New Mac app needs to report all the pieces you do—so you possibly can “rewind” it later

Yesterday, an organization referred to as Rewind AI introduced a self-titled software product for Macs with Apple Silicon that reportedly retains a extremely compressed, searchable report of all the pieces you do domestically in your Mac and allows you to “rewind” time to see it later. In the event you neglect one thing you’ve got “seen, stated, or heard,” Rewind needs that can assist you discover it simply.

Rewind AI claims its product shops all recording knowledge domestically in your machine and doesn’t require cloud integration. Amongst its guarantees, Rewind will reportedly allow you to rewind Zoom conferences and pull info from them in a searchable type.

In a video demo on Rewind.AI’s website, the app opens when a consumer presses Command+Shift+House. The search bar suggests typing “something you’ve got seen, stated, or heard.” It additionally exhibits a timeline on the backside of the display screen that represents earlier actions in apps.

After looking for “tps reviews,” the video depicts a grid view of each time Rewind has encountered the phrase “tps reviews” as audio or textual content in any app, together with Zoom chats, textual content messages, emails, Slack conversations, and Phrase paperwork. It describes filtering the outcomes by app—and the flexibility to repeat and paste from these previous situations if essential.

Based by Dan Siroker and Brett Bejcek, Rewind AI consists of a small distant crew positioned in varied cities across the US. Parts of the corporate beforehand created Scribe, a precursor to Rewind that received some press attention in 2021. In an introductory blog post, Rewind AI co-founder Dan Siroker writes, “What if we may use know-how to enhance our reminiscence the identical means a listening to assist can increase our listening to?”

How does it work?

Rewind AI offers few particulars concerning the app’s back-end know-how however describes “mind-boggling compression” that may reportedly compress recording knowledge as much as 3,750 instances “with out a main lack of high quality,” giving an instance of 10.5GB of knowledge squeezed down to only 2.8MB. Rewind says that even on a small laborious drive, “you possibly can retailer years of recordings”—a heady declare, to make certain.

The Rewind website additionally describes utilizing OCR to seize textual content content material and automatic speech recognition to robotically transcribe something you’ve got stated or heard, together with in conferences, in order that “you by no means have to fret about dropping this content material once more.”

(If Rewind converts all the pieces it sees and hears into plain textual content, that may clarify the large compression ratio. The demo didn’t present any reside video or audio recording playback, for instance, simply static screenshots with highlighted textual content. We have now requested Rewind AI to make clear this level and can replace the article if we obtain a response.)

Rewind AI additionally says that Apple Silicon Macs with M1 and M2 chips are key to creating the product work in a “just about imperceptible” means, using “just about each a part of the System on a Chip.”

Potential privateness points

Whereas laying out the imaginative and prescient for Rewind AI within the weblog publish talked about above, Siroker writes, “Our imaginative and prescient is to offer people good reminiscence.” However commenters on Twitter and YouTube have already begun stating situations the place “good reminiscence” may backfire.

For instance, Rewind would possibly expose its customers to potential abuse from overbearing companions, bosses, law enforcement, or repressive governments; legal issues from recording delicate info; and consent issues round recording different folks in conferences.

Rewind addresses a few of these issues on its website, saying, “We retailer the entire recordings domestically in your Mac. Solely you have got entry to them.” Their demo website also says that you’ll pause or delete recordings at any time, and you may robotically exclude sure apps out of your recorded historical past, together with personal looking modes in browsers.

So far as acquiring permission to report a gathering with different contributors, Rewind offers its personal assist web page titled “Everything you need to know about consent” that features recommendation resembling “Earlier than you report somebody, it is best to at all times ask for his or her consent.” The web page recommends telling folks the assembly will probably be recorded—maybe forward of time—and that customers comply with all native legal guidelines associated to recording conversations.

Privateness and moral issues apart, Andreessen Horowitz is taking the know-how significantly sufficient to steer a $10 million spherical of funding at a valuation of $75 million. The enterprise capital agency wrote about its reasons for investing in Rewind, posing the product as a treatment for info overload.

At present, the Rewind product will not be publicly out there, however anybody can request “Early Entry” on the Rewind web site. We reached out to Rewind and requested for an opportunity to attempt the software program.