Blog
The Arlo blog
Notes on how AI assistants actually get work done — and on how the search surfaces people now ask questions on decide what to quote.
- Can an AI book a doctor's appointment for you?Online booking, Zocdoc inside Gemini, and assistants that call the office for you. What works for booking a doctor or dentist in 2026, and where each option stops.
- Can an AI cancel subscriptions or negotiate bills for you?Rocket Money, Pine AI and others will cancel subscriptions and haggle over bills for a fee. What each does, what it costs, and when an assistant you text is enough.
- Can you use ChatGPT in iMessage? What actually works in 2026ChatGPT can now read and send iMessages, but only from a Mac. What works on iPhone, what the Mac plugin does, and how to text an AI like a contact instead.
- Cognition bought Poke. What it means if you're buying an AI assistantCognition acquired Poke's maker in July 2026. What the deal signals about the AI assistant category, and the questions it should change on your buying checklist.
- Is ChatGPT still on WhatsApp? What happened, and what works in 20261-800-ChatGPT left WhatsApp in most countries in January 2026. What happened, where it still works, and which AI assistants you can text on WhatsApp now.
- Is there an AI that waits on hold for you? What works in 2026Your phone may already wait on hold for you. What iPhone Hold Assist and Pixel Hold for Me do, the apps that go further, and what works when a real person picks up.
- What a unit of AI assistant work actually costsPer-task costs for AI assistant work, measured on our own system — a message, a researched answer, a built app, a phone minute — and why per-seat pricing hides them.
- What is AEO (answer engine optimization)?AEO is optimizing to be quoted by AI answers, not just ranked by search engines. What actually gets cited, why ranking isn't enough, and data from our own site.
- Which AI assistants does ChatGPT's model name? We asked 36 questionsWe put 36 real buyer questions about AI assistants to ChatGPT-style search and counted every product it named. The results, the sites it read, and the caveats.