HP Acquires Humane's AI Software
humane.com
humane.com
> https://support.humane.com/hc/en-us/articles/34243204841997-...
The only feature they could think of was “battery level”? That’s hilarious
https://support.humane.com/hc/en-us/articles/34243204841997-...
I like that it says “battery level, etc”. I’d really like to see the full list of features.
“What is my purpose?”
“You say your battery level.”
“Oh my God.”
"What's the most pointless matter-of-fact thing we could say/do in any given situation, just for the sake of the checkmark of having said/done it?"
> Device Features: Your Ai Pin features will no longer include calling, messaging, Ai queries/responses, or cloud access.
For a $700 device that was on the market for less than a year, that is a not a stellar way to treat your customers. Fortunately it seems there were very few of those.
[0] https://support.humane.com/hc/en-us/articles/34374173951373-...
> Humane’s daily returns are outpacing sales
https://www.theverge.com/2024/8/7/24211339/humane-ai-pin-mor...
One that’s dependent on the company’s servers to operate? Almost no f’ing way.
Until the cycle of release something great so we can exit by selling to big tech is broken, great products are just going to be snuffed out by the giant competitors to be turned into over-monetized products.
You have to be a right knob to describe this as a “transition”
If the hardware requires software that is not available for self service, then the customer is entitled for full refund at any time.
In other words if the hardware is just an accessory for providing service through software then the money the user pays for the hardware should be considered a refundable deposit.
I’d rather they were forced to release their software to the public, making it a requirement without which bankruptcy or sales would be refused by regulatory agencies. That way hobbyists could still get them to work, perhaps even launch a new company to revive the old devices (reducing e-waste). Additionally, we could detect if they had been doing anything shady with the data.
*or they were violating open source licenses like some startups just do.
But in either case a reasonable fine could be appropriate.
Yes, but in this specific scenario the purchasing entity is far from bankrupt at least financially.
If you want to go the other way, a hardware that requires a paid service should be jail-breakable. If the designated service stops working, then the service should be open-sourced. (We would love this on HN but just imagine the OpenSource overload engineers like us would be overwhelmed with to the point no one would try.)
If a service it depends on goes away within X years (5? 10?) you're owed a prorated refund.
In this case, Humane would likely go bankrupt rather than pay out the refunds your regulation would require, so it would still be ineffective in protecting consumers.
An average person does not do or know how to do the due diligence of product validation, and I'd argue even the tech-savvy of us are unable to figure out if a product is going to stick around or not since what info is being given to us for analysis is limited, and heavily watered down.
Food and water safety certainly fall in that category! Ensuring that early adopters of useless $700 widgets are “protected” against startups going bankrupt or otherwise discontinuing / canceling the product doesn’t seem worth anyone’s concern.
Some people’s reaction to observing anything in society that they don’t like is “that should be banned!” I don’t think that’s an appropriate reaction.
The proposed regulation would dramatically increase the risk of any investment in a new consumer hardware startup. And, there are not that many of these startups in the first place, because they’re risky enough as it is! So, the net result would be less innovation and less startups doing hardware, and I don’t think that would be a net improvement.
I don't understand how libertarians look at the current state of things and conclude that fewer regulations would solve the problem.
Worse. It requires that doing so is effectively free. Otherwise, a successful strategy is to lower your product quality compared to your competitors by an amount just shy of the cost of discovering the lower quality. This leads to a race to the bottom.
Making a product cheaper to produce without affecting what people care about (or, equivalently, improving the performance without increasing the cost) is what drives productivity growth, and the relentless competitive pressure to do so is what produced the modern world. It’s not fun or easy, and yes, sitting on your ass would be easier. Oh well!
If you’re not saying that, then what is so hard to understand about the conclusion that we could solve some problems by repealing bad regulations?
This is a completely new product, in a category that never existed and no one was desperately demanding. It was bought with the disposable income of wealthy people who enjoy trying new technology and knew exactly the risk they were taking. Are you seriously going to dispute that? Why is this a space that needs to be regulated?
I had a meeting last week whose sole purpose was for me to re-describe something a couple times which I had already described in text. And which also could be found in vendor documentation.
I also know someone who seems to think that (almost?) anything pushed on the Internet must be true.
