Nonius — The Interview Companion

Nonius is a voice interview companion for journalists: the next question, with the source attached. It helps a reporter notice useful follow-ups while retaining control of the conversation and editorial judgment. AssemblyAI real-time transcription turns microphone or WAV audio into a live conversation. Detected voices appear as Person A, B and C; names and roles apply throughout the interview. Consecutive speech stays in one card. Changed speaker attributions are proposed for review rather than silently replacing the reporter's record. AssemblyAI LLM Gateway considers the reporting brief, prepared questions, their coverage, recent speaker passages and earlier suggestions. It proposes a question category with literal supporting evidence. Application code validates the excerpts and supplies a direct question. The reporter can request follow-ups by button or voice, or enable automatic suggestions. Nonius speaks only when invited. The evidence notebook connects saved excerpts to original audio and surrounding context. Reporter notes remain separate from source words. A downloadable ZIP includes the transcript, notes, available audio and a SHA-256 manifest. Exact text and file checks establish consistency, not truth or recognition accuracy. Primary research on journalistic dialogue and AI-assisted interviewing informs the design. Reproducible software checks cover quotation integrity, speaker revisions, context, playback, exports and usage controls. Historical model measurements, failures and their narrow scope are documented in the repository. Journalist usefulness and distraction remain unvalidated; a counterbalanced practitioner pilot is planned. Independent reporters and small editorial teams are the proposed users. A per-reporter subscription is a business hypothesis. A labeled fictional sample works without API credits. Original project code is MIT licensed, with third-party licence notices preserved.