One of the most anticipated AI gadgets now has a release date | Hacker News Reader

One of the most anticipated AI gadgets now has a release date

inverse.com

23 pointsgalaxyLogic33 comments

If anyone else was wondering why this is a physical device

> Why aren’t all these AI gadgets just an app? The answer is actually really simple: phones and tablets don’t allow AI deep system-level access. The iPhone, especially, is a closed platform that Apple wouldn’t allow AI complete access to.

The quote that comes right after is much more scary:

> The “Her”/R2D2 interface for Consumer AI must SEE everything that you do on your screen. It needs to understand your life in order to help it (incl. when not using).

> You CANNOT do this unless you own the Operating System a person uses for their Work and/or Personal lives.

Good point. The main thing about AI assistant is you must be able to totally trust it. Not sure if that is the case with Apple.

Don't accessibility apps generally have permissions to see and touch anything on the screen?

Glad the iPhone has basic OS hygiene.

Because someone read and wanted to replicate "The Diamond Age"?

That's only one factor. I think the thing that is going to trigger a phase shift when it comes to interacting with LLMs is reducing response latency to conversational ranges by running enough of the models offline. You say something and it starts responding immediately, you interrupt it mid-sentence and it adjusts immediately. That is going to be revolutionary.

Also a needed feature is speech-understanding, which requires a microphone, which everybody has in their gadget.

That’s a non answer.

What would they need “system level access” for? I need to see/hear one actual task that I CAN do on that device that I would not be able to do if it was an app.

At the very least it needs to be always on, or have a dedicated button to quickly activate it. Launching an app is cumbersome on iPhone, it's just too slow if you want an always-on assistant.

It needs to understand what all apps on your device are doing and be able to control them, rather just the one app used for AI.

I’m looking forward to getting mine. I wholly get the skepticism from tech circles, but I’m an eternal optimist. I hope this thing blows me away like my first iPod Touch did: “so this is what the future is like”.

And if not, it wasn’t super expensive as far as desk fidgets go.

> eternal optimist

You’re on the wrong website lol.

Personally my main issue with it is just, what does it afford me that my phone does not?

From the looks of it, there isn’t anything.

Why couldn’t it just be an app? (other than it’d be harder to market)

That’s where my skepticism comes from.

I’m a meta-contrarian.

That’s a very fair point, but I could imagine Apple not helping them make a Siri competitor useful.

We’ll see. This may be another CueCat. But it might also be an iPod! Let’s find out.

I’d assume that if the LLM driven voice control pattern is really compelling, then Apple will eventually integrate a LLM with Siri and just destroy any device like rabbit in the market.

Doesn’t matter if rabbit is on the App Store or not.

Very true. Then I can brag that I was using it before it was cool, and seethe when Apple implies that they invented it. It’s a win-win.

Yeah I mean regardless how successful it is, it’s a part of computing history.

Luckily for us DOJ is now suing Apple for monopolistic behavior

Genuinely curious, is there a more optimistic website?

YouTube has a lot of very AI-optimistic channels, believe it or not.

I can see two gadgets, one in my left pocket and another in the right. One for communicating with others, one for communicating with my future self i.e. my AI-self.

This comment is literally everything I dislike about the current AI hype cycle.

Who exactly is anticipating it? After viewing the non-scripted videos of its use, it is obvious that the thing is very laggy and rather limited. Just wait one version and both iOS and Android will include all the functionality at part of the OS.

When I use apps on my phone I communicate with a specific app at any given time. If I'm making a phone-call my inputs go to the phone-app, not to a specific AI-app. So if there was an AI-app I would have to separately activate it and talk to it, else it would not be hearing and seeing what I am doing with my gadget. As pointed out by others it is unclear if Apple would like a 3rd party app which sees and hears and can control everything. Whereas a separate gadget can do that.

Apple could do that and maybe they will try something like that, but they are not there yet. And Apple's interest is Apple's interest, not your interest. A separate gadget they cannot control.

Looks like a neat toy.

I'd rather them implement a full phone though, I'd be down for an alternative OS that isn't owned by Google or Apple.

Maybe that's the next step

Their gadget could communicate with your phone over BlueTooth when needed.

Never heard about it. Even the article itself admits that this is an obsolete technology once Android and iOS integrate AI into their systems, so this is quite an ironic title. Come back when hardware designed for ML training and/or interference with proper pytorch compatibility becomes readily available for hobbyists.

> Come back when hardware designed for ML training and/or interference with proper pytorch compatibility becomes readily available for hobbyists.

In a way it's already here: regular cpu (and/or gpu) with enough RAM & storage can do it. But what specialized hardware could do:

Bring whole classes of AI uses that don't need that much processing power, into reach of "roll your own, run locally & cut Google/MS/Amazon etc out of the loop". In a power-efficient manner.

That could be a game changer for sure.

I'm happy to see the weird & wonderful AI powered gadgets that will flood the market. But buy any? Will depend a lot on "does it enable company X to look over your shoulder 24/7, yes or no?".

Batch 6

But - I am SO looking forward to getting this. I have Perplexity Pro anyway, so getting it included just made this a steal. If I hate it, I can just sell on and keep the perplexity pro.

I anticipate Avi Schiffmann's "Tap" a hundred times more. In fact I believe in the concept so much that I would invest all my money and time in it.

I assume you mean "Tab" - https://www.fastcompany.com/91007630/avi-schiffmanns-tab-ai-...

Exactly. This typo / ambiguity will likely persist till the end of the singularity ;)

This thing is gonna look great on people's shelves

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