After seven months with GetSeed,

I started leaving my recordings for AI.

Yesterday, when I visited my parents, I took back the Dedao Brain GetSeed recording card I had bought for Mom a few months earlier. I now had my own two-card setup.

I had asked her several times how she was getting on with it. Occasionally she said she had just used it. But when I looked at the records in Dedao Brain, several days were blank, which more or less told me how much it was actually being used.

I said that several livestreams I wanted to watch had recently been overlapping, so I needed another device to record them. Mom did not react much. She simply said I should take it and use it.

I had bought the card for her in the first place. After using mine for a few months and finding it useful, I hoped she could gradually build records of her own. As she gets older, she may no longer remember everything she has just heard by the time she gets home. Changes in her health, things to do, and a doctor’s instructions could all be recorded as they came up. Of course, when recording a medical consultation, remember to obtain the other person’s agreement first.

But Mom has no ordinary habit of recording her life. She copies down some accounts and numbers by hand, but almost never writes about what she has seen, thought, or felt that day. She rarely opens Dedao Brain on her phone either, so the recording card was naturally unlikely to get much use with her.

There is no forcing this. Whichever AI question-and-answer tool feels more direct and convenient to her is her actual experience. I do not need to insist on persuading her.

Tools are ultimately for people. If a person finds one troublesome, all its features mean little.

I happen to be the opposite of her.

PART 01

The recording card gave me a reason to speak every day

Last December, my friend and teacher Tian Xiaozhuang recommended Dedao Brain, which was still called Get Notes then. I began using it as an online knowledge base. Watching a livestream early this year, I learned that they would release the GetSeed AI recording card. I missed the early-bird price. As I remember it, I was about half a month late and paid over a hundred yuan more. I was quite annoyed.

Once the card arrived, though, that annoyance was soon outweighed by how often I used it.

I am a freelancer. I paint, take photographs, and write, and most of my work requires no talking. In my earlier teaching years, I could speak for seven or eight hours a day. Now my voice easily becomes hoarse after an uninterrupted hour. After long periods without speaking, verbal expression really does become rusty.

The recording card gave me a reason to open my mouth every day.

What I ate, what I have just finished, a topic that occurred to me on the road, or a different view that arose while watching a livestream: I say a few words about them as I go. Flip a switch or hold the quick-note button, speak, and finish. Half a minute is fine. A minute is fine too. There is no recording ritual, and no need to unlock my phone, find an app, then enter a particular feature.

That matters a lot to me. I had recording devices before, but after recording I copied the audio to a hard drive, where it took up space and was rarely opened again. Back then, I mainly recorded things to keep and listen to myself. I had never quite become comfortable with my own voice, so the whole thing naturally petered out.

Now, in an AI context, the recordings are mainly there for AI to read. I almost never think of opening them to listen. What I need is the useful information they contain.

Text card one

The sound quality only needs to be good enough for transcription. Dedao Brain turns speech into text, then organizes summaries, views, and to-dos. While watching a livestream, I record the content and speak my own judgments along the way. By the end, other people’s views and my reactions are already together, ready to be developed into an article or a topic.

It has also changed how I record a day. Dedao Brain has a time-recording feature named after Lyubishchev. I say a sentence after finishing something, and the system organizes a timeline of the day by work, life, learning, and so on.

Sometimes a day passes and all I know is that I was busy, without being able to say what I actually did. The timeline leaves at least a record. If I record nothing all day, it will be blank too.

AI cannot live my life for me, still less press the record button for me.

PART 02

Let AI hold the tangled cord in my head

This habit also took practice at the start. Say a sentence after a meal, after finishing a painting, or whenever a thought appears. Each entry alone seems trivial. After a month’s accumulation, AI has a chance to help me look back: which ideas have never led to action, which matters keep recurring, and which inspirations could become writing.

My thinking tends to branch out. I often think of one thing and forget another. Previously, if an idea had not been acted on, I kept holding it in mind for fear of forgetting. When enough accumulated, my head felt stuffed with a tangled length of cord.

Now I speak it aloud first. The record exists, so I can move on to the next thing with less worry. Back in the studio, I ask AI which recent ideas have not yet become articles and which things should come first. It does not always get the order completely right, but at least remembering every thought no longer depends entirely on me.

PART 03

The card is only an entry point; context is what matters

After six or seven months, my judgment of the card changed too. The card itself provides a sufficiently simple way in. The transcription, organization, search, and use of context behind it determine whether those records ultimately become useful.

The software keeps being updated. The same card has not changed much, but its ability to organize recordings and draw on old records is more complete than when I bought it. Recently, I used Codex to connect online Dedao Brain with my local Obsidian, so recorded fragments could continue becoming topics, articles, and project materials.

Of course, it will not suit everyone. If someone rarely uses AI and has no need to record things, buying it will probably just add another object to charge. Mom’s card is a ready example.

Hardware does not automatically build context for people. Someone still has to be willing to speak, and to explain their life little by little.

PART 04

Try one minute first, then decide whether to buy a card

If you want to try this, you do not need to buy a recording card at the outset. Dedao Brain’s current free version also lets you try voice recording. Specific durations and allowances may change, so refer to what the page shows.

Find a moment when typing is inconvenient and speak to your phone for a minute. Describe three things you did today, or an idea you still have not acted on. Once it becomes text, see whether AI has preserved your meaning and whether the record could later become a to-do, a topic, or an article.

After trying a few times, you will probably know whether you need a card you can press without thinking, or whether your phone’s recording function is enough.

Text card two

I did not feel particularly guilty about taking the card back from Mom. If she really wants to use it later, I will give it back. For now, staying with me, it will help record several overlapping livestreams and keep catching thoughts that appear at any time and disappear if I am not careful.

Today, as AI can generate more and more content, I find myself caring more about whose material is being put into it.

The words I say each day, the things I do, and the judgments that briefly occur to me all look small. Only as they accumulate does AI have a chance to write something carrying my experience and choices.

The recording card is only the entry point.

The person willing to speak is what matters.

If you also use voice recordings, you can leave a comment about what you most want AI to remember for you.

This article records my personal experience with a product I bought myself. There is no commercial partnership. Product features and free allowances may change; refer to the official page for current details.