Tellie Press Kit · The Mac Teleprompter That Listens

Ready-to-publish copy

Product descriptions, three lengths.

Copy whichever fits your space. Click the button to copy the text to your clipboard.

Short · 50 words

Tellie is a Mac teleprompter that listens. On-device speech recognition matches what you're saying to the script and scrolls to keep up. Lives in the MacBook notch, invisible to Zoom and screen recorders, no audio ever leaves your Mac. Free forever for early adopters. macOS 14 or later.

Medium · 100 words

Tellie is a Mac teleprompter built around the MacBook notch. Its voice-follow scrolling uses on-device speech recognition to match the words you actually say to the words on screen, adjusting to your pace as you ad-lib or skip lines. The prompter stays invisible to Zoom and screen recorders, so your script never appears on the call or in the recording. All speech processing runs locally. No servers, no API, no telemetry. The notarized DMG is ~2 MB. Free forever for early adopters. macOS 14 or later. tellie.skytech.io

Long · 200 words

Tellie is a Mac teleprompter that listens. Built around the MacBook notch, it uses Apple's on-device Speech framework to match the words you actually say to the words on your script, scrolling to keep up as you speak. Speed up, slow down, ad-lib, or skip a line. The script follows you instead of forcing you to follow it. Three details set it apart from existing teleprompter apps: voice-follow scrolling that uses local speech recognition (no audio ever leaves your Mac); a prompter window that sits above other applications but stays invisible to Zoom, screen recorders, and screen sharing; and a small footprint (the notarized DMG is ~2 MB). Tellie launches from any app via the ⌘⇧E global shortcut, supports markdown and rich text, reads approximately 50 languages, and saves font size, speed, and scroll position per file. One-key retake (⇧R) rewinds to the start of the line without stopping the timer. Jump between sections using # markdown headings with Tab or number keys 1-9. Tellie was created by Steve Chazin, a 30-year tech veteran (Apple, Cisco, Salesforce) who built the app in three days, entirely by talking to an AI agent, despite having never written production code. He built it during a visit to his granddaughter in Vermont, sneaking the work in while she napped or was at school. The app is named after her. Her name is Ellie, and she's just learning how to read. Tellie is part of Chazin's "AI for the Rest of Us" project at stevechazin.com. Free for early adopters. macOS 14 or later. Available at tellie.skytech.io.

What Tellie does

Key features.

Fourteen things journalists most often quote when summarizing what Tellie is.

Voice-follow scrolling.On-device speech recognition matches what you say to the script, word by word.
Voice-activated scrolling.The simpler mode: talk to play, pause to stop. No remote, no foot pedal.
~50 languages.English, Spanish, French, Hindi, Mandarin, Hebrew, and 45+ others, all on-device.
One-key retake (⇧R).Rewind to start of line without stopping timer or breaking flow.
Invisible to Zoom & screen recorders.Script never appears on calls or in recordings.
Adjustable opacity.Dial the prompter down to 60% so it blends with whatever's behind it on screen.
Resizable.Drag any edge to fit a half-screen panel or a thin reading strip. Hotkeys keep working even with the chrome hidden.
Live pace report.Words per minute, longest pause, where you stumbled.
Multi-script playlists.Point at a folder, Tellie lines up all scripts in order.
Jump sections with #headings.Tab through markdown sections or jump with 1-9 keys.
Keyboard everything.Space to play, arrows for speed, +/- for size, global shortcuts from any app.
Gives scripts superpowers.Font size, speed, scroll position saved per file.
Read line positioning.Center on screen, or up near the notch for direct eye contact with the camera.
100% on-device.No server, no API, no telemetry, no accounts, no sign-in.

Pre-built narratives

Five story angles.

Tellie can be the story or the proof point. Pick the framing that fits your outlet.

Angle 1 · Vibe Coding

30-Year Tech Exec Builds First Mac App in 3 Days. Without Knowing How to Code.

A career marketer and product leader at Apple, Cisco, and Salesforce used AI as a pair programmer to ship his first Mac app. The story isn't about the app. It's about the shift in who can now build software.

"At one point Claude suggested we stop innovating and ship what we had. I pushed back. We got the killer feature working. That's when I realized: the human work isn't writing code anymore. It's having the taste and ambition to keep going when the AI wants to quit."

Best fit: TechCrunch · The Verge · Fast Company · The Register · Microsoft Source · The Globe and Mail

Angle 2 · The Product

There's a New Mac Teleprompter That Actually Listens to You

Voice-follow scrolling using on-device speech recognition. Lives in the notch. Invisible to Zoom and screen recorders. ~2 MB. Free.

