[HN Gopher] Humane AI Pin
___________________________________________________________________
Humane AI Pin
Author : jen20
Score : 229 points
Date : 2023-11-09 17:30 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (hu.ma.ne)
(TXT) w3m dump (hu.ma.ne)
| bonyt wrote:
| Star Trek combadge vibes. Neat.
| dmarchand90 wrote:
| I was hoping to be the first to notice this :D
| verdverm wrote:
| Already have it in my ear, which is honestly better than on my
| shirt
| william-evans wrote:
| This is cool, it's a nicer abstraction than what the Google
| Glasses & then Meta Glasses tried to go for...but it's still a
| pin I have to wear on my shirt which is stopping me from
| adopting.
| metalrain wrote:
| At least for me it's very common to have several layers of
| clothing on most days. It would be hassle to attach this from
| outer jacket to shirt when moving from outside to inside.
| whatever1 wrote:
| Biggest issue is that people hate talking to computers in public.
|
| Alexa was the closest to achieve significant usage since you can
| use it within the privacy of your home.
|
| For voice UIs the non clear boundaries on what you think it can
| or cannot do is also a huge hurdle. After you get a couple "sorry
| I cannot do that" you stop using it
| unshavedyak wrote:
| I agree, BUT, i think it's going to get a _lot_ better soon. Ie
| i loathe Siri because it felt like there was always some
| incantation i had to remember. Like a very terrible CLI. LLMs
| though, even if we never get intelligence right, i think can
| help this area significantly.
|
| Combine that with areas like GPT Vision, (GPT?) Whisper, etc ..
| it'll start feeling a lot more natural here very soon i
| suspect.
|
| TBH i'm surprised Apple isn't pushing this much harder. They
| tout Siri so hard but it's just worthless to me. It feels like
| apple _could_ make a AI Pin like this, but visibly from the
| public side i have zero idea that the 're even working in this
| space. It feels like they purposefully watched the boat sail
| away.
|
| _edit_ : Sidenote, Pin + Airpods would be a nice way to
| interface more quietly too.
| rrrrrrrrrrrryan wrote:
| The Google assistant has been years ahead of Siri and Alexa
| for a good while now. I've been able to give it really loose
| sloppy commands, even stuttering or backtracking on my
| sentences, and does a competent job of figuring out what I
| want. In my experience Siri is much more dependent on
| keywords and certain phrasing, and doesn't quite integrate as
| deeply into one's life because Apple isn't doesn't play
| Google's game of slurping up all your personal data and all
| the public data on the internet.
|
| These next gen AI voice assistants are still a solid
| improvement over Google's current offerings, but they'll feel
| like a _massive_ jump into the future for folks that have
| been stuck in Apple 's ecosystem, and that's probably where
| the biggest opportunity lies.
| brotchie wrote:
| Yeah, unless the utility of this devices is large enough to
| override existing cultural norms, there's actually very few
| venues where it feels "comfortable" to voice interact with a
| device.
|
| I went through this exercise with GPT voice. It's an awesome
| capability, but other than perhaps walking outside, or sitting
| in my office, there's no other space where it feels "ok" to
| just spontaneously talk to something.
|
| A grey area is when you perhaps have headphones in / on and it
| looks like you're in a phone conversation with somebody, then
| it kinda feels ok, but generally you're not going to take a
| phone conversation in a public area without distancing yourself
| from others.
|
| There's a reason most casual communication these days is text
| rather than voice or video calls.
| sergiotapia wrote:
| The weirdness is caused by the incantation all these things
| have. Once you can just talk to the AI without doing
| anything, just talk to it, it'll catch on very easily.
| crooked-v wrote:
| "Siri, lights to half."
|
| "Siri, lights to HALF."
|
| "Siri, lights to HAAAAALF."
|
| "Siri, LIGHTS TO FIFTY PERCENT!"
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| This fortunately is a solved problem. Or will be, once
| Amazon, Apple and Google get out of their asses and plug
| a better voice recognition model to an LLM.
|
| Silly how OpenAI could blow all voice assistants out of
| the water _today_ , if they just added Android intents as
| function calls to the ChatGPT app. Yes, the "voice chat
| mode" is _that good_.
| chasd00 wrote:
| I know i'm getting close to Torment Nexus territory but
| how do you get an LLM to run code as the response? Given
| that an LLM basically calculates the most probable text
| that follows a prompt, how do you then go from that
| response to a function call that flips a lightswitch?
| Seems like you'd need some other ML/AI that takes the LLM
| output and figures out it most likely means a certain
| call to an API and then executes that call.
|
| With alexa i can program if/then statements, like
| basically when i say X then do Y. If something like
| chatgpt requires the same thing then i don't see the
| advantage.
| vineyardmike wrote:
| > If something like chatgpt requires the same thing then
| i don't see the advantage.
|
| So LLMs today can do this a few ways. One they can write
| and execute code. You can ask for some complex math (eg
| calculate the tip for _this bill_ ), and the LLM can
| respond with a python program to execute that math, then
| the wrapping program can execute this and return the
| result. You can scale this up a bit, use your creativity
| at the possiblities (eg SQL queries, one-off UIs, etc).
|
| You can also use an LLM to "craft a call to an API from
| <api library>". Today, Alexa basically works by calling
| an API. You get a weather api, a timer api, etc and make
| them all conform to the Alexa standard. An LLM can one-up
| it by using any existing API unchanged, as long as
| there's adequate documentation somewhere for the LLM.
|
| An LLM won't revolutionize Alexa type use cases, but it
| will give it a way to reach the "long tail" of APIs and
| data retrieval. LLMs are pretty novel for the "write
| custom code to solve this unique problem" use case.
| lukifer wrote:
| It's staggering to me that Apple has not improved on the
| UI for "try again" or "keep trying", whether the fault is
| with Siri itself, or just network conditions. It seems
| like (relatively) low-hanging fruit, compared to the
| challenges of improving the engine. (I don't use any
| other voice assistants, no idea how well they do here.)
| aantix wrote:
| For iOS, there's nothing more frustrating than dictating
| a long note only to have it come back with try again.
| lukifer wrote:
| > it looks like you're in a phone conversation with somebody
|
| Even though everyone's seen AirPods by now, in those rare
| occasions when I'm on the phone in public, I feel compelled
| to have my phone out and vaguely talking at it, so it's clear
| I'm on a phone call and not a crazy person.
|
| I'm curious if we would see similar usage with the pin, where
| voice commands in public are always performed with the hand
| up for the projection screen (it will still prompt looks, but
| hopefully be clear in context, "oh they're doing some tech
| thing").
|
| Of course at this price point, it's highly dubious that we'll
| see anywhere near the ubiquitous market penetration of
| AirPods (which garner understandable complaints about the
| price point sub-$200, and that's with a clear value prop).
| smaudet wrote:
| I don't mind the earphones, but often headsets are entirely
| impractical. Most notably, in the case of any sort of
| weather, wind, etc. A phone can also get rained on, but its
| a bit easier to keep safe.
|
| The other reason they are mostly impractical - keeping a
| charge. *wired* headsets were great in this regard, but
| then there's the wire, and now, there's the phone (that may
| not even support the wire?).
| maliker wrote:
| I've noticed the latest iOS speech recognition model works with
| whispered speech pretty well. Not a perfect fix, but it's
| something.
| pzo wrote:
| same with swiftkey - can handle whispered speech to some
| extend.
|
| Still I would guess Meta Glasses or AirPods should be better
| to handle such whispered mode since microphones are so much
| closer. Would be interesting if Airpods had some contact mic
| that could pickup whispered sound inside your mouth.
