Switch from Paperclip to Task Machine

Paperclip is a free, open-source control plane for teams of AI agents — org charts, roles, goals, heartbeats, governance, budgets, audit logs — self-hosted from a single npx command. Task Machine is a hosted operating layer for business outcomes. If Paperclip is the autonomous-company abstraction to explore, Task Machine is the machine that ships the outreach, the content, the client report.

Why do people switch from Paperclip?

• The abstraction stops being the point. Paperclip's draw is the company simulator itself — org charts, roles, heartbeats. At some point you want the work, not the model of the work. Task Machine is narrower on purpose: recurring business operations run as deterministic, verifiable workflows by a team of humans and agents, not an org chart.
• Self-hosting is a second job. You install, upgrade, and babysit the stack yourself. Task Machine is hosted, while agents still run on machines you connect — and hosted doesn't mean custodied: you keep 100% of your revenue, Task Machine takes no cut and never custodies your accounts.
• Governance config vs one inbox. Paperclip ships governance, approvals, and audit logs as capabilities you wire up. Task Machine makes them the daily surface: approval, question, and verifier steps land in one inbox, inside the three-surface workflow (chat, inbox, tasks).
• A blank control plane vs a stocked catalog. Paperclip hands you primitives and lets you assemble the company. Task Machine's playbook catalog — 123 playbooks across 17 categories — installs the agents, workflows, and documents for a concrete job in a few clicks.

What maps to what?

What do you give up?

Honesty first: Paperclip is free, open source, and self-hosted, with a huge community around it. You can read every line, modify anything, run it forever without a subscription, and keep the whole stack on hardware you control. Task Machine is a hosted product in private beta. If you enjoy the company abstraction for its own sake, or open source and full-stack ownership are the requirement, Paperclip is genuinely the better fit.

How does the switch work?

1. Join the Task Machine waitlist and connect a workspace to the accounts you own — email, Stripe, repos — through connectors.
2. Translate your org chart into jobs: for each role your Paperclip agents held, pick the playbook that does that work (outreach, content, reporting, support) — each installs the agents, workflows, and documents for it.
3. Connect a worker on a machine you control — the same machine that ran your Paperclip stack works.
4. Set autonomy levels low to start, recreate your heartbeats as scheduled recurring workflows, and set token and money budgets with 80% and 100% alerts.

Common questions

Is Task Machine open source like Paperclip?

No. Task Machine is a hosted product. What you keep is ownership where it counts operationally: agents act through accounts you own, on workers you connect, with step-level run history you can inspect.

Do I lose the org-chart structure?

You trade it for teams and workflows. Agents still have roles and responsibilities, but control flows through deterministic, verifiable workflows — approval, question, and verifier steps — rather than reporting lines and heartbeats.

Why pay for something Paperclip does for free?

If Paperclip's shape fits you, don't. People switch when the maintenance and assembly stop being fun: Task Machine trades that time for a hosted system, one inbox, and a playbook catalog that starts real business work the same day.