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Most AI tools don't survive a year of daily use. Joanna Stern found the one that did.

7/23/2026

The real test for any AI application is not the demo. Tech reporter and "I Am Not a Robot" author Joanna Stern spent a year integrating dozens of AI tools into her daily life, then measured what stuck.

What the experiment reveals Stern's methodology was accumulation followed by attrition. Dozens of AI applications entered her workflow over the course of the year.

The constraint is familiar to any product evaluator: tools that feel essential early often become friction later.

Sustained daily use is the filter, and it exposes whether a tool reduces cognitive load or simply relocates it. The evaluation carries weight because of who ran it.

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