|
| Maybe the holly grail is to have something inside your mouth
| so you don't have to even make voice - device will figure out
| what you want to speak from how mouth and tongue movement -
| smart tooth braces anyone? :)
| Ninjinka wrote:
| Agreed. I have the new Meta Ray-Ban glasses, and have been
| pleasantly surprised with how soft I can speak since the mics
| are so close to my mouth, but still don't enjoy doing it in
| public.
| ryanklee wrote:
| The only reason people don't like talking to computers in
| public is that it's distinguishable in an awkward way from
| talking to humans in public. That's not going to be an issue
| for much longer. ChatGPT voice mode is about 99% of the way
| there. The only remaining issue is the cadence of the
| conversation -- you can't interrupt ChatGPT naturally, you have
| to press a button.
| azinman2 wrote:
| The issue is that your private communications are now audible
| by the people around you. It's one thing when it's to another
| person and you can whisper and share social context, it's
| another when it's at a good volume and contextless.
| ryanklee wrote:
| These don't seem like real issues to me. They are the exact
| same issues you have when you are talking to humans. And
| the way we solve that issue with humans is that we only
| have conversations around other humans that we are
| comfortable having. We save sensitive conversations for
| when we are not in public.
| azinman2 wrote:
| Except there's no way to have a sensitive conversation on
| this device that isn't spoken. With my phone I can.
| That's part of my point.
| yetanother12345 wrote:
| > The only reason people don't like talking to computers in
| public is that ...
|
| It does not seem right to speak of a single reason. There are
| probably multiple. So, IMHO it would be more productive to
| come up with a list and put some weights on the options if
| you want to dissect this matter.
|
| IMHO one very strong factor / important reason (one that you
| ignore) is the social context. Ie the reaction of others in
| the same physical space, as you start talking out loud,
| seemingly unmotivated.
|
| Humans are social animals, and so the reaction of others to
| the actions you do tend to be very important to a large
| fraction of the population. What is acceptable in one context
| simply isn't in another. Also, the exact tolerances tend to
| differ with the local culture (here "local" is used in the
| sense "geographically/physically local")
|
| It's not just about not annoying others here. In this case
| it's also about a thing as imprecise as "perceived self
| image". Some people (I'd argue, most people) dislike having
| the perception that others perceive them to be mentally
| unstable or rude. Most people need some kind of social
| acceptance for the actions they do.
|
| One significant trait of some mental instabilities (as well
| as some drug induced behavioral changes) is that those
| affected will spontanously start talking in public. You will
| probably know the Tourettes Syndrome, and the alchoholic
| rambling about because these cases often imply quite rude and
| offensive verbiage and/or loud volume, but these are not the
| only cases.
|
| People in general are well adept at detecting such anomalous
| behaviour as it is part of our insticts trained through
| Evolution. Also the uncomfortable feelings that observing
| this type of behaviour leads to will lead many to react with
| a "confront or escape" (aka. "fight or flee") response (a
| stress signal), which is not beneficial to social interaction
| in general.
|
| TL;DR: If you speak out in public without a very clear and
| socially valid reason (speaking to an object is not that) you
| are not only rude to others, but you also cause them
| stress... and you will have to face the social stigma of
| being perceived as insane.
|
| (edit: grammar/typos)
| maliker wrote:
| The can and cannot do problem reminds me of writing
| Applescript. I just want to call a function not figure out
| where to sprinkle in random a/the/of modifiers!
| ugh123 wrote:
| How well does whispering do with these things? I've found that
| I can reliably write sentences and set alerts when holding the
| mic fairly close on my Pixel 6.
| petercooper wrote:
| If people can speak more naturally, maybe they'll be okay with
| it. I am constantly encountering people who are laughing or
| talking to themselves out in public nowadays. Of course,
| they're probably on phone calls with Airpods in, but it doesn't
| seem to be awkward in a way it used to in the 'Bluetooth
| headset' days.
| SllX wrote:
| Well, I hated talking to Siri in public because about 70% of
| the time it did what I want and 30% of the time it made me feel
| like a fool for even trying. That 30% was what killed it for me
| after giving it a serious go around the time Apple was rolling
| out shortcuts.
|
| After watching the presentation, I am now curious about
| Humane's thing though, but I'm still going to hold off for a
| bit because I want to see the failure modes first and I also
| don't want to rush out and be one of the first to buy the brand
| new 3Com Audrey.
| bilsbie wrote:
| Any way we could capture subvocalizations?
| hauget wrote:
| This is easy to fix IMHO. Pair a small screen in the future for
| typing or have a cuff link mic for whispering. You will see
| accessories like these pop up in the near future.
| dist-epoch wrote:
| I see people talking on speaker phone all the time in public.
| jdiez17 wrote:
| It was looking very promising until I read "A subscription is
| required to use Ai Pin." right at the bottom of the page. Oh
| well.
| CharlesW wrote:
| SmartBrooch is a $699 + a $24-a-month subscription commitment.
| owlninja wrote:
| Well it does come with a phone line and data coverage through
| T-Mobile, so like a cell phone really?
| make3 wrote:
| true. it does make sense however, you can't expect the ai model
| to reside in the wearable device
| whywhywhywhy wrote:
| It's seemingly OpenAI API
|
| https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/9/23953901/humane-ai-pin-
| la...
| georgelyon wrote:
| On Mobile Safari: A problem repeatedly occurred on
| "https://hu.ma.ne/aipin".
|
| I guess they really do hate smartphones...
| IMcD23 wrote:
| Same...
| boeingUH60 wrote:
| > Another revelation from that FCC filing: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman
| is Humane's largest shareholder.
|
| > Altman owns "14.93% equity and voting through a number of
| holding companies none of which individually holds 10% or greater
| ownership interest in Humane," the filing states.
|
| https://www.lowpass.cc/p/humane-ai-pin-cellular-mvno-sam-alt...
| magneticnorth wrote:
| Huh, interesting. He is known for not having any equity in
| OpenAI - interesting that he has other AI investments instead.
| jstummbillig wrote:
| Sam might be completely wrong about the most important things
| (I don't think so, but I don't think it's super unlikely
| either) and I still peg him as mostly genuine and smart,
| while not being very concerned with and certainly not being
| very good at being likeable.
|
| He was fairly outspoken about getting (even more) rich off of
| other investments and believing OpenAI was simply too
| important to make it a conflict of interest, and mostly
| considers it a nuisance/distraction. That's fairly arrogant,
| and, again, might be completely off but I still do believe he
| means that and I would give it good odds to be the entirely
| right course of action, if most impact/most quickly is what
| you are going for.
| schnable wrote:
| A lot of that subscription fee is flowing back to OpenAI.
| xnx wrote:
| Discussion in progress here:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38207656
| iamcasen wrote:
| I've been waiting for this. Seems like it is a self-contained
| cellular device requiring a subscription, which makes sense. I
| guess I am curious how I can be in communication with it. Will my
| contacts be texted from a new phone number? That seems like the
| biggest hurdle for me, as I'd just like to use my pre-existing
| cellular service that I already pay for.
|
| I also find it curious that a former Apple exec formed this
| company. I'd assume Apple itself would want to pursue this
| internally, as such a device would be yet another killer addition
| to the iron grip of the Apple ecosystem.
| belugacat wrote:
| Imran wasn't an exec, just an IC designer.
| azinman2 wrote:
| He was a lot more than "just an IC designer"
| ryandrake wrote:
| Bethany wasn't an exec either, but she was a project
| manager reasonably high up on the totem pole.
