying what everyone else is buying. Here's how to turn history into intimacy. Sat, 14 Feb 2026 18:43:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/building-a-valentine-that-actually-means-something https://omrajguru.com/writings/why-ads-in-chatgpt-might-kill-what-makes-it-useful OpenAI recently announced they're introducing ads to ChatGPT's free and lower-cost tiers to expand access. Here's what OpenAI promises, why skepticism is warranted, and what a better model might look like. Fri, 13 Feb 2026 12:30:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/why-ads-in-chatgpt-might-kill-what-makes-it-useful https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-founders-paradox This research report investigates the perilous inflection point where a founder’s personal operating system—the unique blend of habits, instincts, and biases that catalyzed a startup’s genesis—transforms from a competitive advantage into a structural liability. Thu, 12 Feb 2026 16:03:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-founders-paradox https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-internet-stopped-being-useful-and-nobodys-talking-about-it We broke search. The technology still works, but the entire point of it feels lost. Between AI slop flooding every corner of the web and zero-click answers that keep you trapped on Google, the internet's becoming a dead mall where nothing feels real anymore. Wed, 11 Feb 2026 09:47:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-internet-stopped-being-useful-and-nobodys-talking-about-it https://omrajguru.com/writings/ai-beta-testing-use-case Turns out AI's weird strengths line up perfectly with finding bugs Tue, 10 Feb 2026 15:22:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/ai-beta-testing-use-case https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-invisible-excellence-trap I obsess over details most people will never see. I refine, iterate, perfect. Then I watch as users glide past my work, oblivious to the care embedded in every choice. This is the paradox of craftsmanship: when you do it right, it disappears. Mon, 09 Feb 2026 20:33:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-invisible-excellence-trap https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/valentines-day-gift Mon, 09 Feb 2026 17:32:02 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/valentines-day-gift https://omrajguru.com/writings/leadership-as-service leadership begins with connection. explore how the daily walk and shared conversations build a standard of trust and support. Mon, 09 Feb 2026 11:08:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/leadership-as-service https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/boards Sun, 08 Feb 2026 17:08:54 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/boards https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/finally-killed-the-thoughts-page Sun, 08 Feb 2026 16:46:51 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/finally-killed-the-thoughts-page https://omrajguru.com/writings/why-ai-coding-is-still-broken After two years of using AI to code, I've watched it hit a wall that nobody wants to talk about. The tools are getting bigger, but they're getting worse at the one thing that matters: actually thinking like an engineer. Sun, 08 Feb 2026 14:45:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/why-ai-coding-is-still-broken https://omrajguru.com/writings/soul-of-a-brand I will invest my money, my attention, and my loyalty in companies that view marketing as a craft, a promise, and an opportunity to connect. And I will walk away from any brand that treats advertising as something AI can handle while humans take a back seat. Sat, 07 Feb 2026 19:30:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/soul-of-a-brand https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/i-want-to-study-history-again Sat, 07 Feb 2026 17:23:28 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/i-want-to-study-history-again https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/typing-speed Sat, 07 Feb 2026 11:40:07 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/typing-speed https://omrajguru.com/writings/why-i-choose-to-stay-in-this-feeling love leaves us exposed in ways nothing else can. when someone sees our unguarded self and then walks away, the ache settles deep. I'm exploring why moving forward feels impossible, why loyalty persists even when the story has ended, and what this vulnerability teaches me about the depth of real connection. Sat, 07 Feb 2026 08:15:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/why-i-choose-to-stay-in-this-feeling https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/i-hate-god Fri, 06 Feb 2026 19:50:27 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/i-hate-god https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/the-iterative-life Fri, 06 Feb 2026 16:17:21 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/quick-ships/the-iterative-life https://omrajguru.com/writings/returning-to-the-essential we believe the mind is an architect, designed to construct its own reality. to step back from the digital current is to reclaim the primary role in one's own life. we prefer to invest our time with intention, favoring the deep restoration of scholē over the speed of the scroll. today, we choose to design a life that looks and feels like our own. Fri, 06 Feb 2026 10:22:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/returning-to-the-essential https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-ai-everywhere-rush Every single company is sprinting to adopt it. But is it actually solving user problems? Thu, 05 Feb 2026 17:40:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-ai-everywhere-rush https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-soul-of-gifting The perfect gift is a feeling. A captured memory. A mirror that shows the recipient exactly how much they matter. Thu, 05 Feb 2026 09:15:00 GMT hello@omrajguru.com (Om) https://omrajguru.com/writings/the-soul-of-gifting