Every day, there’s a new article about artificial intelligence.

One half reads like a miracle: faster workflows, smarter decisions, personalized everything. The other half sounds like a warning: job displacement, data misuse, dystopian futures. No wonder so many people feel both curious and cautious. AI, right now, lives in the uncanny valley between “this could help me” and “this might replace me.”

And here’s the deeper issue: for most people, AI is still too abstract. Too app-based. Too off-to-the-side. It doesn’t show up where people already are. It asks us to come to it—open an app, click a toolbar icon, log in to a new platform—when the best technology tends to fade into the background and meet us where we live, work, and think.

Arthur C. Clarke once said, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” And that’s exactly where AI sits right now: somewhere between sorcery and software, awe and uncertainty.

That might be about to change.

Sam Altman of OpenAI and Jony Ive, formerly of Apple, announced their collaboration to define a new kind of AI-native hardware. It’s not just about what the next device looks like. It’s about creating a new form—a truly embedded AI experience, not inherited from the past but invented for the future.

This excites me as a designer.

Because when form meets function at this level, when we stop adapting old shapes and start shaping new behaviors, we move into something more human. Something closer to assistive technology than artificial intelligence.

Consider this: we’ve been augmenting our reality for years. Glasses, hearing aids, smart watches, digital maps—all of them help us move through the world more capably. AI, when designed ethically and intentionally, belongs in this lineage. It shouldn’t just be another app we download. It should be the invisible layer that makes everything else smarter, smoother, and more aligned with how we think and act.

In the best case, AI will disappear into our experiences. Not because it’s gone, but because it’s so well-integrated we no longer have to think about it. The friction will fall away. The abstraction will give way to intuition.

Designers have always had the power—and the responsibility—to shape this kind of future. To see not just what technology can do, but what people actually need. That requires clear thinking, ethical foresight, and a commitment to problem-solving with purpose.

Which leads to a final thought: as we move toward these AI-infused experiences, let’s remember the why. Every product, service, and interface should solve something real. It should begin with a challenge, not a trend. It should respect the people who will use it—and the ones who might fear it.

If you’ve got a thorny problem that AI might help address—or one that just needs a more strategic creative approach—let’s talk.

After all, the future isn’t just something we sit around and wait for. It’s something we have the power to shape.