How this site uses AI
What AI does here, what it never does, whose model runs, and what leaves the site.
- The site runs no AI model of its own and pays for none.
- It never receives or stores your AI keys.
- Search, proofreading and checks are ordinary code.
- You can bring your own assistant to the site, and your assistant's company runs it.
- Every post is reviewed by me, and a post the writer helped with says so.
What runs with no AI at all
Proofreading in the Workshop, its spelling and house-style checks, its checks on figure descriptions and its tag suggestions are rules and ordinary code. They run on the site, and nothing you type into them leaves it.
Search and related posts
Search ranks posts by the words in their titles, tags, summaries, series and categories. That part is ordinary code.
Related posts are worked out ahead of time, when I build the site, by a small open model that reads only the posts. It never sees anything you type.
Your assistant and the site's connector
You can add this site to Claude, ChatGPT or another assistant as a connector. Your assistant then searches the blog and reads post summaries through the site. Your assistant's company runs the model, under your agreement with them. The site sees only the requests your assistant sends it. The details are in Connected AI and the MCP server.
The site also publishes /llms.txt, a plain map of its public pages for assistants.
When you connect your own AI
If you are signed in, you can connect an OpenRouter account or your own key from Anthropic, OpenAI or Google on /ai/connect. The key stays in your browser, encrypted in that tab, and lasts only as long as the tab. Calls go straight from your browser to the provider you chose, and the site never receives the key. The page where you connect it may talk only to the site and those four companies.
The details for authors are in AI for authors.
Writing with AI help
In the Workshop I can ask a writer for help with a draft, through my own AI connection. Invited authors can too, through theirs. The draft goes from the browser to the provider chosen on /ai/connect, never to a model of the site's. Every suggestion arrives marked, and nothing changes until it is kept. When one is kept, the post records which of the writer's tools helped.
The details for authors are in AI for authors.
Posts, figures and descriptions
I review every post before it goes live, and I am responsible for what it says. A post a writer helped with says so under its title. The description read out for each post's hero image comes from the image's own caption and labels, by rules, not by a model.
Some earlier posts, and some of their hero images, had AI help. They carry no label of their own, so this line is theirs.
Every feature, in one table
| Feature | Uses AI? | Whose model | What leaves the site | Kept by the site |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Search | no | — | nothing | nothing |
| Related posts | when I build the site | a small open model | nothing | the list of related posts |
| Proofreading, house style, tags, figure checks | no | — | nothing | nothing |
| Ask this post | no | — | nothing | nothing, but your question is in the page's address, so your browser's history, a link you share and access logs along the way may keep it |
| The site in your assistant | yours | your assistant's company | the site's public content, to your assistant | a salted hash of your address for one minute, and the tools called for 30 days |
| Your own key, on /ai/connect | yours | the provider you chose | what you send, from your browser | nothing, the key stays in your browser |
| The Workshop's writer | the writer's own | the provider chosen on /ai/connect | the draft, from the browser | which tools helped, once a suggestion is kept |
| Hero image descriptions | no | — | nothing | the description, once I keep it |
What your browser is allowed to run
Every page on the site carries a security policy that lets your browser run only the site's own scripts. Only the page where you connect your own AI may talk to an AI company.
Changes
This page changes when the site's AI features do. Each version is dated, and earlier versions stay readable at their own address. Questions to kumarchandrachooda@gmail.com.