|
| It's nice to see this product isn't actually vapor.
| Congrats to them.
| paxys wrote:
| Communication seems to be a major selling point of the pin going
| by the demo, but I'm pretty certain it is impossible for it to
| work with iMessage, WhatsApp etc. in the way that is shown, so
| I'm wary about the actual advantages.
| tasoeur wrote:
| 100% this, the lack of a clear 3rd party integration path does
| raise alarm bells in terms of breaking into mainstream as a
| customer product. Curious to see where they are going with
| their "we don't do apps" LLM ecosystem.
| filterfiber wrote:
| Genuinely asking, problem does this solve? And won't apple
| instantly destroy them the moment they use an LLM for siri?
|
| Why wouldn't I use my existing watch/phone/earbuds/pods instead
| of paying 600$+subscription for this?
|
| I don't understand the insistence on using voice as the main
| interaction and ditching the screen.
|
| At least google glass/AR let's me read
| mpalmer wrote:
| Instantly destroy? Or acquire?
| belugacat wrote:
| Quite a few bridges were burned to form the company, an
| acquisition would be a surprising development.
| zffr wrote:
| Can you expand on that? How did humane burn bridges to form
| the company?
| nameless912 wrote:
| Aren't the humane folks a bunch of ex-Google/ex-Android
| execs?
| polynomial wrote:
| Who is the extremely slow talking spokesperson?
| killerdhmo wrote:
| Wrong, ex-Apple people
| filterfiber wrote:
| A bit tongue in cheek - I said "instantly destroy" because if
| the main selling point is an ai voice assistant, then people
| would just use what's already built into their
| phone/watch/airpods instead of paying 600$ if apple was to
| implement a better LLM for siri.
|
| I'm skeptical of the usefulness of the hand projection vs a
| watch. And I think anyone who wants to bring a camera would
| be far better served by an iphone (or any phone).
| ape4 wrote:
| Yeah, people already have phones. This is could just be a phone
| app.
| worldsayshi wrote:
| Part of me just wants to get rid of my phone if I get a
| device that does the actually useful things. Get info about
| something, checks and sends messages in a smart way, checks
| the bus.
|
| Most of the other stuff is just idling. I don't expect I
| would idle in the same way with an actually good assistant
| that respects me.
|
| But then I'd prefer an open source Wikipedia/Wikimedia like
| organisation behind it.
| filterfiber wrote:
| The apple watch can already Pay, music, communication
| without a phone.
|
| Siri itself is lacking but I expect that to change with an
| LLM soon.
|
| You can already lock down your phone to prevent distracting
| apps.
|
| I've skeptical that people would actually choose to go
| without a phone in favor of this
| troupo wrote:
| > Part of me just wants to get rid of my phone if I get a
| device that does the actually useful things. Get info about
| something, checks and sends messages in a smart way, checks
| the bus.
|
| This requires an always-on device, or always-in-the-cloud
| server processing your data and pushing updates to your
| device.
|
| The former is limited by physics (battery), the latter is
| limited by how much data you want accessed from the cloud.
| Neither are solved by open source.
| lelandfe wrote:
| The problem this solves is my pager looks outdated
| cowsup wrote:
| This looks like a cool toy that high-level members of an
| organization will buy, and nobody else.
|
| It can't compete in the consumer space, because it doesn't let
| you waste time on social media. It can't compete in the
| corporate world because it doesn't have a screen -- no email,
| no spreadsheets, no collaborative chat application we've all
| grown used to. And it can't even be great for photography,
| since you need another device to view the photos and videos
| this thing takes.
|
| _If_ this thing takes off for its impressive AI capabilities,
| smartphone makers can pump R &D into their AI, and give us this
| for free as a software update. But right now, the only people
| who will use this are folks whose job involves scheduling
| meetings and firing off quick text messages to colleagues and
| clients.
| msluyter wrote:
| I can see something like this filling a niche with the elderly
| population as like an external memory. (Or even just for
| forgetful adhd folks like myself, having something I can ask
| "wait, what did my wife just say to me 5 minutes ago?" ;) )
| polynomial wrote:
| "what did my wife just say to me 5 minutes ago?" is the most
| brilliant app idea I've seen (in recent memory.)
| verdverm wrote:
| but requires an always on and listening device, which
| people don't really want because it is always abused by the
| overlords
| lainga wrote:
| counterpoint being "bring up what my husband said 10 months
| ago". the Devil skips away, contract in hand...
| Erwin wrote:
| Black Mirror's "The Entire History of You" S1E03 episode
| has one take on what would happen if we could effortlessly
| record -- and replay -- everything. As with most Black
| Mirrors, there are some dark but believeable ideas.
|
| Incidentally, it was written by Jess Armstrong who later
| created "Succession".
| cdrini wrote:
| The guy had a Ted talk a while back going into his motivations.
| I believe the main one was he didn't like how phones get
| between you and the world, and take you out of the moment. This
| was an attempt to make tech that isn't a distraction in your
| life but that fades into the background. That was his driving
| principle, I believe.
| MattDamonSpace wrote:
| I got the impression his driving principle was "if we can't
| replace smartphones then Apple wins"
| gizajob wrote:
| Tim Cook sleeping like a baby tonight.
| matwood wrote:
| > Genuinely asking, problem does this solve?
|
| People are thinking about the form factor _after_ the cell
| phone. Apple is busy training everyone to use hand gestures
| with the new Apple Watch and upcoming Apple Vision. Humane is
| going down the path of projecting on the hand and touch.
| filterfiber wrote:
| Doesn't the projection require one hand to be up and in a
| flat position, and the other hand interacts with it? Meaning
| it requires two hands?
|
| Apple's implementations are for 1 hand operation. You can
| operate the watch's touch screen while holding a steering
| wheel for example.
|
| What's the difference between the objectively not great
| screen that is my hand, and the oled watch that doesn't
| require both my hands for operation?
|
| EDIT Heck this requires one hand just to see anything. I can
| look at my watch without any hands!
| alwaysbeconsing wrote:
| From the demo video it looks that buttons can activate with
| similar pinch gesture as new Apple watch has.
| polynomial wrote:
| "What comes next" is interesting as a problem formulation
| insofar as it encourages solution based thinking ("Here's the
| solution I think is next, for an problem still to be
| identified- other than it is what comes next.)
| verdverm wrote:
| > I don't understand the insistence on using voice as the main
| interaction and ditching the screen.
|
| There was a google i/o talk a few years back were they talked
| about users wanting multi-modal, an example being they ask for
| restaurant recommendations by voice, then get the list they can
| view on their device. Both query and results are presented in
| their easiest modal, and humans will naturally switch between
| them.
|
| This thing seem dead on arrival. Who wants to hold their hand
| up like that? Who wants to look at an uneven "screen"? Can you
| use it while walking or experience the movement in a vehicle?
| (car, bus, subway)
|
| Is this just a big sunk cost fallacy launch?
| TehCorwiz wrote:
| I agree with you on all points except one. Arguably the
| uneven "screen" problem can be solved with a depth camera and
| warping the projection to match the contours of your hand.
| Since they already support hand gestures on the target hand
| it's possible they already have the equipment built-in to do
| this.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| > _Genuinely asking, problem does this solve?_
|
| It's a combadge.
|
| I repeat: it's a combadge. It solves the self-evident problem
| of there not being combadges available and in use.
|
| Or, at least, it's _almost_ a combadge. A good qualitative jump
| forward, but with plenty of unwanted features like
| _subscription_ (I guess this could work for a _Ferengi_
| combadge), screen, wake words, etc. A combadge doesn 't need to
| be an image projector, nor does it need rich tactile controls.
| But I guess you can improve the product-problem fit by ignoring
| those features.
| a-priori wrote:
| It's a poor version of the comm badges in Star Trek Discovery
| when they go to the 32nd century. Those one can project
| holograms in front of them.
