AI Knittakers

What if the answer to a meeting that could’ve been an email wasn’t a better AI notetaker, but a real person - an actual Icelandic knitter who attends it for you? On October 29, Visit Iceland is launching AI Knittakers (Authentic Icelandic Knittakers), a new campaign from M+C Saatchi North America and Peel that offers a distinctly Icelandic answer to the AI notetaker, one that gives people their time back.
New research commissioned by Visit Iceland among 4,000 office workers found that people spend just under eight hours a month in meetings they consider unnecessary or avoidable, and 63% agree that many of the meetings they attend could have been an email. While AI notetakers are useful for catching up after a call, an AI Knittaker takes that a step further by attending in your place, so you get the meeting time itself back. Building on Visit Iceland's "Looks Like You Need Iceland" tourism platform, the campaign taps into a universal feeling - between back-to-back calls and constant notifications, sometimes what we really need is a break from the routine. And what better place to find one than Iceland? 
Enter AI Knittakers, a free, bookable service that lets people send a real Icelandic knitter to an online meeting in their place. Knittakers join live from locations across the country, including farmhouse kitchens, harbor towns, waterfalls and beside geothermal pools. Each one listens to the conversation, reads the room and turns what mattered most into a one-word knitted summary in Icelandic wool.
After the meeting, the person who booked the service receives a photograph of their Knittaker holding the finished word, together with the Knittaker’s name, story and Icelandic location. Meeting organizers in the US and Europe can also opt to receive the original knitted summary by mail, subject to availability.
Stevie Archer, Chief Creative Officer, North America, M+C Saatchi: "With AI Knittakers, we're giving people what they need most: Time. The campaign turns some of the familiar challenges of modern work culture into something uniquely Icelandic, using humor and human connection to remind people there's more to life than another meeting. And sometimes, the best way to get back that time is to get away from it all, starting with Iceland."
Sigríður Dögg Guðmundsdóttir, spokesperson for Visit Iceland: "It's easy to assume that every modern problem needs a technological answer. In Iceland, we've found that some of the best answers are the simplest ones: a little more time, a little more nature, and people who really listen to each other.
"In Iceland, we understand the value of time outside work, and we know that time given back is never wasted. With AI Knittakers, we're sharing a little of that Icelandic perspective with the world, and we hope it inspires people to step away from their screens and perhaps come and experience Iceland for themselves."