What we mean by 'personal' AI
The phrase gets used loosely. Here's the specific bar we hold ourselves to: your data, your retrieval, your choice of AI, your choice to walk away.
By Ilian Raykov, founder of BrainTube · · 5 min read
'Personal AI' has come to mean almost nothing. We use it for something specific: a system where you own the corpus, choose which AI reads it, can swap that AI without rebuilding anything, and can export everything in an afternoon. If any of those four is missing, the AI isn't personal — you're renting it.
You own the corpus
Your highlights, notes and digests are yours. We store them in the EU, private to your account, and BrainTube doesn't train models on your library. Export your library as Markdown or Anki cards from Settings, or the whole corpus through MCP. Deleting your account deletes the corpus. There is no shadow copy we keep 'for analytics'.
You choose the AI
BrainTube does the capture, transcription, indexing and retrieval with its own routed mix of models — you don't manage keys or pick a model. What you do choose is which AI reads the result: connect the same library to Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or any MCP-capable client. The corpus is the constant; the assistant on top is your call.
We apply the same four tests to other products in our comparison of AI memory tools for ChatGPT and Claude.
You can swap the AI without rebuilding
Because the corpus lives in one place and the retrieval interface is MCP, moving from one assistant to another is a repoint, not a migration. When a better client ships next month, you connect it to the same endpoint and carry on. You're never stuck with the app you started in.
You can walk away
We publish a one-page data pledge: what we store, how long, who can read it, and the exact export format. Walking away means exporting your library as Markdown or Anki cards from Settings, or the whole corpus through MCP. We'd rather lose users we can't keep happy than trap them.
Takeaways
- Personal AI = own corpus + choose the AI that reads it + swap it without rebuilding + clean exit.
- Anything less is rental, regardless of the marketing.
- Our data pledge is one page on purpose.
Keep reading
Try BrainTube on your own corpus
Free tier, no card. Export anytime.