This regulation will transfer that requirement from the consumer to the maker so that the maker can choose to create products they issue full refund when they can’t guarantee perpetual software availability or they can choose to make all the software available with the product. It also avoids dictating how the product should be designed when doing all that.
Plus monthly subscription.
https://www.theverge.com/news/614883/humane-ai-hp-acquisitio...
> After the shutdown, offline features like “battery level” will still work, Humane says, but “any function that requires cloud connectivity like voice interactions, AI responses, and .Center access” will not.
I'd really like to know if the Humane PR flack typed that with a straight face.
But no, I wouldn't be able to write that sentence myself without wanting to find the closest hole to hide out of embarrassment.
But yeah what you said is way worse
The LG version never looked like anything Palm/HP put out, which makes me wonder what LG actually bought, but it's still around.
I can't wait for an HP AI printer
Their smart magic control is best in class too.
I just can’t imagine there was anyone who both knew it existed and didn’t know it was garbage.
The only reason I can see anyone having bought one at that point is because they wanted to own an interesting little failure in gadget history. And even then just buy one used, there was no point in spending $700.
Getting such articles written in the first place shows some level of business connections. I don't like that people will throw so much money away on hype, especially when so many useful products languish, but it's the world we live in.
But you knew it was a failure at that point, that’s why you were buying it. You wouldn’t have been expecting it to be a good product for the next couple of years. Otherwise you wouldn’t have been interested.
For those with premium credit cards, this is why I suggest always putting electronics on that card. In my experience, the extended warranty coverage kicks in if and when the original merchant is unwilling or unable to cover their initial warranty (as well as for 12 months thereafter); this is clearly a violation of fitness for purpose, so I'd expect zero issue in getting this refunded by the CC folk.
Like, I think they recognize that printing is a dying business. They want to pivot to something else, but they have no idea what to pivot to. They keep buying out other companies, but then effectively canceling the product.
I doubt so, that's 100M+ USD that disappeared.
Yes, Humane burned through $200M of investor capital, and some of it was spent on salaries for employees. The employees likely accepted lower cash salaries than were otherwise competitive, in exchange for equity which is now worthless. What is your point exactly?
Are you suggesting the employees pulled a fast one somehow because the investors paid their salaries? That’s, obviously, how venture-backed startups work, and everyone involved (especially the investors) is very aware of the trade. In exchange, the investors own much more of the company than the employees and have a much higher upside potential if the company succeeds.
I've worked at large companies that were so focused on the quarterly results that almost everything was incremental; that were so entrenched that very little changed at all; that were so tech-debt-laden and understaffed that almost nothing could get done; and where tech was simply not the focus. None of that is fun.
The risk-reward aspect is secondary to the philosophy of the place for me.
Of course if you are externally hired engineer it could be that you really have to do hard work, but, again, it depends.
You're being facetious, right? Or is there indeed some definition of customers that allows for negative numbers?
:%s/Cloud/AI/g
So they'll hang around as some sort of director-level Thought Leaders or something? Sounds like a safe and lucrative landing.
2: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-02-18/hp-116-mi...
What, did the state of California ask them to develop a new punishment for tech workers convicted of murder? Is Hans Reiser being tortured with this?
In version 2 it will be able to nag^W persuade you to buy genuine HP ink, by reminding you repeatedly the benefits of genuine HP ink.
If you like I could call you on your cell to remind you, send you a text, email you, or I could just shout loudly from right here in printer!
HP Printer: "I'm sorry Jeff, I'm afraid I can't do that"
Our bright, shiny future...
I don’t see how they have anything of value at all other than patents.
It's possible they think the OS and the team that built it could have value if put to better uses than building an AI pin.
I still remember a few of the previous ones, like ”A mundane everyday thing…on a computer!” and ”The same thing every company has been doing for decades…but over the internet!”
Be mentally prepared for a few decades of stifled innovation, as every perfectly-ordinary-thing-but-with-ai patent is suppressing the market
> Device, method, and graphical user interface for accessing an application in a locked device
> Ornamental design for a user interface for a computer display
I have no idea what the invention (or design) is in this one.
$700 hardware can't do more than that?