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| Hell, Star Wars had those, and that was A Long Time Ago!
| altcognito wrote:
| Honestly, if they did the one thing that com badges did, it
| would have at least one feature I would say, "oh, that's
| nice"
| dist-epoch wrote:
| > Genuinely asking, problem does this solve?
|
| Simple example: which way do I go at the next intersection?
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| Apple Watch and Android Wear solve this.
| jejeyyy77 wrote:
| lol looks awful
| jeffbee wrote:
| The device and the subscription both cost more than my Pixel 8
| Pro + Google Fi. Seems a bit steep, especially considering that
| the P8P can do most or all of these AI tricks and then some,
| except for clinging to my shirt.
| montekaka wrote:
| is there any SDK or API?
| btbuildem wrote:
| This thing better not come with a speaker. Public speakerphone
| users are among the most obnoxious pests.
| jeffbee wrote:
| Haha what do you mean, that's the main feature they are
| advertising here. I agree that the advent of portable high-
| output, low-power audio amplifiers is chiefly responsible for
| the downfall of human society so I, too, hate to see it.
| jantissler wrote:
| It even comes with a "Personic Speaker". From the website: "Ai
| Pin's speaker system uses a Head Related Transfer Function
| (HRTF) to create a personally optimized bubble of sound, at a
| fixed distance, regardless of how soft or loud."
| _Parfait_ wrote:
| Unless physics has changed, I think headphones are the only
| way to do this.
| kaibee wrote:
| Directional speakers exist and are very effective actually.
| Whether this device is using one, I have no idea.
| _Parfait_ wrote:
| You can't create a "bubble" of sound unless that just a
| marketing term for quiet and facing only the user.
| askiiart wrote:
| Well I don't know about a bubble of sound, but there are
| "sound lasers"
|
| https://youtu.be/aBdVfUnS-pM
| anonymouse008 wrote:
| They need their modern Chiat\Day because right now they are about
| to squander the best movement in hardware tech in 10 years.
| jeffbee wrote:
| One thing I am quite interested in here is the gesture controls.
| Google completely fumbled their Project Soli (although I bet they
| filed a thousand patents for it) but it's the kind of interface I
| want when driving my car. Buttons are better than touchscreens
| but gestures could be better than both.
| hekec wrote:
| I'm shocked at how bad the presentation video is.
|
| Almost the entire beginning of the video is about which colors
| are available and how the battery snaps, with zero hints about
| why I would need a cringe projector on me.
|
| I can't believe this was shipped by ex-Apple people. Imagine
| Steve Jobs introducing the iPhone like this: "We are introducing
| a revolutionary new device. The first thing you should know about
| it is that it has a charger and an Apple processor. The second
| most important thing: here is how the battery works."
| nostromo wrote:
| Their on-screen chemistry is super odd -- particularly
| considering they are married and cofounders. It's giving low-
| rent Apple.
| elicash wrote:
| Oh they're married!
|
| I couldn't figure out why he kept touching and adjusting the
| pin on her chest, a thing I would never do with a coworker.
| All I knew was that she was CEO and he was Chairman, so I
| knew it was a joint decision. This makes so much more sense.
| whywhywhywhy wrote:
| The TED reveal he did was really bad but I attributed it to
| being live. Think it's telling that they internally didn't see
| that and tell him "Dude, you desperately need to take speaking
| classes" and that with a pre-recording that was the best take.
|
| Sign no one internally is being honest with them, feels they
| can say "It's bad"...
| webwielder2 wrote:
| Lucky break that LLMs became a thing while they were making this
| chung8123 wrote:
| Given their shareholders it might not have been luck as much as
| they already knew.
| nostromo wrote:
| This strikes me as a less-functional Apple Watch that you wear on
| your shirt instead of your wrist.
|
| (Yes, Siri is not great today, but that will change very quickly
| with Apple working hard on their own LLMs.)
|
| Cool project, but not something I imagine most people will want.
| Like Google Glass.
|
| They even did the cringey stunt Google Glass tried and featured
| it on the runway during Fashion Week, as if that instantly makes
| something fashionable:
|
| https://images.fastcompany.net/image/upload/w_1200,c_limit,q...
| dmarchand90 wrote:
| It actually reminds me a lot of much older product:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vj24kNJEQJs (bonyt noticed this
| first)
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Indeed. It just screams "comm badge", which makes the product
| idea obvious, _and_ makes me surprised they somehow managed
| to make zero references to Star Trek in the entire godawfully
| long landing page.
| lukifer wrote:
| At some point, someone produced an actually working TNG comm
| badge as a Bluetooth phone accessory, apparently it's still
| for sale: https://shop.startrek.com/products/star-trek-the-
| next-genera...
|
| Though from the reviews I've seen (and as with so many
| Bluetooth devices), it's unusably terrible, and the battery
| only lasts a few hours.
| beambot wrote:
| Watches & phones don't have the optical & audio "visibility" of
| the Humane AI Pin -- which, incidentally, looks an awful lot
| like the Axon body-worn cameras for police.
| chasing wrote:
| Yeah, just realized this is an Apple Watch competitor -- but
| one that requires and odd new paradigm of interactivity that
| seems much worse than that of the Watch. Lifting your wrist up
| and having a small screen you can look at and talk to seems so
| intuitive in a way that the Humane widget doesn't.
|
| Think of the simple interaction of wanting to issue a voice
| command in public. Watch: Bring it close to your mouth, maybe
| cover both with the other hand to be even less audible to
| others. Humane: Smoosh your shirt up to your face?
|
| (Also: I live in one of the sunniest places on earth -- I
| simply don't trust that I'll be able to see light projections
| onto my hand when I'm outside.)
|
| Anyway. All in favor of exploration and new ideas. Very willing
| to be proven wrong on the form factor. But I also feel like
| we've kind of solved the wearable computing interface problem
| -- a couple hundred years ago, turns out -- and so it's going
| to take a lot of convincing.
| dbish wrote:
| Also more expensive, i pay 10/month for a dedicated watch, and
| i can still make 3rd part apps for it, i can't do that with
| humane as far as i can tell and don't really want to put it on
| my shirt like this.
|
| Only real differentiator is maybe the real time translation,
| but that's not a frequent use case and i think i can take my
| phone out for that with google translate as needed.
|
| It's too bad, love new hardware, this isn't it for me at least
| with that price and functionality.
| nharada wrote:
| It's kinda funny that the latest version of a "less space than
| a Nomad" comment now holds up Apple specifically as the product
| of comparison.
| ExMachina73 wrote:
| I don't think this really competes with a phone. If anything it
| competes with a smartwatch. And as far as wearable tech, a watch
| blends in much better.
| jantissler wrote:
| And a smartwatch offers a lot of health features, too!
| Something many people seem to find interesting and useful.
|
| The watch is an accessory to the phone that adds features plus
| offers convenience and if you want to, it can temporarily
| substitute your phone like when you go to the gym. A cellular
| Apple Watch combined with Air Pods can do a lot. And both the
| Apple Watch and the Air Pods have use cases in addition to that
| in other situations. I don't see that here at all. I see a
| device with a very limited feature set.
|
| Edit: Wording
| tkiolp4 wrote:
| Almost. I was almost sold until they mentioned the monthly
| subscription. This device looks so futuristic, but monthly
| subscriptions are (should be) a thing of the past.
