$27/month. Runs 24/7. Here's the honest take.
I'm Mert Köseoğlu, Senior Software Engineer turned consultant. Build AI systems for clients. Saw Clawdbot blowing up on Twitter. Had to try it.
Two weeks later, still using it. Not for everything people claim. But for enough.
What Is This Thing
Open-source AI agent. Lives on a server. Talks to you via Telegram or WhatsApp.
Key difference from ChatGPT: doesn't just chat. Does stuff.
- Researches companies while you commute.
- Monitors prices while you sleep.
- Reminds you about that thing you keep forgetting.
Sounds too good? Partly is. Let me break it down.
What Stuck
Morning briefs. Wake up, open Telegram, digest is there. What needs attention today. Took me a week to trust it. Now I rely on it.
Research on demand. Voice note while walking: "what does [company] do, 3 bullets." By the time I park, it's done. This one's legit useful.
Reminders that actually remind. Set something for Tuesday. Tuesday comes, ping arrives. Simple but I kept forgetting stuff before.
Background monitoring. Competitor pricing. Job postings. News mentions. Only alerts when something changes. No noise.
What Didn't
Email access. Everyone's connecting Gmail. I'm not. Don't want an agent with full inbox control. Maybe later. Not yet.
Content factories. "Write me 200 articles overnight." Cool demo. But Claude Code does this too. Same prompt, same output.
Calendar shuffling. Tried it. Honestly faster to drag things around myself.
The $27 Setup
People buying Mac Minis for this. Why? A $7 VPS does the same job.
- Claude Pro: $20/month
- Cheap VPS: $7/month
- Done.
No hardware. No electricity. No fan noise. Runs from a datacenter somewhere.
30 Minute Setup
Looks technical. It's not. Here's the actual timeline.
0:00 - Server
AWS free tier. Create account if you don't have one. Launch EC2 instance, pick Ubuntu, click connect. You're in a terminal. Scary looking, does nothing scary.
0:05 - Install
One line:
curl -fsSL https://clawd.bot/install.sh | bashWait. That's it. Everything else is a wizard.
0:07 - Configure
Wizard pops up. Pick Anthropic. Pick Opus 4.5. Pick Telegram. Click through.
0:15 - Telegram Bot
Open Telegram. Find @botfather. Type /newbot. Name it whatever. Copy the token it gives you. Paste into wizard.
Find @useridbot. Copy your ID. Paste that too. Now only you can talk to your bot.
0:22 - Identity
Clawdbot messages you. Asks your name. Asks what to call itself. Asks your timezone. Answer.
0:25 - Done
Bot responds. It's alive.
Stuck somewhere? Screenshot it. Paste to ChatGPT. "I'm here, what now?" Works every time. Did it twice myself.
How I Actually Use It
Voice notes mostly. Walking somewhere, remember something, send voice. Clawdbot handles it.
Morning: check digest, see what's flagged.
During day: quick research asks, reminder setting, monitoring checks.
Don't use it for writing. Don't use it for deep work. Use it for the stuff that slips through cracks.
Try These First
Before trusting it with real work:
- Ask about a company you know. See if the brief is accurate.
- Set a reminder for tomorrow morning. See if it actually pings.
- Give it a URL, ask it to extract something specific. Check if it got it right.
Build trust first. Expand later.
Verdict
Not the AI revolution Twitter claims. Also not useless hype.
Good for: background tasks, reminders, research, monitoring.
Not for: anything needing real judgment, full context, or high stakes.
$27/month worth it? For me, yes. Morning digest alone saves time. Research saves more.
Think of it as a junior assistant. Clear tasks. Limited scope. Gets better as you feed it context.
Mert Köseoğlu, Senior Software Engineer, AI consultant. x.com/mksglu · linkedin.com/in/mksglu · mksg.lu