The worst thing about those "note taker" bots on video and voice calls isn't when your employer uses one internally -- where there might be awareness and at least nominal consent -- but when you get ambushed by one, at the start of a call, outside that company-internal context.

For example, on calls with customers/partners, or with a recruiter, or for a job interview.

Thanks, fellow human. You probably just sold out my voice and likeness -- and, if I don't notice and disconnect immediately, the content of our conversation, and any info I might share -- to some ruthless sociopath techbro startup. Which will use and abuse and leak the data. Even though they don't have rights. And it's actually a felony to be recording calls without consent where I live.

I think Zoom throws up a consent screen. Obviously if it's some 3rd party thing that joins the call as a recorder, you don't get that.

This is one of those obvious but subtly inappropriate things that just kind of gets foisted on people. Nobody raises an eyebrow, or their voice, and so it's just normalized. Imagine walking into an in-person meeting to find a camcorder set up on a tripod - and if that isn't weird enough, none of your co-workers make a comment on it or acknowledge its presence. It's like pervasive but discreet cameras in public places vs. Surveillance Camera Man making it obvious by sticking a camera in your face.