| r3nruturnEr wrote:
| Seems like cool tech and I'm excited to see how it does. I guess
| I'm sort of expecting a flop since this relies on good connection
| and fast ai over cell signal still seems like a challenge in a
| lot of places (upload voice file, speech recognition, nlu/llm
| orchestration, etc) but I do love the idea of a less intrusive
| 'smart phone' that would let me leave my phone at home more.
|
| On another note, this reminds me a lot of the short story The
| Perfect Match by Ken Liu. The story isn't ground breaking but is
| worth a read and harps on AI assistants making decisions for
| people and driving biases based on the corporate agenda and
| sponsors (not to get too tinfoil hatty).
| bookofjoe wrote:
| https://mspreibisch.files.wordpress.com/2019/09/the-perfect-...
| paxys wrote:
| I know this is the direct source, but people really need to go
| read the NY Times piece on this -
| https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/09/technology/silicon-valley....
|
| > A Buddhist monk named Brother Spirit led them to Humane. Mr.
| Chaudhri and Ms. Bongiorno had developed concepts for two A.I.
| products: a women's health device and the pin. Brother Spirit,
| whom they met through their acupuncturist, recommended that they
| shared the ideas with his friend, Marc Benioff, the founder of
| Salesforce.
|
| > Sitting beneath a palm tree on a cliff above the ocean at Mr.
| Benioff's Hawaiian home in 2018, they explained both devices.
| "This one," Mr. Benioff said, pointing at the Ai Pin, as dolphins
| breached the surf below, "is huge."
|
| > "It's going to be a massive company," he added.
|
| This product was also named a "best invention of 2023" by TIME
| magazine before it was even released. Entirely by coincidence,
| Marc Benioff happens to own TIME magazine.
|
| HBO's Silicon Valley may be over, but the real world Silicon
| Valley is still going stronger than ever.
| notfed wrote:
| Wow, this device looks extremely awkward to use. Imagine having
| to aim this at your hand.
| quadrature wrote:
| maybe its tracking your hand and aiming the projection ?.
| Can't really say much based on the landing page, I doubt most
| of the interactions are as smooth as they are pictured. But
| it is refreshing to see a new take on mobile devices.
| boeingUH60 wrote:
| Peak Silicon Valley is when a Buddhist monk arranges a business
| meeting that leads to a startup investment.
| notahacker wrote:
| Peak Silicon Valley is when the Buddhist monk is rewarded by
| someone acquiring his mantras-as-a-service subscription
| webapp
| ktaube wrote:
| How is this form factor better than a smartwatch with a proper
| screen?
| jonplackett wrote:
| The problem with voice interfaces in public is you look like a
| tosser while using the - and that's if they actually work. Also
| you may need it to communicate privately with you too...
|
| "Hey humane, add a meeting next Tuesday at 2pm'.
|
| "I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that. You have a doctors
| appointment about your haemeroids"
| ulrischa wrote:
| As noted here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38208209
| jacooper wrote:
| 700$ for a device I can't watch videos on, locked to one provider
| and has only first party Apps. An immediate flop there is no
| doubt about it.
| macintux wrote:
| 2007 flashbacks.
| elxr wrote:
| $700 buys a full PC I can use to code, browse the web, and run
| millions of desktop apps. It comes with a screen too.
|
| This thing has no business being $700.
| Zanni wrote:
| This feels like the Kinect in that, _if_ it works perfectly,
| seamlessly, responsively every time, it would be an amazing "the
| future is here now" gadget. But if it doesn't, it's just a tech
| demo with no real use.
|
| The pin form-factor is awkward. At least with a watch, you have
| watch functionality to fall back on, making it immediately
| useful, and you can discover incremental functionality--health,
| message, alerts, etc. This is all or nothing (and I think it's
| going to land closer to nothing).
| MikeBVaughn wrote:
| What does it feel like when (critically, not 'if') it
| accidentally shines into your eye?
| koqoo wrote:
| not sure about its future success, but the Voice Interface will
| be the new paradigm for sure.
| zffr wrote:
| I'm surprised that the data plan is priced so high. For an Apple
| Watch, you can add it to your existing cell plan with unlimited
| data for as low as $10/mo
| zanderwohl wrote:
| Does anyone remember the Cicret bracelet scam? This seems an
| exact copy of that, except now on your shirt.
| collsni wrote:
| Does it know where your hand is? or do you have to put your hand
| in a certain spot?
| owenpalmer wrote:
| I was wondering the same thing
| seydor wrote:
| Things you see in movies aren't meant to be made real. In movies,
| the pin is good for theatrical effect, because the actor recites
| his thoughts to the camera. There is no camera in real life,
| instead there is other people
| ShamelessC wrote:
| I'm curious what movie you're referring to? Even in Her, Theo
| just puts his phone in his shirt pocket with the camera exposed
| so Samantha can see things.
| conkeisterdoor wrote:
| Correct me if I'm wrong GO, but I'm pretty sure he's
| referring to StarTrek, by comparing this pin to a combadge.
| mjhoy wrote:
| In the video, they apparently didn't actually check up on the
| answer it gave about the next eclipse. The April 8 2024 total
| eclipse is best seen in North America. Exmouth Australia was
| where the April 20 2023 total eclipse occurred.
| https://science.nasa.gov/eclipses/future-eclipses/eclipse-20...
| dbish wrote:
| Not to mention that voice based Q&A has been done by everyone
| at this point. Should have focused on the differentiators they
| have with that form factor.
| _jal wrote:
| New categories of things to wear are really hard to get people to
| adapt without some instantly-compelling use case. I'm having
| trouble coming up with a mildly interesting use case for this.
|
| Get it to the point where it can constantly observe my
| surroundings and make the sort of suggestions a partner might
| ("if we stop at the hardware store first, we can get those fresh
| bagels Bob likes from the place that closes early", ) and maybe
| there's something to talk about.
| schnable wrote:
| Asking the price of vintage photos of a solar eclipse isn't a
| killer use case for you?
| notahacker wrote:
| Real time translation and direction finding seem like the
| obvious use cases for an always on device attached to your
| chest, plus the standard Siri questions without having to grab
| a phone. Those are more niche than a phone, but big niches
|
| You just might have to deal with reactions to always on cameras
| and the annoyance of being admonished by LapelClippy on a
| regular basis
| dbish wrote:
| We know how the glasshole situation went :)
|
| Siri question type things I can use my watch for real time
| translation is neat but it has to be a big and frequent use
| case to differentiate from just taking my phone out and using
| google translate (which i believe i can also do on my apple
| watch).
| notahacker wrote:
| I think audio translation when it's quite close to real
| time will feel more natural without the phone in the hand
| than with it especially with a well functioning gesture
| interface, but yeah, there's nothing that stops a phone
| from doing it.
|
| Also agree this is more a smartwatch competitor than a
| phone competitor. The fact that smartwatches sell at all is
| proof there are (much smaller) markets for wearable devices
| that do stuff that can be done at least as well on a phone
| if you get it out your pocket, the argument for separating
| the powerful internet connected functionality from the
| watch and having it on some other wearable on your chest is
| that actually I like the wrist-mounted device that tracks
| my activity and sleep to not need charging every day...
| sam wrote:
| This comment thread will go down in history along with the famous
| HN Dropbox thread.
|
| This thing is incredible and will eventually crush the iPhone.
| Solves iPhone addiction while retaining the utility of an iPhone?
| Solid gold.
