The Curator and AI
The Curator is an AI that knows your collection and tells you about it. It's included in Spinery, like the other artificial-intelligence features, each with its own limit. Beyond the limit, if you like, you use a key of your own.
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For now Spinery is invitation-only.
Free, with no ads and no tracking. You don't need a key to get started.
What the Curator is
It's a chat inside the app, with an AI that knows your collection the way you see it: where each record is, who it came from, what's in your wishes and suggestions.
Ask it what you'd ask a friend who knows your shelves:
- "Suggest a record for tonight."
- "Who gave me Bollicine?"
- "What am I missing from David Bowie?"
- "What would you suggest that's like Kind of Blue?"
It answers with your records and, when needed, also searches Discogs for the ones you don't have. You find it in its chat, from its sign in the top bar and, from a record's or an artist's page, with "Ask the Curator".
You confirm the wishes
If you ask it to put a record in your wishes, change a price threshold or accept a suggestion, the Curator prepares a proposal: you see it as it is, and it becomes real only if you tap "Confirm". The circle's journal keeps a note: "added via the Curator".
You write to it when you like: the rest of Spinery works even if you never ask it anything.
What's included
The artificial-intelligence features come with Spinery: no key, no account with a provider, no card. Each has a limit, the same for everyone.
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The Curator
The chat, and "Ask the Curator" from a record's or an artist's page. Questions count together, wherever they come from.
10 questions a day
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Add from a photo
Take a photo of the cover and the app recognises the record to add.
10 a month
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The monthly summary
Once a month the Curator takes stock of the collection: what came in and what you're missing. It's ready when you open the app.
1 a month
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Search help
When you ask, it reads what you typed and splits it into artist, album and track.
20 a month
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Weekly suggestions
Every week the Curator picks records for you that the circle doesn't have, each with its reason. You find them on Home and in More → Suggestions.
7 a week
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Record and artist stories
The Curator writes each one the first time you ask, and it stays for everyone: how the stories are made.
One Curator question
The limits belong to each person in the circle: everyone has their own. Daily questions start again the next day, monthly ones the next month, and you see what you have left in More → Settings → Your AI service. For the included features you only need to have confirmed your e-mail address.
Record and artist stories
A record's story tells how it came about, who played on it, how it was received; an artist's, who they are and what they did. The Curator writes it the first time someone taps "Ask the Curator" on the record's or the artist's page and there is no story yet: the answer comes in two parts.
- The first part is the story, and from then on it stays on the page for anyone who has that record or records by that artist, even in another circle. That's why it talks only about the record or the artist: if it names something of your circle, it stays only in your conversation.
- The second part is for you: your edition and your copy, or what you have by that artist. It stays in the conversation.
- Every "Ask the Curator" counts as a question, from a record's or an artist's page too. Reading a story already written costs nothing.
- An artist's story carries a date, "updated on …", because their story goes on: to rewrite it, tap "Rewrite for everyone".
Like any text written by an AI, a story can contain a mistake.
Beyond the limits, your own key
If the limits feel tight, you can use a key of your own, from the AI provider you prefer. With your own key our limits don't apply: you pay the provider for what you use, directly, and you see your usage with them.
You keep the key:
- It stays on your phone, in its secure storage. It doesn't pass to other phones and doesn't enter the circle.
- It travels only inside your requests. When you ask a question, the key goes with that request to our server, which uses it to call the provider and doesn't keep it.
- We don't store it. Not on our servers, not in logs, and we don't use it for anything else.
How to add a key
- Create an account with the provider, if you don't have one, and set up payment under its terms: usually you register a card, with them.
- Create a key in its console (they call it an "API key") and copy it. It's a line of letters and digits: keep it to yourself, like a password.
- Paste it into Spinery: More → Settings → Your AI service. Choose the provider, paste the key and press "Verify": the app runs a small, real test and tells you whether it works. Then press "Save on the phone".
Anthropic
In the app: "Anthropic (Claude)". The key starts with "sk-ant-".
Create the key on Anthropic (opens in a new tab)platform.claude.com/settings/keys
OpenAI
In the app: "OpenAI". The key starts with "sk-".
Create the key on OpenAI (opens in a new tab)platform.openai.com/api-keys
In the app: "Google Gemini". The key starts with "AIza".
Create the key on Google AI Studio (opens in a new tab)aistudio.google.com/apikey
Each provider sets its own prices: they're on the price list of Anthropic (opens in a new tab), OpenAI (opens in a new tab) and Google (opens in a new tab).
Spinery also works with xAI (Grok), Mistral, DeepSeek and OpenRouter, which gives access to Meta, Qwen and others with a single account: in the app, for each of them, "Open the key page" takes you to its console. And with any OpenAI-compatible service, whose address you type in. The Curator needs a model that can use the app's tools: for each provider we suggest one, and "Verify" tells you whether it works.
What the provider sees
The Curator answers well because it knows the collection: that's why the AI receives what it needs, and only that:
- For the Curator and the monthly summary, the circle's records and wishes with locations, ratings and estimated values and, when the question calls for it, the details of a record, including provenance, price paid and story.
- For the weekly suggestions, the circle's records with your ratings, your wishes and past suggestions: never notes, provenance or prices.
- For adding from a photo, the cover photo.
- For the stories of records and artists, what the Curator receives, since it writes them when you ask it; nothing of the circle goes into the story that stays on the page for everyone.
It never receives the other members' personal notes. If you use a key of your own, the provider you chose applies.
Artificial intelligence is part of Spinery: the app says so at your first sign-in, with the provider's name, together with the Terms to accept.
The details are in the privacy noticeQuestions
What does it cost?
Nothing. The included features are free, within the limits above. If you add a key of your own, you pay the provider for what you use, under its price list; nothing to us.
What happens when I run out of questions for the day?
The Curator tells you, and your conversations stay there to read again. The next day you start again from ten. If you don't want to wait, add a key of your own: from then on our limits don't apply.
Why are there limits?
Every answer from an AI has a cost for whoever runs it. For the included features we bear it, and the limits let us do it for everyone.
Can it be turned off?
No: the AI features are part of Spinery and are always on. They work when you use them; the monthly summary and the weekly suggestions get themselves ready, and you find them waiting when you open the app.
Who sees my key?
No one in the circle: the key belongs to whoever puts it on their phone. Our server receives it inside the request, uses it to call the provider and doesn't keep it, nor writes it to logs. If you have two phones, you add it to both.
What happens if I remove the key?
With "Forget the key and go back to the included AI" the key disappears from the phone and you go back to the included features, with their limits. If you fear someone has seen it, delete it in the provider's console too: from then on it no longer works.
What does it remember about me?
Conversations stay on your phone. While you talk, the Curator takes a few notes about you, like the genres you prefer or the record you've been after for years: the notes stay with your account, which is why they apply on all your phones. You find them in its menu, under "What I remember about you": only you see them, and you delete them whenever you want.
Didn't find the answer? Write to support@spinery.it: we answer in person.