My wife doesn’t use AI much. He is not philosophically opposed to it, and he is not waiting for machines to overthrow civilization. He just opens Google Photos because he wants to look at his photos.
Recently, however, the app continues to greet him with invitations to try out its AI tools. Google would much rather have him search his library through chat, create something new, or ask Gemini to edit a photo. He dismisses the information, moves on with his life, and eventually meets them again.
That little irritation made me check the apps on my phone. Apparently, almost all of them have come to the same conclusion. I just don’t need AI occasionally. I need it waiting inside every search bar, messaging app, music player, and document reader I already use.
My apps have all caught AI fever
Google Photos now includes Ask Photos, which uses Gemini to search your library, answer questions about it, and make edits with written instructions. Google says this feature is still experimental and may produce incorrect results. You can turn it off, though doing so requires digging into the Pictures settings, Preferences, and finally the Gemini features in Pictures.
The setting is there, better than nothing. However, someone who repeatedly declines an invitation has already expressed their preferences. The app simply translates “not now” as “please ask me again when I forget if I was upset.”
Meta took a broader approach. Its assistant now resides across WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook, and Messenger. One green circle was able to track users across four different apps, like a store assistant that appears in some way across all platforms.
Spotify has its own AI DJ, AI-generated playlists, and interactive music search. Adobe Reader puts an AI assistant alongside the humble PDF. Microsoft went ahead and renamed its Office hub as the Microsoft 365 Copilot app, probably because “Microsoft 365, Now With AI Whether You Asked It or Not” got negative reviews.
Microsoft allows desktop users to disable Copilot in Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Its documentation says that the same switch is not available in the iOS, Android, or web versions. Mobile users can change extensive privacy settings instead, which can affect other connected features in the process.
That’s less of a switch and a circuit breaker.
Some of these tools are really useful
I’m not pretending that all AI features are useless. Getting a specific picture by describing the partially remembered situations around it is helpful. Asking a 70-page PDF a specific question can save time. Conversational music searches can be successful when Spotify’s standard search bar sometimes behaves as if I gave it a riddle.
I also pay for ChatGPT and Claude. Obviously, my objection is not that artificial intelligence exists.
The difference is the intention. When I open an AI app, I choose AI interaction. When I open Photos, I want my photos. When I open WhatsApp, I want to send someone a message. When I open Spotify, I probably already know what I want to hear.
These apps worked before AI became its loudest new feature. Now, the assistant is increasingly being introduced as the natural center of the experience, while everything the app was originally designed to do is being pushed aside a bit.
The industry seems to fear that AI may become invisible. Every assistant needs a button, every button needs a colorful light, and each light has to occupy a piece of the screen where your thumb already goes.
A truly useful feature needs no further introduction. It quietly becomes part of your process because it solves the problem better than the old way. The current trend feels closer to software companies that are proving strongly that they, too, have an AI strategy.
“No” should survive the next update
These companies keep promising software that we understand. Google Photos can identify faces, places, objects, and partially remembered holidays from years ago. Spotify learns what we eat, when we play it, and what song we skip after 12 seconds. Meta has spent years building systems designed to predict what will keep us staring at the screen.
But remembering that someone has rejected an AI feature is obviously always beyond the limits of modern computing. Of course, we can find a way in their written way out, but why choose to log in as default?
Hidden information returns. The hidden button becomes more prominent. A quiet app update gives the assistant another chance to introduce itself. The software remembers everything except preferences that conflict with the company’s current strategy.
Maybe these apps already understand what “no” means. They just decided to remember that it would be bad to get engaged.