On-device processing in ~50 languages, one-key retake, markdown section jumping, no telemetry, no API calls.

Best fit: 9to5Mac · MacStories · Six Colors · Cult of Mac · The Sweet Setup · MacRumors

Angle 3 · Creator Economy

Mac Teleprompter Built by a Creator, for Creators

Steve Chazin is shipping content creator tools as part of his "AI for the Rest of Us" mission. Tellie is the first: a solution to the real problem: looking at the camera versus reading your script.

Built in 3 days, designed for YouTube/TikTok/podcast creators, free for early adopters, works from the notch so it stays out of the shot.

Best fit: Creator-economy newsletters · YouTube creators reviewing tools · Pat Flynn / Sean Cannell tier creators

Angle 4 · AI Thesis

Why This Tech Exec Built a Mac App to Prove AI Isn't Scary

Steve Chazin's mission is to decode AI for everyday people. Tellie is a concrete example of what "AI for the Rest of Us" actually means: technology that's useful without being complicated, built by a human who isn't a professional developer.

"The bottleneck for creating software used to be technical skill. Now it's imagination. The new question isn't 'Do I know how to build this?' It's 'Can I describe clearly what I want to exist?' That's a better question. A more human question."

Best fit: Stratechery · The New Stack · Axios · Morning Brew · podcasts on AI / future of work

Angle 5 · The Naming Story

He Built a Mac App Named After His Granddaughter. While She Napped.

Steve Chazin built Tellie this month during a visit to his granddaughter in Vermont, working only during her naps and school hours. He named the app after her. Her name is Ellie, and she's just learning to read. The poetry writes itself: an app that helps grown-ups read aloud on camera, named for the three-year-old learning the same skill.

"I built Tellie for my own personal use in just three days, entirely by talking to an AI agent. I actually built the whole thing this month while visiting my granddaughter in Vermont, sneaking the work in while she was asleep or at school. Her name is Ellie, and she is just learning how to read. I named the app after her."

Best fit: Human-interest beats · grandparent-focused publications · NPR / podcast story features · Apple-history outlets where a former Apple exec's family-coded app reads as a perfect arc · Sunday-edition profile pieces

About the creator

Steve Chazin, three bio lengths.

Use whichever fits your context. Click to copy.

Short · 1 line

Tellie was created by Steve Chazin (Skytech.io), a 30-year tech veteran (Apple, Cisco, Salesforce) writing about "AI for the Rest of Us" at stevechazin.com.

Medium · 3-4 sentences

Steve Chazin spent 30 years leading product and marketing at Apple, Cisco, Salesforce, and Alarm.com, where he was rehired personally by Steve Jobs in 1997 and helped grow WebEx past $1B in annual recurring revenue. He now runs Skytech.io and writes about AI at stevechazin.com under the banner "AI for the Rest of Us." Tellie is his first shipped Mac app and was built without formal coding training, using AI as a pair programmer.

Long · for speaking + feature pieces

Steve Chazin spent more than 30 years leading product and marketing at Apple, Cisco, Salesforce, Alarm.com, and Symantec. At Apple, he was personally rehired by Steve Jobs in 1997 to help return the company to profitability. At Cisco, he helped grow WebEx from $900M to $1.3B in annual recurring revenue and helped create Cisco Spark. At Salesforce, he led the acquisition of Dimdim and designed Chatter Messenger, which predated Slack. He now runs Skytech.io, writes about AI for non-technical readers at stevechazin.com under the banner "AI for the Rest of Us," and hosts the podcast The Skytech Minute. His goal is to be the Bill Nye of AI: translating the technology clearly, without hype or doom, for everyday people. Tellie is his first shipped Mac app. He built it in three days, entirely by talking to an AI agent, during a visit to his granddaughter in Vermont this month, sneaking the work in while she napped or was at school. The app is named after her. Her name is Ellie, and she's just learning how to read. He calls this moment the Digital RenAIssance: when the bottleneck to building software shifts from technical skill to imagination.

Visuals

Screenshots & demo.

Right-click any image and Save As, or use the download links. Email steve@skytech.io for additional shots, different angles, or a live demo over Zoom.

A note on why there isn't a screen-recorded demo video: Tellie is built to be invisible to Zoom, screen recorders, and screen sharing software. That's a deliberate user feature so scripts never leak into recordings or calls. The same property makes it harder for Tellie itself to be screen-captured. The assets below were prepared specifically for press. For a live demo, email Steve and he'll walk through Tellie over Zoom (with the prompter visible to the call, captured by his iPhone camera on the side).

