I'm building an AI copilot for live calls. I assumed the AI would be the hard part. It wasn't — it was getting clean audio off the machine. Here's what I wish I'd known.

The constraint: no bot in the call

Most meeting AIs join your call as a participant ("X's Notetaker has joined"). I didn't want that. The goal: capture both sides of a conversation with nothing in the meeting — just the local device.

Two streams:

Your mic (you) — easy.