Flowrite is a new AI tool that promises to turn simple instructions into a fully-fledged email. The software can be used as a web app or browser extension, and it’s one of a growing number of AI tools for everyday users. “AI can take the drudgery out of many tasks so humans can focus on more strategic objectives,” Sam Zheng, CEO of AI software company DeepHow, told Lifewire in an email interview.
Helping (AI) Hands
Flowrite aims to power the most common web writing uses with a product based on OpenAI’s language model, GPT-3. Unlike Grammarly, which helps improve existing writing, Flowrite works by aiding you in creating messages. You give Flowrite bullet points about what you want to say, and the AI-powered tool creates a full email. While the productivity market has been growing rapidly, “existing writing tools tend to focus on only small parts of the whole experience like spelling and sentence completions,” Flowrite CEO Aaro Isosaari said in a news release. “Flowrite enables an unforeseen shift in how short-form content is produced, allowing users to convert words into ready-to-send texts without having to think about structure, articulation, and grammar.”
The AI Advantage
Flowrite is far from the only AI-powered product on the market that’s aimed at helping you get common tasks done. Sam Davis, the owner of Sticker Crypt, said in an email interview that they’ve been experimenting with a few AI software writing tools, though they prefer using the writing tool Jarvis. “They can really help me out in weak spots, like writing email copy or advertisement copy. The shorter the task, the more on-point AI writing will be,” Davis said. “Something about the way they work with the API, in general, produces better responses than other AI writers I’ve tried, like Ink or sample tools.” For creative writers, Story Prism helps users plan their stories. It allows a writer to go from a vague idea to a workable concept and uses AI to help brainstorm ideas for their story, sort of like having a virtual co-writer to bounce ideas off. “Some tasks such as writing emails, creating calendar events, research, etc., can be very tedious and time-consuming,” Jon Firman, co-founder of Story Prism, told Lifewire in an email. “AI can assist in these tasks and in some cases automate completely, which helps free up people’s mental bandwidth, allowing them to focus on more high-level tasks.” Other AI software can help automate video tasks. DeepHow, for example, has developed an AI model that can review a video of someone doing something that requires technical skills (like a manufacturing technician setting up a machine lathe) and turn the raw material into a training video. “This eliminates all the complexity of video editing and delivers a ready-to-use training video with subtitles in several languages,” Zheng said. “It’s a huge timesaver for any company that depends heavily on training and development of skilled trades workers.” Another handy tool is Clockwise, an AI-powered calendar assistant. While you can manually schedule breaks between meetings, you can also have Clockwise do it for you. For any given team, Clockwise’s AI will model up to a million different permutations of team members’ calendars to see what works best for the whole team. For example, Clockwise has a setting called Smart Meeting Breaks that, when enabled, can optimize your calendar to fight Zoom fatigue. So if you have three hours of back-to-back meetings, Clockwise will try to fit in a 15-minute break. “This is something no human would be able to accomplish in the amount of time an AI-powered tool could,” Charles Martucci, head of design at Clockwise, told Lifewire in an email interview. AI is growing more powerful and is likely to become ever more embedded in our daily lives. Look forward to AI helping you with everything from writing tasks to understanding your speech when talking to smart assistants.