Tellie prompter open on a Mac desktop showing the 'Scrolls when you talk. Stops when you don't.' demo script

Hero shot

The Tellie prompter expanded on a clean Mac desktop, scrolling text visible with one word highlighted, against the macOS Tahoe wallpaper. Best for hero / lead images.

Download PNG 2621×1075 · 1.1 MB

Tellie Settings window showing read-line position controls and voice-follow mode selector

Settings panel

Settings window with read-line position controls, voice-follow modes ("Scroll while talking" vs "Track my words"), and other configuration. Good for features-depth shots.

Download PNG 1064×1248 · 387 KB

Tellie menu bar dropdown showing keyboard shortcuts and menu items

Menu bar / keyboard shortcuts

The menu bar dropdown reveals every keyboard shortcut at a glance: ⌘⇧E to show, ⌘⇧P to play, ⌘⇧R to scroll to top, and more. Use when discussing keyboard-first workflow.

Download PNG 564×824 · 140 KB

Welcome wizard

First-launch onboarding showing the Tellie clipboard icon and "The Mac teleprompter that listens" tagline. Good for stories about the user experience.

Download PNG 1144×1408 · 396 KB

Settings walkthrough (video)

Short screen capture moving through the Settings UI. Shows read-line position, voice-follow modes, and the depth of customization without requiring a live demo.

Download MOV 5.5 MB · QuickTime

Ready to publish

Press release, two formats.

A traditional third-person release for outlets that want a straight news piece, and a first-person founder's note for outlets that prefer to quote Steve directly. Copy whichever fits.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Tellie Brings Voice-Follow Scrolling to Mac Teleprompters

A 30-year tech exec built his first Mac app in three days. Without knowing how to code. Here's what he shipped.

FAIRFAX, VA. Steve Chazin, a product and marketing leader at Apple, Cisco, and Salesforce, today announced Tellie, a Mac teleprompter that listens to your voice and scrolls the script to match.

Built in three days using AI as a pair programmer, Tellie uses on-device speech recognition to match what you're actually saying to the words on screen. The app lives in the MacBook notch, stays invisible to Zoom and screen recorders, and processes all speech locally. Nothing ever leaves your Mac.

Chazin built the app this month during a visit to his granddaughter in Vermont. He worked in the hours when she was napping or at school, then named the app after her. Her name is Ellie. She's three and just learning to read.

"The bottleneck for creating software used to be technical skill," Chazin said. "Now it's imagination. I built Tellie because I needed it for my own work. But shipping it proved something bigger: ordinary people can now build real, useful software without permission from a tech company or years of training."

"It's the first Mac app I've ever made," he added. "And I made it for a kid who's just learning to read."

Tellie is free forever for early adopters, runs on macOS 14+, and is available at tellie.skytech.io. The notarized DMG is approximately 2 megabytes.

Chazin is on a mission to decode AI for everyday people through his "AI for the Rest of Us" project at stevechazin.com.

About Steve Chazin
Steve Chazin spent 30 years leading product and marketing at Apple, Cisco, Salesforce, and Alarm.com, where he was rehired personally by Steve Jobs in 1997 and helped grow WebEx past $1B in annual recurring revenue. He now runs Skytech.io and writes about AI at stevechazin.com under the banner "AI for the Rest of Us." Tellie is his first shipped Mac app and was built without formal coding training, using AI as a pair programmer.

Media Contact
Steve Chazin
steve@skytech.io
stevechazin.com

A Note from the Founder

Welcome to the Digital RenAIssance

I spent 30 years helping companies like Apple and Cisco build products, but I never wrote a single line of production code myself. I have always been the person who translates complex technology into simple, human benefits.

This week, everything changed.

I built Tellie for myself in three days by talking to an AI agent. I am visiting my granddaughter in Vermont this month, and I actually built the app while she was asleep or at school. Her name is Ellie. She is just learning to read, and I named the app after her.

Tellie is a Mac teleprompter that actually listens to your voice. Instead of forcing you to match a robotic scrolling speed, it waits for you. It scrolls when you speak. It stops when you pause. It is a simple tool designed to help creators look directly into the camera and connect with their audience.

But Tellie is also proof of something much bigger. We are living in a Digital RenAIssance. The barrier to creating software is no longer technical skill. It is just imagination. You do not need a computer science degree to build something beautiful and useful anymore. You just need an idea and the willingness to try.

I hope you love using Tellie as much as I loved building it.

Steve Chazin
Creator, Tellie

Tellie is a Mac teleprompter that listens.

Fact sheet.