This isn't a pitch. It's the plain answer to one question: what does Buzz actually do for us that Slack can't? Then what I've built, and the two minutes it takes you and Nav to get in.
The why, straight off
Right now, every team works the same way. The talking happens in one app. The AI sits in another. So somebody spends all day carrying: copy the question out of the chat, paste it into the AI, copy the answer back, explain the context every single time.
Buzz puts the AI inside the chat, as a teammate. That one change is the whole story. Everything below is just what falls out of it.
The carrying stops.You ask the question in the channel, out loud, once. The AI already read the whole conversation, so it has the context without anyone explaining. The answer lands where everyone reads. Practically: fewer relays, nothing lost in translation, one version of the truth.
"Go do this" actually goes and does it.You don't ask it for advice, you give it the job. "Pull the numbers." "Draft the plan." "Build the page." It does the work and posts the result back into the same thread that asked. Operationally: no chasing, no status meetings about whether the thing happened. The thread is the status.
Everything the AI does is on the record.Every action is stamped: which AI teammate did it, what exactly it did, and which human asked. You can always check the tape. That's the difference between a toy and something you can eventually trust with real work.
You're not married to one AI company.A teammate can run on Claude this week and OpenAI next week. It keeps its memory through the swap. If one gets worse or triples its price, you move in a minute. Slack can't give you that; nothing else can either.
The room can belong to you.Slack keeps every message you've ever sent on Slack's computers, and you rent access to your own conversations. Buzz is free, the code is public, and you can run the whole thing on a machine you own. Your room, your record, in your house.
So what is it, exactly
A free team chat app from Block, Jack Dorsey's company, launched in July. Channels, threads, voice calls. iPhone app on the App Store. It looks and feels like Slack on purpose: the new idea isn't the chat, it's who's sitting in it.
What I've built us
"Maybe you and I build a little two‑man Buzz, kicking‑the‑tyres thing. Little nerd‑box corner."
Your idea, Friday. It's done.
A private Buzz running on my own little server at home. Nobody's cloud. Three members ever: you, me, and Nav. One channel: #nerd‑box. One AI teammate in the room, loaded with everything I've researched about the tools we keep talking about.
The three of us use it for exactly what you said: find the good AI stuff, drop it in the room, kick it about, and see what holds up before anyone thinks about the larger thing.
Where this could go
The nerd box · nowYou, me, Nav, one AI teammate. Trade finds. Kick tyres. Zero stakes.
A meetings roomNotes from a call land in a channel; the AI turns them into actions and owners in the same thread the team reads.
A content roomEach day's numbers post themselves; the team and an analyst AI talk about what worked, right where the numbers land.
The big oneTeams replacing Slack entirely: AI as staff, on machines they own. Too early today. The nerd box is how we'll know when it's ready.
Straight talk
Because we're not selling this
It's four weeks old, version 0.5. Some things wobble.
Heavy AI use burns real money in credits. Fine for a two-man room; not ready to run a whole company on.
Whoever runs the server can read the room. Ours runs on my machine, and nothing sensitive goes in anyway.
The "ask a human before acting" controls aren't finished yet. So it stays a sandbox until they are.
How to get in · two minutes
Get the Buzz app. Buttons below.
Open it and let it create your identity. One tap, it sorts itself.
Paste in the room address from my message, and say hello in #nerd‑box.
No account, no password. If anything looks different on your screen, message me and I'll walk you through it.
How we use it, day to day
See something good, drop it in.A tool, a demo, a thread, anything. One line on why it caught your eye. That's the whole job.
Want a view, ask Scout.Scout is the AI teammate in our room. Tag it and ask straight: "@Scout, worth an hour of my time?" It's read everything in the channel, so you never explain backstory.
Want something done, give Scout the job."@Scout, compare these two and give us a verdict." "@Scout, what did we say about this last week?" The answer lands back in the thread.
No meetings, no homework.The room is the meeting. Dip in when you're curious, ignore it when you're busy. It keeps perfectly without us.