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Local computer work and laptop-closed AI are different products
It is tempting to describe every computer-using agent as the same capability. Where it runs determines what it can reach, what survives a disconnect, who holds credentials, how cost accumulates, and what evidence recovery requires.
Local work uses the person’s machine, files, applications, and network state.
General laptop-closed Ava execution is Direction—not current behavior—and requires durable jobs, isolated workspaces, governed credentials, cost limits, monitoring, retries, and unknown-outcome recovery.
The Owner keeps the mission, necessary authority, consequential calls, and a durable home for every result and its evidence.
Local execution inherits the person’s environment
A local agent can work with checked-out repositories, installed tools, authenticated applications, and files that may never belong in a cloud environment. The person can often see and interrupt the work directly.
The work stops when the machine sleeps, the network changes, an application closes, or the local session loses access.
Direction
Cloud execution needs its own operating system
Laptop-closed execution needs durable jobs, isolated workspaces, credential custody, cost limits, monitoring, retries, idempotency, and an explicit way to resolve unknown outcomes. It cannot be a hidden remote browser attached to a chat message.
The result and evidence still need a durable home in the Owner’s mission.
Available today
Available today: product state survives, external work does not run broadly
Current signed-in Superboard stores canonical Boards in cloud storage and protects local edits with an offline-safe cache. The Board can be reopened from another supported session after synchronization.
Ava does not currently run arbitrary customer workflows after the laptop closes.
What remains with the Owner
The Owner retains the mission, the authority needed for local or cloud access, and every consequential decision. Whether work runs nearby or remotely, the Owner’s Superboard mission remains the durable home for the accepted result and its evidence; execution location does not transfer accountability.
Choose by job, not by spectacle
Use local execution when the work depends on the person’s environment or benefits from direct observation. Use cloud execution when continuation, isolation, or remote capacity is the job and the necessary authority is available. A mature product may use both without pretending their risk models are identical.