Agents made my retro tech safe to use again and showed their real value as testers of ideas

Over the years, my home has become an Island of Misfit Kit, filled with ancient computers that are out of support. They still work, but it's not advisable to use them anymore. Recently, I decided to see if an agent could help revive a 15-year-old device with a tiny CPU, ancient Arch Linux, and an outdated browser. I gave the agent full control, and over three hours, it struggled to compile the latest cURL with modern cryptography.

Finally, it found a fast math library, and cURL ran smoothly. Now, I can chat with the agent via Telegram. The agent then invaded my retro collection, resuscitating a 12-year-old iMac Pro, a 10-year-old VR PC, and a Surface Go stuck at Windows 10. All devices are now running beautifully because I install an agent as soon as the OS boots and the network link comes up.

Testing ideas has become trivial, and I've become a mad scientist, testing numerous ideas. Agents are transforming retro-tech revivals and have the potential to impact various fields, including science, business, and governance. The bottleneck is understanding which measurements matter, which can be gamed, and which should be ignored. This requires human judgment and cannot be learned from an agent.