Pith

A private place to think out loud before the thought disappears.

Pith is an on-device iOS experience that turns raw voice into structured insight without sending a personal journal, a meeting, or a private conversation to the cloud.

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The reason Pith exists

Most thinking tools ask people to become organized before they are allowed to be honest.

Voice notes are fast, intimate, and almost frictionless, but they often become an unsearchable pile of audio. Cloud transcription solves retrieval, but asks people to trade away context that may be deeply personal.

Pith reframes the problem: record without performance, then return a useful shape. The product had to feel as private as a journal while being more helpful than a transcript.

The thinking behind it

The product began with a few practical questions, not a predefined feature list.

I used the tensions in voice notes to decide what Pith should and should not do.

Thoughts usually arrive before structure.

I chose to

Start with voice, not a form.

Pith can receive a thought before asking someone to name, sort, or edit it.

Privacy needs to be felt, not just promised.

I chose to

Make local-first behavior visible in the product.

On-device language and airplane-mode use make the boundary clear without turning it into a settings page.

Recall should not feel like searching an archive.

I chose to

Let a person ask about a session in context.

The product can return to a thought through conversation instead of forcing someone to replay or scan every note.

Three ways to return to a thought

The same recording action can mean very different things.

Journal

For a walk, a late-night thought, or a feeling that needs space before it needs a label. Pith finds the thread and returns a warm, structured summary with a Core Vision.

Briefing

For meetings, lectures, and consultations where recall matters. Pith organizes a longer session into chapters, anchor facts, and takeaways that are easy to return to.

Conversation

For a shared discussion. Pith distinguishes voices and maps the exchange into a navigable record of interests, ideas, and decisions.

A closer look at two ways the product is used.Journal and Briefing

Designed around trust

“True clarity should not cost you your privacy.”

That sentence became a product test. If a state, interaction, or piece of language made the experience feel like surveillance, it did not belong in Pith. Privacy had to be designed into the rhythm of the product, not appended as a policy.

Ask Pith lets you continue a thought without digging back through a pile of voice notes.

Ask Pith answering questions from a private note

Works in airplane mode

Record anywhere, even when a connection is not part of the moment.

No cloud uploads

Personal context stays on the device instead of becoming another account to manage.

Context stays close

Ask about a session without having to explain the thought all over again.

From product idea to iOS app

The work moved between product design and development without losing its point of view.

Experience framing, interaction flows, and the visual system.

A connected recording-to-recall journey, rather than isolated screens.

Design decisions translated into a coherent, native product experience.

The live product

Let your thoughts breathe.

Explore Pith, an offline voice-to-insight companion built for the thoughts you would rather keep to yourself.

Visit Pith