Who Do You Trust to Help Run Your Life?
Published
|
Written by
Nat Robinson
Trustworthy's Family Operating System® automatically organizes your most important information and turns it into answers, guidance, and action.
Something interesting is happening to AI.
For the first few years of the generative AI boom, much of the competition was about intelligence.
Whose model could reason better? Write better? Code better? Score higher on benchmarks? Know more about the world?
That race isn't over.
But another one has begun.
In January, OpenAI introduced ChatGPT Health, a dedicated experience designed to bring your health information and ChatGPT together. Eligible users can connect medical records and Apple Health so answers can be grounded in their own information.
The reason is pretty clear: people were already asking for it. OpenAI says more than 230 million people globally ask health and wellness questions on ChatGPT every week.
A few months later, OpenAI launched a personal finance experience. Users can connect supported financial accounts and ask questions grounded in their spending, bills, subscriptions, net worth and investments.
Google has gone even further in naming what is happening.
It calls it Personal Intelligence.
Gemini can connect to services including Gmail, Google Photos, Search and YouTube and reason across them to provide answers based not only on what it knows about the world, but what it knows about you.
Google is now expanding that idea across Search, Gemini and Chrome, with Calendar integration coming as well.
Apple is moving toward the same destination from a different direction, building personal context into Siri and Apple Intelligence while emphasizing on-device processing and its Private Cloud Compute architecture.
These aren't unrelated product announcements.
They're signals.
The first generation of AI became remarkably good at understanding the world.
The next generation needs to understand your world.
Intelligence Is Only Half the Equation
Imagine asking the most capable AI in the world:
Do I have enough life insurance?
It can explain how life insurance works beautifully.
But it can't really answer your question unless it knows something about you.
Your income.
Your mortgage.
Your savings.
Your existing coverage.
Your spouse or partner, if you have one.
Your children or dependents.
Your plans.
Or ask:
What should I do before my trip to Italy next month?
Now the AI might need your calendar, airline reservations, hotel confirmations, passport, travel insurance, credit cards and healthcare information.
If other people are traveling with you, it may need some of their information too.
Or:
What happens if I die tomorrow?
That's an everything question.
Estate documents. Beneficiaries. Insurance policies. Property. Financial accounts. Debts. Passwords. Emergency contacts. Instructions. People who depend on you.
These aren't difficult questions because AI lacks intelligence.
They're difficult because it lacks context.
And that creates a powerful dynamic.
The more an AI understands about your life, the more useful it can become.
We've Been Imagining This Assistant For 60 Years
None of this is a particularly new dream.
We've been imagining some version of the perfect digital assistant for generations.
The computer on Star Trek could answer almost anything.
Rosie from The Jetsons helped run the household.
HAL 9000 understood virtually everything happening aboard Discovery One—although perhaps not the best advertisement for giving an AI too much control.
KITT from Knight Rider knew the car, the environment and Michael Knight well enough to become a partner.
JARVIS didn't just answer Tony Stark's questions. He understood his systems, surroundings and what Tony was trying to accomplish—and could act on his behalf.
Samantha in Her went further still. She understood Theodore's communications, relationships, emotions and daily life.
And Black Mirror has spent an uncomfortable amount of time exploring what happens when technology knows us a little too well.
Then the fictional assistants started becoming real.
Siri.
Alexa.
Google Assistant.
At first they could set a timer, play a song or tell us the weather.
Today's AI can reason, see, hear, remember, search, write, plan and increasingly act.
The assistant we've been imagining for 60 years suddenly doesn't feel very far away.
But there's something almost all of those fictional worlds took for granted:
The assistant already knew everything it needed to know.
Rosie knew the household.
JARVIS knew Tony's world.
Samantha knew Theodore.
Nobody spent much screen time watching Tony Stark upload his insurance policy or explain to JARVIS which bank account belonged to whom.
That's the missing ingredient we're confronting now.
Intelligence isn't enough. The assistant needs context.
So How Much Information Does It Take to Understand a Life?
Potentially, a lot.
Consider just a few indicators of the information surrounding a modern American life:
The average person may have 100–150 online accounts associated with their email.
The average U.S. consumer actively uses 3.7 credit cards.
99% of U.S. families hold at least one financial asset, a category that can include bank accounts, retirement accounts, investments and life insurance.
The average subscribing household pays for four streaming video services—and those are only one type of recurring subscription.
Americans average roughly three physician-office visits per person per year, before considering prescriptions, labs, dental care, health insurance and other medical information.
And this is before we get to mortgages, property, taxes, vehicles, estate plans, identity documents, utilities, travel, purchases, warranties, education, photos, messages, contacts or years of email.
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