At a recent startup demo day, I scanned the Zoom participant list—there were 50 attendees. Only 10 were actual people. The rest? AI bots. It’s not just me, this seems to be a new phenomenon.
It wasn’t a glitch. Every investor had brought their own AI notetaker: Otter, Fathom, Fireflies, tl;dv—you name it. Some meetings had three or four bots at once, each silently transcribing, summarising, and surfacing highlights. The future of meetings had arrived and it was oddly crowded.
This shift isn’t just anecdotal. AI notetakers have quietly but rapidly become fixtures in our daily work lives. Their rise brings with it undeniable productivity benefits—but also a fresh set of questions around privacy, consent, etiquette, and what it even means to show up.
The Booming Market for AI Meeting Assistants
What was once a niche software category has exploded into a multi-billion-dollar industry.
- The global note-taking app market is projected to reach $11.11 billion by the end of 2025, up from $9.54 billion in 2024—a healthy 16.5% CAGR.
- The AI-specific note-taking market is growing even faster, expected to surge from $450.7 million in 2023 to $2.55 billion by 2033 at a CAGR of 18.9%. There are vertical applications for lawyers, doctors, etc.
- North America leads the market, accounting for 38% of global revenue in 2023 (~$171 million).
- Students and educators are early adopters—over 40% of users are students, and the education sector commands more than 30% of the total market.
- Cloud-based deployment is king, with 65% of users opting for this approach, and software alone accounts for over 60% of market share.
But beyond the stats is a deeper shift in how we work—and how we feel about work.
The Allure of AI Notetakers: Superpowers for Meetings
It’s easy to understand the appeal. At a meeting with one of my portfolio companies, a founder asked if we could switch to Google Hangouts. I was giving him feedback on a deck, and he didn’t want to worry about manually taking notes.
Today’s tools offer far more than simple transcription:
- Transcribe and Summarise: Tools like Otter.ai and Fireflies.ai capture every word, identify speakers, and distill key points, often within minutes.
- Organize and Analyze: Avoma (like Gong) offers conversation analytics—tracking filler words, monologue length, and even competitor mentions. Fireflies lets you organise meetings by topic or team.
- Skip and Skim: Some employees are now sending AI bots to attend meetings on their behalf, skimming transcripts later instead of sitting through the actual conversation.
- AI Chat and Search: Ask Otter what decisions were made. Have tl;dv generate a highlight reel. Let Fathom turn your calls into action items automatically.
The pitch is simple: never miss a detail, never take notes again, and maybe—just maybe—stop attending so many meetings altogether.
The Pushback: Privacy, Consent, and Human Discomfort
But the quiet infiltration of AI into our meetings hasn’t gone unnoticed—and it’s not without controversy. In most cases, the AI note taker arrives to the meeting before the human, creating an awkward situation. In other cases, people are recording conversations without asking for permission. I always tell founders that while I don’t mind if they record the conversation, my preference would be not to.
Who gave the bot permission?
- Many AI notetakers act like passive observers, but they’re essentially recording the meeting. And depending on the tool, they might do so without clearly identifying themselves or obtaining full consent.
- In one case, an AI bot recorded a sensitive internal strategy call and emailed the transcript to everyone—including an external client.
- In another, an employee was horrified to see a transcript of a supposedly private meeting flashed on screen at an all-hands.
Not all users understand that AI-generated notes may be used to train future models—sometimes by startups they’ve never heard of. This creates legal and ethical landmines, especially under wiretapping and data privacy laws. And some tools can record audio directly from a user’s device, even if they don’t join the meeting as a visible participant.
Human behavior shifts under surveillance
- People tend to self-censor when they know they’re being recorded. “Dumb questions” go unasked. Jokes land flat. Honesty is replaced with caution.
- AI can’t understand nuance, tone, or subtext. A sarcastic remark might get logged as an action item.
- And what happens when there are more bots than people in the room? One founder put it bluntly: “I don’t want to talk to a bunch of note takers. I want to talk to people.”
Some companies are setting policies. Others leave it to individuals. But the social friction is real. As Carl Sagun, co-founder of Synaptico, said:
“Relationships don’t get built through transcripts. Deals don’t get done by bots. Trust doesn’t grow when you’re not in the room.”
A New Normal—or Just a Phase?
AI notetakers aren’t going away. In fact, they’ll likely become even more powerful—adding video analysis, facial recognition, and deeper integrations with work tools.
And like email and Slack before them, they’re reshaping how we meet, collaborate, and make decisions. Whether they make meetings more effective or more performative is still up for debate.
Ultimately, while AI notetakers offer undeniable benefits in terms of efficiency and information management, they raise critical questions about privacy, trust, and the fundamental nature of human interaction in the workplace
But one thing’s clear: the way we work is changing—not just in productivity, but in presence.
He is a former General Partner at Google Ventures (GV) in Europe, former head of Google for Entrepreneurs in Europe, and founding head of Campus London, Google's first startup hub. Eze writes on Israeli tech, venture capital, artificial intelligence, and founder strategy.
He is also the founder of Techbikers, a nonprofit that brings together the startup ecosystem on cycling challenges in support of Room to Read.
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