| crazygringo wrote:
| The thing is, most people don't actually _want_ to solve their
| phone addiction even if they say they do.
|
| In reality, they want to read news while waiting at a doctor's
| office, play games while they take the subway, and see
| Instagram updates from friends throughout the day.
|
| And if you already want a less capable device, it's called an
| Apple Watch, but it comes with a little screen that is way more
| useful than laser projection, and will soon surely have a
| powerful LLM it can access. (And paired with AirPods it does a
| much better job preserving your audio privacy.)
|
| So it's hard to see how this is going to succeed, when Apple
| can just copy the good part (LLM) as part of the Watch.
| dbish wrote:
| Apple watch? Cellular mode allows this, has siri built in, can
| handle calling/messaging/etc. People don't want to replace
| their phones though.
| troupo wrote:
| > along with the famous HN Dropbox thread.
|
| Most people saw the utility and the use cases of Dropbox even
| when it launched.
|
| What's the utility and use case of this? What problem does it
| solve?
| killerdhmo wrote:
| Maybe in the long term view - people correctly identifying that
| Dropbox had no differentiator (to quote Steve "this is a
| feature, not a product').
| bee_rider wrote:
| I think it looks quite neat. I dunno, maybe I played too many
| video games growing up, but the idea of UI that pops up when I
| need it in response to what's in front of me seems cool as heck.
| But it designing that UI will be challenging, and just using
| something like this for texting and other cellphone tasks seems
| like a real waste.
|
| I have a similar feeling about augmented reality glasses.
| verdverm wrote:
| Having used the Hololens 2, I can say I definitely want smart
| glasses, but not the passthrough kind, the realview with
| projected holograms kind.
|
| It was/is an amazing experience. It's really a hardware
| miniaturization at this point, except that M$ canned the device
| and team to focus on other things. Really thought this was
| their opportunity to build a device that would dominate the
| market
| nameless912 wrote:
| This is literally an episode of Big Mouth. I cannot believe this
| exists.
| animal_spirits wrote:
| I can't see this going anywhere. It won't work as soon as you
| need to put a jacket on for rain or cold weather.
| ipsum2 wrote:
| Clip it to the outside of your jacket?
| mempko wrote:
| I just watched the Humane video about their AI pin. My wife said
| it's too boring to watch and my thought was 'wow, this guy doing
| the presentation is also bored'.
|
| There has been a shortage of ADHD medication because people are
| taking it as an enhancement drug (tech folks do it a lot) and
| people who need it aren't getting it. My wife can't get hers, it
| sucks.
|
| I told her 'I guess everyone in tech is also short on ADHD
| medication now'. ;-)
| dbish wrote:
| Seems like a design choice but it was odd. Both people didn't
| smile and seemed bored as you say. A bit odd, maybe tied to
| their like of things like Fashion Week where it's more of a
| serious look then a happy one
| mempko wrote:
| The problem with ditching the screen is that people genuinely
| love reading. Vast majority of my time in the day is spent
| reading, either on screen or paper. The product with the most
| variety is books, by a long shot.
|
| They are making a device to replace the screen, yet the screen is
| a rich source of information! People love screens! Screens can
| present information non-linearly and also interactively.
|
| While voice and sound is always linear.
|
| And yes, this thing has a display, but it's low fidelity and
| cumbersome.
| ChicagoBoy11 wrote:
| Between things like the Apple watch, and the upcoming glasses-
| based interfaces, this seems to kinda do nothing well and some of
| those things, just more poorly. It's beautiful, definitely
| interesting, but seems pretty dead in the water.
|
| The MIT wearable demo from a few years ago which used a similar
| concept to project an interface in the real world was incredibly
| compelling, but mostly because it assumed near flawless real
| world AI object recognition, along with flawless projection onto
| said items. They'll need to demonstrate this on this particular
| device, before this becomes remotely interesting. Yes, it's a
| "detail", but I think for a lot of this kind of tech,
| demonstrating just how DEEPLY you can go into the interactions is
| sort of the whole point if they are thinking of replacing the
| kinds of devices that we depend on.
| make3 wrote:
| People have proved that they're willing to go far to make tech
| lighter.
|
| Wearing glasses when you can just wear nothing seems like a big
| progress to me.
|
| The only thing that remains is to make it look better imho
| troupo wrote:
| There's always physics. You can't make batteries out of
| nothing.
| Whooping7116 wrote:
| No thanks, I'll stick with my Cicret Bracelet.
| ahmedontia wrote:
| Can't help but think this is dead on arrival, wearable tech
| doesn't have a good track record. Imagine talking to someone
| while they're wearing this (sans translation feature),
| frustrating to say the least. I imagine the adjustment is too
| steep a curve for people to adopt this comfortably. That said, I
| hope they keep pushing, I guess.
| comment_ran wrote:
| I was thinking about a use case for this device. First thing,
| it's about water resistance. Is this waterproof? So I'm thinking
| about its relation to, let's say, a smart glass you have. I mean,
| they both can take a picture on camera. They can both understand
| your voice. You can use it as a microphone. So what's the thing
| that a smart glass is not able to provide?
| pzo wrote:
| Current smart glasses (like those AR glases from Meta) doesn't
| provide any screen output. Also not everyone want to wear
| glasses (and many that do need prefer contact lenses).
|
| But I agree with your point that some combination of Apple
| Watch, AirPods, Meta AR could provide a better experience and
| probably future AR glasses will have better display
| technologies.
|
| I wish though pico projectors got more maintstream in devices
| such as laptops, tablets - there could be many useful
| applications for indie devs.
| lyair1 wrote:
| It'e amazing, years of development, and at no point of time
| anyone stopped and asked: "what problem are we solving here?"
| king_magic wrote:
| Oof. Looks like a huge UX miss to me at best, and a worse version
| of Google Glass at worst.
| kleiba wrote:
| Surprised to see all the negative sentiment here. Besides the
| true point that voice-only interaction is a bad idea for public
| spaces, I think this is a very cool device with lots of
| potential.
|
| I'm especially excited about the fact that they found a really
| low-barrier user interface for using CV and AR-type functionality
| -- like, without having to put on silly glasses, and without
| having to use a second device with a screen in addition to the
| pin.
|
| Come on, this is cool! Or would you have designed (and built!) a
| better device?
| omginternets wrote:
| I think a lot of us are coming down from the high of buying
| expensive surveillance devices.
| verdverm wrote:
| Could you use this effectively while moving? Is the device
| going to jostle about? Can you keep your hand that steady (in
| relation to the projection)? Can you do this while standing,
| slouching in a chair, walking, and/or riding in a vehicle?
| Could you use it discretely, like in a meeting or waiting room?
| kleiba wrote:
| Probably yes to some of these questions and no to some
| others.
|
| But why only focus on some potential shortcomings instead of
| appreciating the positive aspects?
|
| Btw, there is no tech device out there for which I couldn't
| come up with a list of critical questions like yours.
| verdverm wrote:
| What are the positive aspects? I don't see any, this looks
| terrible to me, a waste of money for both investors and
| consumers
|
| I'm limiting my points to the physical usage concerns,
| there are more concerns if we broaden the context, many
| other commenters have pointed them out. This is not even
| the full list of physical concerns. What people wear will
| have a big impact too
| frou_dh wrote:
| The projection onto the hand is just straight up neat. I'm not
| going to buy this device, but do look forward to using that
| paradigm at some point in the future.
| jv22222 wrote:
| To monetize v1 could focus on the single purpose of tracking
| nutrition. If it somehow could estimate input / output and keep
| you on task, maybe nudging you to walk. Like a personal trainer
| on your shoulder all the time.
