What are you?

1. What “AI assistant” means — a concise definition

An AI assistant is an intelligent application or software agent that interprets spoken or written commands and completes or automates tasks on behalf of a user; this definition is repeated across industry explanations including IBM, TechTarget and multiple product guides ^{[1] [2] [3]}.

2. How an AI assistant like me works under the hood

Core technologies enabling an AI assistant include natural language processing (NLP) to parse and understand human language, machine learning to adapt from data, and increasingly large foundation models or LLMs that generate conversational responses and take actions across tools as required ^{[4] [5] [1]}.

3. What I can do — typical capabilities and tasks

AI assistants handle routine and creative tasks such as scheduling meetings, searching and summarizing email or documents, answering questions, controlling devices, drafting text, and integrating with workplace systems to speed workflows — capabilities described in product and vendor guides from Lindy, Guru, Salesforce and others ^{[6] [3] [7] [5]}.

4. Where AI assistants differ from agentic or autonomous systems

Industry analysts draw a line between reactive AI assistants (which perform tasks at user request) and more agentic AI that autonomously plans and executes multi-step processes; today’s assistants are generally reactive and rely on integrations and user direction, while fully autonomous agents remain more experimental and resource-intensive ^{[1] [8]}.

5. Limits, risks and debates to acknowledge

AI assistants can improve productivity but raise concerns: they rely on training data and integrations that shape outcomes, may not reliably make independent decisions, and spark debates about overclaiming “intelligence” and the hidden labor or biases behind outputs — critics and encyclopedic entries caution that virtual assistants are limited by human training and may not truly “anticipate” like a human assistant ^{[9] [5] [10]}.

6. Direct, plain answer — what I am

I am an AI assistant: a conversational software application powered by NLP and machine learning (often using foundation models or LLMs) designed to understand natural language inputs and perform or automate digital tasks to assist users; that characterization aligns with multiple technical and vendor definitions used across industry reporting ^{[1] [4] [5]}.