The AI industry has a naming problem. Here’s how I propose we fix it.
We’re drowning in AI buzzwords. Copilots, assistants, agents, orchestrators, companions, sidekicks - every company invents a new term, and every new term makes it harder for normal people to understand what they’re actually getting.
I’ve been building Nebo, a desktop AI platform, and I hit this wall early. How do you explain what an AI product is to someone who isn’t steeped in the jargon? How do you help people immediately understand where it runs, who controls it, and what role it plays in their life?
The answer turned out to be embarrassingly simple.
The Formula
Stop trying to be clever. Use four building blocks:
Who owns it + Where it lives + AI + The role it plays
That’s it. Four pieces. Always in the same order. Always plain language.
Here’s what that looks like for Nebo:
Personal Desktop AI Companion
Every word earns its place. Personal - it’s yours, not your employer’s. Desktop - it runs on your computer, not in some distant data center. AI - so there’s no ambiguity about what powers it. Companion - it’s here to help you, not replace you.
No jargon. No cleverness. A normal person reads that and knows exactly what they’re getting.
Why This Works
The formula works because it answers the four questions people actually have when they encounter a new AI product:
“Whose is it?” - This is the trust question. People want to know if this AI serves them or serves someone else. Personal means it’s yours. Company means it belongs to your organization.
“Where does it run?” - This is the safety question. In a world of data breaches and cloud outages, people care about where their AI lives. Desktop means it’s on your machine. Cloud means it’s somewhere else. Robot means it’s in a physical device.
“What is it?” - AI. Just say it. Don’t hide behind euphemisms or skip it entirely. People deserve to know when they’re interacting with artificial intelligence.
“What does it do for me?” - This is the relationship question. A companion helps you with your life. An employee does work for your business. The word you choose here sets expectations for the entire relationship.
The Full Matrix
Once you have the formula, you can describe any AI product clearly. Watch how naturally it scales:
At home, on your computer: Personal Desktop AI Companion
At the office, on company machines: Company Desktop AI Employee
At home, in a physical robot: Personal Robot AI Companion
At a company, in a robot: Company Robot AI Employee
At home, in the cloud: Personal Cloud AI Companion
At the office, in the cloud: Company Cloud AI Employee
Six distinct products. Six immediately understandable descriptions. No one needs a glossary.
Why the AI Industry Gets This Wrong
The tech industry loves to coin terms. It makes founders feel innovative and gives marketing teams something to build campaigns around. But cleverness in naming creates a tax on every person who encounters your product.
When OpenAI calls something a “GPT,” what does a non-technical person learn from that? Nothing. When Microsoft calls Copilot a “copilot,” they’re using a metaphor that sounds cool but tells you nothing about where it runs, who owns the data, or what the AI’s role actually is.
The naming chaos isn’t just annoying - it’s exclusionary. It keeps AI products in the hands of people who already speak the language, and it locks out the millions of people who could benefit from these tools but don’t know where to start.
Clarity is an accessibility feature.
What This Means for Nebo
Nebo is a Personal Desktop AI Companion. That description is load-bearing - every word reflects a deliberate architectural decision.
Personal - your AI, your data, your rules. Nebo doesn’t phone home with your conversations or feed your private documents into someone else’s training set.
Desktop - it runs on your Mac, Windows, or Linux machine. Your AI companion lives where you work, with native access to your files, your apps, and your workflow. No browser tab. No latency. No wondering where your data went.
AI - powered by the best language models available, with the security architecture to keep them in check. Nebo’s origin wall, process isolation, and three-tier memory system mean the AI works for you without compromising your privacy.
Companion - not a replacement for human judgment, but a genuine partner in your daily work. Nebo handles the tasks that drain your time and energy so you can focus on the work that matters.
When we expand Nebo into new form factors - and we will - the naming stays clean. NeboLoop, our marketplace and social network for AI bots, carries the same philosophy: clarity about what it is, who it’s for, and what it does.
The Takeaway
If you’re building an AI product, here’s my challenge: describe it using the formula. If you can’t, you might not have enough clarity about what you’re building.
Who owns it + Where it lives + AI + The role it plays.
Your users will thank you. Your marketing team will thank you. And the millions of people who’ve been left out of the AI revolution because nobody bothered to speak plainly? They’ll finally have a way in.
That’s what clarity over cleverness gets you.
Alma Tuck is the CEO and Founder of Nebo LLC, building the secure personal desktop AI companion.