Celebrity media figure Qin Shuo's first AI plug-in is actually this card!

Although I'm reasonably capable when it comes to organizing and editing content, I often fumble with technical tools. Even a simple tape recorder—with just a few buttons for recording, stopping, fast-forwarding, rewinding, and playing—I frequently operate incorrectly.

The most embarrassing incident happened in 1993, when I co-interviewed Li Ziliu, then mayor of Guangzhou, on behalf of Nanfengchuang. A Xinhua News Agency reporter led the questioning, while I was responsible for audio recording and note-taking. I must have pressed the wrong button; after a while, I noticed the cassette tape had popped out. Fortunately, the mayor didn't notice. I quickly stuffed the device into my pocket and hit stop.

After the interview, upon replaying the tape, I discovered most of the conversation hadn’t been recorded. I had to ask a TV reporter for help, lying that I needed to verify the version, just to reconstruct the missing parts. This incident left me with lasting psychological scars.

Ever since then, whether using tape recorders, voice recorders, smartpens, or smartphones, I can't help constantly checking the recording status. For important interviews, I even use two phones simultaneously to record—only then do I feel at ease.

It wasn’t until one day, while flipping through my daughter’s university textbook, that I came across Donald Norman’s The Design of Everyday Things, and finally found peace. The book points out that when products malfunction, people tend to blame themselves, but the real problem often lies in poor design. "User errors should not be blamed on users, but rather attributed to product and design flaws."

So it wasn’t my fault after all!

Even though this realization eased my mind, in reality, truly user-centered recording devices—ones with good visibility and intuitiveness—remain hard to find. Especially today, when many interviews are conducted in English and the era of self-media demands rapid transcription and publishing, the pressure persists.

My AI Sidekick: First Experience with DingTalk A1 Voice Recorder

Not until recently, when I attended CES (Consumer Electronics Show) and tried the DingTalk AI Voice Recorder (DingTalk A1), did I finally overcome my recording anxiety. It attaches to the back of a smartphone and supports intelligent voice-to-text conversion, content summarization, real-time translation in eight languages, and simultaneous interpretation in over 20 languages. Even in noisy environments like a bustling marketplace, it captures clearly, transcribes accurately, translates precisely, and summarizes effectively—becoming my first true "AI sidekick."

From the heavy analog tape machines of the past to today’s mere 40-gram AI recorder; from manual note-taking to automatic transcription, extraction, and meeting summary generation—this evolution clearly reflects my personal journey through the eras of informatization, digitization, and now, intelligent augmentation.

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