They didn't start with a VC-friendly strategy of free-then-paid to acquire market share. There was an off-putting monthly subscription right at the start. No confusion about what this product's business model or target customer was.
Contrast that to the ham-fisted way Apple, Android and Microsoft are attempting to bootstrap their AI offerings by jamming it into successful hardware products and sneaking users into it with dark patterns to opt them in.
Did you forget that they released a video that proudly demonstrated the AI pin hallucinating the date of the eclipse? They then went back and memory-holed the mistake: https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/13/23959473/humane-will-be-...
In every single public appearance, Imran was clearly trying to project an image of some Zen master version of Steve Jobs. I think you have a massive misread of this company and the hubris of its founders.
I dunno:
"Humane AI Pin founders banned internal criticism" https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/06/report-humane-ai-pin...
"The Disappearing Computer — and a World Where You Can Take AI Everywhere | Imran Chaudhri" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMsQO5u7-NQ
From The New York Times' coverage of the company (https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/06/technology/humane-ai-pin....):
> Many current and former employees said Mr. Chaudhri and Ms. Bongiorno preferred positivity over criticism, leading them to disregard warnings about the Ai Pin’s poor battery life and power consumption. A senior software engineer was dismissed after raising questions about the product, they said, while others left out of frustration.
> One [issue] was the device’s laser display, which consumed tremendous power and would cause the pin to overheat. Before showing the gadget to prospective partners and investors, Humane executives often chilled it on ice packs so it would last longer, three people familiar with the demonstrations said.
> When employees expressed concerns about the heat, they said, Humane’s founders replied that software improvements reducing power use would fix it. Mr. Chaudhri, who led design, wanted to keep the gadget’s sleek design, three people said.
> In January, Humane laid off about 10 employees. A month later, a senior software engineer was let go after she questioned whether the Ai Pin would be ready by April. In a company meeting after the dismissal, Mr. Chaudhri and Ms. Bongiorno said the employee had violated policy by talking negatively about Humane, two attendees said.
Not even sure now if man is a fraud or a complete delulu.
Most of the tech sector has this problem, which is why they rug pull customers with the price the second the VC money dries up. We're inured to seeing 10-20% price increases every year for SaaS, because the acquisition price point was artifically low.
I'm glad a company decided to just set a "market price" for once. Unfortunately it failed and rugpulled customers by doing so.
You couldn't even connect the Ai Pin to your phone ?! Lock-in makes sense but it was a very risky bet.
Essential viewing: Review of the Ai Pin - The Worst Product I've Ever Reviewed... For Now (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TitZV6k8zfA)
Disruption is incredibly difficult but this product was giving off Juicero vibes from the start.
Pre and post 3G mobile broadband were different worlds.
But it did what it needed enough to be extremely compelling. And it improved very fast in the early years.
It wasn’t long before we had Maps, Latitude, Yelp, Four Square, Twitter, so many possibilities due to combo of camera + mobile broadband + GPS + battery technology to allow on the go computation and communication.
iPhone was late to the 3G game. It was one of the complaints of the original iPhone, that it didn't have 3G despite so many other devices out there already having it.
I guess it could also have have just been a superior business strategy to compel ATT to offer unlimited data so that people could freely explore the possibilities without worrying about overage charges.
It was only like $15/mo for unlimited data to add to my dumb phone plan. I didn't use the free dumb phone with the plan, I just popped the SIM into other devices.
The iPhone was pleasant to use, or at least not actively infuriating. That was, to a large extent, all it took.
Nokia really messed up, here; there was nothing stopping them making an iPhone-ish thing (perhaps without multitouch) a few years previous to the iPhone coming out, and there was even a semi-decent third party browser for their platform (Opera) which they could have taken cues from or bought, but they were always far more excited about the featurephone market, seeing smartphones as a niche.
There's a lot to post-mortem here, but failures like these are part of an entrepreneurial culture.
It's important to note that the AI Pin powered by ChatGPT was a bit of a pivot. If ChatGPT never came out, they wouldn't have even had that. It would have been more like having a dedicated Siri or Alexa device to do really basic stuff with. I can't imagine how much worse the product was going to be. What investor say that early pitch and work and was like, "sign me up?"
