The Singularity Needs a General Contractor

Alex Wissner-Gross and Peter Diamandis wrote a long essay called Solve Everything about where AI is taking us. In the post announcing it, Alex wrote a line I keep coming back to:

"The Singularity has plenty of authors now, but what it has always needed is a general contractor."

Alex Wissner-Gross, “Solve Everything,” The Innermost Loop

He meant the essay itself: a plan you can actually build from. He wasn't writing about robots or contractors. But I run a general contractor, and I think the line holds up when you read it literally too. Here's what I believe.

I don't think the technical barrier is the problem anymore

The hardest part of robots used to be programming them. From what I've seen this year, AI is making that a lot easier. A lot of the people building robots today are using the same AI tools I use to run our business. They're not smarter than us. They decided to start.

So the question isn't whether it's possible. The question is: do you want to do it?

It's not a tool. It's agentic.

People talk about AI like it's a better hammer. In our business it doesn't act like one. Our intake, quoting and follow-up now run on AI we built ourselves, and it doesn't wait for us to swing it. It takes the next step. That changes what a small crew can take on.

Working with your hands still counts

Here's the part the robot story usually skips. Every robot eventually has to leave the lab and go into a real space: a counter that's a different height, a floor that isn't level, an outlet in the wrong place, people working right next to it. Someone has to walk in, figure out what the job actually needs, fit the machine to that room, set it up safely and come back when it stops.

That's not software. That's a job site. It's what general contractors already do every day.

Bring the robots to the work

We don't want to keep doing the work the old way. We want to be the people who bring robots to the work. That means robots that are affordable and actually do the job, not showpieces, installed where they save someone real time.

Picture a neighborhood coffee shop with one owner behind the counter and a line out the door. They'll never hire a robotics engineer, and they shouldn't have to. What they need is what every small business owner already needs: someone local they trust, who shows up, gets it working and keeps it working.

Bring a brain, not just a sensor

A sensor can tell you a pipe is wet. It can't tell you why, or what to do about it. When we come back to service something, I want us to bring a brain, not just a sensor: someone, or something, that understands what it's looking at and what to do next.

Why we're starting now

I'd rather help build this than watch it happen. Very few local contractors are trying it yet. Even if we get parts of it wrong, we'll learn more by building than by watching.

What we're doing about it

We started DuetRight Labs to learn this from the inside. We're early: setting up the lab, and next we'll sit down with small-business owners to find out which tasks are actually worth handing to a machine. We'll share what we find in public, including what doesn't work.

The future gets built by people who show up.

Follow along: DuetRight Labs