| callalex wrote:
| Well in their video demo they got the nutrition information
| completely wrong, so clearly the tech isn't capable of doing
| that even in a controlled environment.
| crooked-v wrote:
| > Photography was not allowed during WIRED's visit to Humane, and
| the company didn't provide WIRED a Pin to try.
|
| Clearly very confident in their product.
| catchnear4321 wrote:
| finally, a plausible contender for the mark of the beast.
| impractical, but it could be made mandatory without too much arm
| twisting.
| mocmoc wrote:
| Love it
| Kim_Bruning wrote:
| In both firefox and chrome I get a big page with a single picture
| on it. Navigation was non-obvious. Full-screen pages even at UHD.
| Firefox Readability couldn't gather enough data to provide a
| summary. When asked to provide a summary, phind.com hung for over
| a minute and didn't return a reply.
|
| You know what, I just don't think I'm the target audience for
| whatever this site is trying to sell.
| callalex wrote:
| The website is seriously unusable. I was genuinely interested
| in learning about this just because it's novel and creative,
| but every time I scroll the website on my iPhone it flings past
| several sentences then comes to rest with half-obscured
| sentences. It was so frustrating compared to a bullet list or
| slideshow that I just gave up and left.
| cududa wrote:
| I counted 14 almonds in the video. It said there were 15 grams of
| protein in the almonds. Almonds have about a quarter gram of
| protein each.
|
| Also, you can't view the total eclipse in either locations it
| stated.
| papa_bear wrote:
| Yeah that stood out to me, would need ~60 almonds to have that
| much protein.
|
| A screen would be useful for showing the details of how it
| misestimated the almond count, and let you adjust them.
| gs17 wrote:
| That's a big part of the issue to me as well, it's not going to
| be reliable. The dragonfruit example is correct, but I can't
| imagine it being accurate when it's not "single whole objects
| of average size that are in the USDA nutrition database".
| Pretty scary if you try to rely on it for something like
| translation.
| dcchambers wrote:
| The general public is being mislead on LLMs/AI and it's
| dangerous. These are indeterminate systems. We CAN NOT know what
| they are going to output.
|
| A product like this makes it very difficult to verify what it is
| telling you.
|
| As others have pointed out, their own product launch video has
| several inaccuracies in it.
| tarr11 wrote:
| Isn't this just the Halting problem? No software has the
| property of being "determinate".
| marysnovirgin wrote:
| But, but, AI is just a tool!!! No, it's not. If something else
| is making decisions for you, you're the tool.
| natch wrote:
| DOA.
|
| - too stealable, by people who will not care that a subscription
| is needed.
|
| - the act of theft will happen violently and close up, not fun.
|
| - it's an easy smallish act of violence, which means the on-ramp
| to violence is also easy. Not something most people want to
| invite into their lives.
|
| - "they" (the Committee) will say phones can also be grabbed. But
| the equation here is different. With a phone there's no hand on
| your chest, no tearing of clothing, and for a phone thieves know
| you will try harder to get it back. With this, after the violent
| taking, the shock value and the relative disposability of the
| device will stop most from chasing the thief. This will be known
| subconsciously if not outright, so the "phones are also easy to
| grab" comparison does not apply.
|
| - the features are already provided by something most everyone
| has, a smartphone.
|
| - the level of obnoxiousness of the status signaling is off the
| charts.
|
| - association with AI is not a positive for many people and is
| stigmatizing (whether the stigma is correct or not).
|
| - built in camera and recording functionality or even the
| perceived possibility of recording is also stigmatizing and
| highly antisocial.
|
| - all the voice UX inhibition concerns others have been
| mentioning.
|
| - [edit, how did I leave this out, but it's just too obvious]:
| subscription. We. Don't. Want. More. Subscriptions.
|
| On the positive side, the size is nice, it looks good, and
| reading stuff off your hand is a cool idea, although it will look
| pretty goofy. But no.
| troupo wrote:
| > too stealable, by people who will not care that a
| subscription is needed.
|
| I even doubt there will be much theft of these. People will
| simply forget these, and stop using them.
|
| So they showed one clipped to a jacket. Don't they take the
| jacket off? What's the intended usecase? That you take it off
| and re-attach to various clothign as you dress/undress? It also
| looks quite heavy, so most T-shirts and other light items of
| clothing are not really suitable for this.
| markcollin wrote:
| I liked the demo actually. But it's scary that they would have
| access to all personal details.
|
| But then Google already has access to all my data - via Gmail and
| my phone (android)
|
| Humane clearly appears to be a category creator in the making
| tobiasbischoff wrote:
| No one wants to talk to a computer in the public. How could they
| missed that after all these dump voice assistants like siri and
| alexa. No one want to capture photos without directly checking
| them afterwards. This is so out of place.
| maranathapemje wrote:
| I think they missed the opportunity to make this a smartphone.
| Humans are obsessed with their screens, and taking away the
| visual appeal of a smartphone is questionable. Although the
| target audience may be people who are actively trying to use
| fewer screens so, owning this alongside an iPad could work for
| some people.
| Osmium wrote:
| For all the reasons that this might not take off, what a thrill
| that people are trying something new--and it looks really nicely
| designed too.
|
| I think this is easy to dismiss at first glance, but I genuinely
| believe they're trying to think about a new mode of interaction.
| The idea that "the computer will disappear" is probably accurate
| in the long term. Except for content delivery (reading, photos,
| movies), most tasks we achieve via computers and phones do not
| strictly require a screen. It's probably a good thing if
| computers did a better job of getting out of the way, and stop so
| loudly disrupting human interactions.
|
| Whether this will be the solution is unclear; the
| privacy/creepiness angle is still real with an outwards-facing
| camera. Latency and battery life limitations might be too
| significant. The cost will be a non-starter for many (it is for
| me).
|
| But I'm still impressed because there was a vision here. The
| conversational interface has never worked before for many
| reasons, but that does not mean it _cannot_ work in principle, or
| that the ideal implementation would not be spellbinding. I 'm
| glad they're trying. Also, the laser display is neat!
| dj_gitmo wrote:
| I agree. This looks like a gadget, which means I probably won't
| rush to buy one, but I'm glad people are trying to push the
| envelope.
| Aperocky wrote:
| > most tasks we achieve via computers and phones do not
| strictly require a screen.
|
| X (doubt). There are unfortunately only 5 senses that our
| brains can interact with the outside world, and visual ways are
| the most information dense and the easiest to utilize. The
| screen isn't going away anytime soon.
|
| Projector to me are same as screen - they've been around for as
| long too.
|
| Though I do look forward to direct computer-brain interface,
| like introducing a 6th sense.
| eschneider wrote:
| Yeah, I expect that this will die a horrible death in the
| market, but it's definitely interesting with it's Star Trek
| vibe. :)
|
| The next generation of devices that incorporate some of these
| features might be more successful.
| ChrisLTD wrote:
| > Whether this will be the solution is unclear; the
| privacy/creepiness angle is still real with an outwards-facing
| camera.
|
| I don't think you're wrong, but it's funny that we aren't as
| concerned about everyone walking around with outwards-facing
| _phone_ cameras.
| niemal_dev wrote:
| Well said.
| yreg wrote:
| Or microphones being present absolutely everywhere.
|
| I myself never felt like taping my camera, I feel like if
| someone pwned my system I would be much more worried about
| the leaked audio.
| vineyardmike wrote:
| First, I'm really excited people are trying new things, but I
| won't be buying this just based on the demo.