Humane's series C was in 2023, long after the end of ZIRP. They will still throw huge sums of money at you for the dumbest idea, provided that you say the magic term 'AI' enough.
Perplexity investors probably think it will get acquired some day by some big co.
(Since 1999 that is)
I am glad someone will take the tech. But I am upset it is HP and I doubt they have a vision for the product.
>The end of an AI hardware experiment. Lots of reasons this didn’t do well, from trying to get people to do something they don’t already do (wear a computer on their clothes) to poor execution. The research @IrenaCronin and I do shows glasses are the form factor but they are still years from having decent all color displays. Until then it will be hard to get people to use much other than their phones.
Ignoring the massive industry of people actively having their eyeballs cut open and lasered just to avoid wearing glasses.
Huh, has Scoble... matured and grown? Got to admit I haven't been paying attention to him for a long time, but the above is discordant, coming from Google Glass Superfan Number One.
Frustrating, because his "Next year Apple will..." predictions in his AR/VR phase were wild and utterly out there. I remember he predicted Apple Glasses the size of small sunglasses were coming next year. There was also a prediction of a completely transparent iPhone, just a pane of glass. I still wonder how that would have worked in his mind.
I wish they'd slim it down and make it affordable for a normal human so they can iterate on it. But even then I would not buy it unless someone gets us to an unlocked bootloader and Linux.
Humane rep: Here’s what we can do. We can just shut it down. The fine print says we can.
HP rep: Excellent! You’ll fit right in here at HP!
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40598742
[1] https://www.theverge.com/2024/6/6/24172718/humane-ai-pin-sel...
The only reason a dinosaur like HP is even buying out this no-name player.
The basic premise that people would want to wear a device as a pin is an industrial design failure.
The entire product is bad industrial design. Being built with nice materials is not automatically good industrial design.
It was a scam destined to fail and HP is making a stupid acquisition of worthless tech.
Teenage Engineering also helped with that, so it makes sense.
Sounds easy but it took 6 years of hard work!
Founders and employees would get nothing out of this (aside from whatever HP is giving them directly as incentive to stick around).
It's a pity that we do not have a version of "Who's holding the bag?"[1] for LP and VC funds, but with all challenges to raise money, it would be interesting to see how many funds are losing money at the moment.
This is the inherent feature from VC funds but still, one thing is raise cheap money and having a "circular" money flowing (from A -> B - (...) -> IPO -> A) but if they do not arrive even in the IPO how this ecosystem will work if a US 5 Year Coupon pays 4.40%?
[1] - https://pscmevents.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Who-Is-Hol...
Start with: an AI which emits a binary yes/no to, “Should I invest some of this $230 million such that it becomes $115 million 5 years from now.”
I meant to ask "If you were to get $230 million, how would you plan to generate as much money as Humane was able to generate during the length of its existence". Do you have an answer?
> an AI which emits a binary yes/no to, “Should I invest some of this $230 million such that it becomes $115 million 5 years from now.”
If you were pitching that to me, I'd ask: what is the AI's confidence in its answer, and how can you verify that?
Humane generated negative $114M. They turned $230M into $116M.
My prospectus is to buy a $1M house, throw $1M parties every day for a month, and burn the house down at the end and sell the charred remains for $1. I'll take a million dollar salary for these services. Then I'll shut it all down and return the leftovers to the investors.
So total expenses for this endeavor: $1M + 31 * $1M + $1M in salaries so $33M. That's $81M better than Humane did, and I'll do it in less time!
> Humane raised $240 million in funding from high-profile investors, including Marc Benioff, the chief executive of Salesforce, and his counterpart at OpenAI, Sam Altman
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/18/technology/hp-humane-ai-p...
Why would it need to be AI? VC investors care about making money, not how.
These guys figured out an entire new category of hardware peripheral, and did what I understood to be some pretty cool engineering to make it work.
WHY do people push this closed off ecosystem stuff? Seriously I do not get it.
That thing failed to explain what it does and how. As one reviewer said, “with this battery, I can spend a whole day”.
Can’t believe they managed to find someone to buy this nothing-burger for $100m+.
Maybe I missed something though.
does spit-take
Pretty sure the person means HP bought a joke of a company/product because of the marketing.
I feel its more a cargo cult mentality among the executives.