Inbox → Insight: Email Forwarding & LLM-Powered Event Extraction

Transforming scattered event notifications into structured suggestions is at the heart of our discovery engine. This article dives into how a simple email-forwarding workflow and an LLM-based parsing pipeline deliver privacy-safe, high-quality event data.

Forward-to-Service Workflow

User Action:
- The user forwards any event-related email (from newsletters, ticket platforms, venue announcements) to a dedicated service address.
- No full inbox access is required, ensuring user privacy.
Privacy & Permissions:
- Forwarded emails are processed only for event extraction and then discarded.
- Users can revoke forwarding at any time, and no personal metadata beyond the event content is retained.

LLM Parsing Pipeline

Once an email arrives, our AI pipeline performs:

Title Extraction: Identify the event name, removing extraneous marketing headers.
Date & Time Parsing: Normalize single or multi-day events into ISO-8601 format.
Venue & Location Resolution: Geocode addresses and map common venue names.
Category Tagging: Assign event types (e.g., concert, art exhibit, sports) based on content cues.
Image & Media Detection (Optional): Extract key images or thumbnails when present.

Schema Mapping & Data Normalization

All extracted fields flow into a consistent event schema:

Field	Example
`title`	“Summer Jazz Festival”
`start_time`	`2025-08-15T19:00:00+02:00`
`end_time`	`2025-08-15T22:30:00+02:00`
`location`	“Stadsteatern, Stockholm, SE”
`categories`	`[“music”, “festival”]`
`image_url`	`https://…/jazzfest-thumb.jpg`

This normalized structure feeds directly into our calendar UI and recommendation engine.

Example: Email → Structured Event

Raw Email Snippet:
“Join us for the Summer Jazz Festival on August 15 at Stadsteatern. Doors open at 7 PM…”

Parsed Output:

{
  "title": "Summer Jazz Festival",
  "start_time": "2025-08-15T19:00:00+02:00",
  "end_time": "2025-08-15T22:30:00+02:00",
  "location": "Stadsteatern, Stockholm, SE",
  "categories": ["music", "festival"],
  "image_url": "https://…/jazzfest-thumb.jpg"
}

Next Steps: Scaling & Integration

Bulk Imports: Connect to popular newsletter platforms for one-click subscription imports.
API Partnerships: Ingest event feeds from local venues and cultural institutions.
User Review Loop: Allow users to confirm or edit parsed details, improving AI accuracy over time.

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