|
| > The conversational interface has never worked before for many
| reasons, but that does not mean it cannot work in principle,
| .... I'm glad they're trying. Also, the laser display is neat!
|
| So I did a lot of work over the years to research voice UI/UX
| and I'm very skeptical about this, even with the LLM stuff. I
| think an LLM was missing from the Siri/alexa era to transform
| it from "audio cli" to "chat interface" but there's a few
| reasons besides that it didn't catch on.
|
| The information density and linearity of chat, voice
| especially, is a big problem.
|
| When you look at a screen, your eyes can move in 2 dimensions.
| You can have sidebars, you can have text fields organized in
| paragraphs and buttons and bars etc. Not so with chatting -
| when you add linearity (you can only listen to or read one
| thing at a time, conversation can only present one list at a
| time) it becomes really slow to navigate any sort of decision
| or menu trees. Mobile-first have simplified this of course, but
| it's not enough. Reading TTS becomes even slower to find the
| info you care about. It's found a place for simple controls
| (smarthome, media, timers, etc) and simple information
| retrieval (weather, announce doorbell, read last text). Then
| there's the obvious problem of talking out loud in public,
| false response recognition etc which are necessary evils of a
| voice UI.
|
| I think the best hope for a voice device like this is to (as
| they've done) focus on simple experiences like "what's I miss
| recently" and hope an AI can do a good enough job.
|
| The laser display might help with presenting a full menu at
| once (media controls being an easy example), but it probably
| will end up being a pain to use (eg like a worse smartwatch).
|
| Honestly though, my biggest hesitation (which could end up
| great) is the "pin" design. It's novel, especially with the
| projector, but how heavy is it and how will that impact the
| comfort of my clothes? What about when wearing a jacket or
| scarf? Will this flop around while walking? Etc.
| dukeyukey wrote:
| Any word when it'll be released outside the US?
| bitsoda wrote:
| This will absolutely be a commercial failure. I don't harbor any
| ill will to anybody in the company, and I wish them the best, but
| a voice interface in public is a complete non-starter. What is
| the use-case for this device for which a comparably-priced
| smartphone isn't better...much better? The only real
| distinguishing feature this thing has over a smartphone is
| projection, and even that doesn't seem too difficult to tack onto
| future models.
|
| Once the AI Pin replies with a "sorry, couldn't get that" a few
| times, people will give up on it and reach for their phones. I
| could see it finding some success in the accessibility market,
| but outside of niche applications, I don't think this thing
| sticks around.
| blueridge wrote:
| "...a voice interface in public is a complete non-starter."
|
| As I sit in a crowded coffee shop at a shared table, with three
| people who are on meetings and talking away about sensitive
| things. Right next to one another! Along the wall there are two
| people chatting on their phones to family, one of them on
| speaker.
|
| People don't care, they don't have manners.
| ShamelessC wrote:
| I think what you want is a public library. Or some
| headphones.
| goalonetwo wrote:
| Once in a while I catch up with friends in a coffee shop and
| I usually get some death stares from those remote laptop
| workers.
|
| A coffee shop is NOT supposed to be quiet. If you want
| quietness go to a library.
| what-no-tests wrote:
| Great website! It looks wonderful on my powerful new Mac.
|
| Also, I like how the focus appears to be on how it will benefit
| the user, instead of focusing on tech specs.
|
| Data privacy and personal security aside, I understand there will
| be a reciprocal action between lifestyle and technology. We might
| have to change our lifestyle to make room for and benefit from
| new technology tools, just as we have for smart phones.
|
| If kids get interested in it, then it will have a chance. If it's
| cool and fun, then it has a chance. If it actually makes things
| easier and better, then it could take off.
|
| But if it has that cringe factor like google glass had, then it
| will never get anywhere.
|
| The possibilities are awesome, but something like this requires a
| reinforcing feedback loop on top of a network effect to become
| successful.
| hokkos wrote:
| What I find the most interesting is the battery booster idea,
| there seems to be a mini battery inside the main computer part
| (to allow hot swapping of the booster), and the booster attach
| magnetically on the opposite side of the garment to bring the
| main source of power wirelessly. I would have loved this idea of
| battery hot swapping when smartphone used to have very poor
| battery, and it can makes product more durable because it is
| extremely simple to change the battery.
| ShamelessC wrote:
| This is mostly achieved already thanks to the magnetic wireless
| charging standard found in many new phones and all the Apple
| ones. Replaceable internal batteries is still largely
| unavailable, but at least you can bolster the internal one and
| the same way as this pin.
| demarq wrote:
| That subscription is priceeeey, the responses in the demo were
| off.
|
| However those are things that can change. So I don't worry about
| that.
|
| The form factor is innovative, and the laser display (which they
| didn't lean into) is very cool!
| magicsmoke33 wrote:
| Trying to play the linked video just crashes the page on
| MobileSafari, but I found their presentation on Youtube.
|
| It's almost as if they held their two most apathetic employees at
| gunpoint in a laboratory. Safe to say I've never seen that level
| of ennui in any startup's presentation before.
| gizajob wrote:
| Aren't they the founders? It did strike me that already a
| minute in and they were bored with what they had to say about
| the product, like they'd already watched their lifetime's share
| of Apple demos. At least when the Segway was launched we had
| weeks of building OMFG!!! hype around how it was going to be
| the worlds most radical new transportation device. Even the
| presenters of the hu.ma.ne website seem like they're riddled
| with ennui, as you say, or just unenthused with presenting. It
| in no way seemed like the launch of a game changing new device.
| Plus, referring to their website, has anyone in history had
| cause to ask an AI assistant "how much is a vintage photograph
| of an eclipse going for?" like seriously?? And using this
| device as a speaker while roller skating in a city? I couldn't
| even hear my iPhone Pro Max on full volume in an environment
| like that. Unless this device is phenomenally good and
| responsive, it's going to flop so so hard in so many ways.
| People's tolerance for latency and inaccuracy is low.
| bilsbie wrote:
| Does this run an LLM on device?
| gizajob wrote:
| Haha in the demo he asks "when is the next solar eclipse and
| where is the best place to see it?" - The AI responds correctly
| that it's on April the 8th 2024, but then clearly hallucinates
| like crazy and says "the best places to see it are in Exmouth,
| Australia and East Timor" which is totally incorrect - this
| eclipse will be visible only in North America, and invisible in
| Australia and East Timor. Good job he didn't ask it to book
| flights to Australia on the 7th of April.
|
| You'd think your tech demo would check to see if your AI was
| hallucinating!
| dang wrote:
| Related ongoing thread:
|
| _The Humane AI Pin Launches Its Campaign to Replace Phones_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38207656 - Nov 2023 (130
| comments)
| gs17 wrote:
| > there are no wake words, so it's not always listening [...] it
| doesn't do anything until you engage with it, and your engagement
| comes through your voice, touch, gesture, or laser ink display
|
| I'm guessing they mean a combination, so you need to touch AND do
| something else. But taken literally the gesture option implies
| they're also always watching.
|
| > if it's ever physically tampered with, it will require service
| from Humane to restore operation
|
| So it's entirely non-repairable?
|
| --
|
| I also love the "you can shop in the real world" example where
| they imply the scenario is him going into a physical bookstore
| (they say "retail") and yell out that you're looking up if it's
| cheaper online and buying it there.
| ge96 wrote:
| I remember version 1 of this thing, Sixth Sense
| rpmisms wrote:
| Maybe this is simply getting older, but this feels gross. I don't
| want my technology to feel this opaque. The form factor is a
| little silly, too. Why not a smartwatch? Tech like this produces
| glassholes.
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