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Time Magazine's Best Inventions of 2023 Award for Humane's AI Pin
- causi 3y agoAKA "The worst product I've ever reviewed" according to Marques Brownlee. People need to stop falling for the hype-bullshit-industrial complex. Manufactured attention is the only reason a publisher would give positive attention to a device that replicates the functionality of a bluetooth earbud at a cost of $700 plus $25 a month.
- browningstreet 3y ago> hype-bullshit-industrial complex I didn't get the feeling that anyone was falling for Humane's modest hype. The coverage has generally been pretty skeptical. No one seemed to believe that Humane made a quantum leap over Alexa & Siri, which both suck. EDITING since downvoters who didn't read the article may not know that "*(Investors in Humane include TIME co-chairs and owners Marc and Lynne Benioff)", hence, this hype was pretty fake
- causi 3y agoSubmitting its reception of Time's "best invention of the year" to HN is an example of someone falling for it.
- nashashmi 3y agoJohn Gruber is remarking on the irony of best invention of the year before it was released, yet turning out to be the worst product ever after it was released. Time magazine owners are investors in the device.
- jjtheblunt 3y agoDid you read the linked submission? It points out the curiosity that investors in Humane are influential in Time's decision of what to call a Best Invention of 2023.
- mikestew 3y agoI submitted it. If you think I "<fell> for it", I am left with no choice but to question your comprehension of TFA. To be clear: I think Time's awarding of this honor has already aged like a fine dog turd in summer sun. The reason it was submitted was because Gruber does a better job at snark than I do.
- moralestapia 3y agoI saw that video (as everyone did) and I'm on the camp that Humane did not deserve that. I would never get a (v1) Humane pin but, all things considered, is a somewhat decent product that had to go through it's mandatory share of R&D, product design, manufacturing, etc... One thing is to provide a review like "you know these are the current limitations of the thing, etc..." another one is to just bash it like a spoiled child. Marques has spoken much more favorably of much worse performing products. Anyway if you want the moralestapia's review of Humane, I think it opened up a new category of products and it's pretty decent for a first release. It doesn't give me any benefit over a regular smartphone right now, but I can definitely see hundreds of millions of these devices being worn by people (and dogs and whatnot) in the next decade (maybe not from Humane, who knows). I also really like the idea of "Ambient Computing", they did not create it but they embraced it, and that is quite nice.
- bryanlarsen 3y agoMKB's review may be beneficial for them in the end by establishing a low baseline. In comparison to the MKB review of V1, V2 and V3 reviews may be glowing and help sell product.
- coffeebeqn 3y agoIf they survive this. I’m sure they had an absurd amount of investment to blow through over the next decade like Magic Leap
- JohnFen 3y ago> I can definitely see hundreds of millions of these devices being worn by people (and dogs and whatnot) in the next decade Good lord, so many people I'd have to avoid being around. I really hate this future we're building.
- coffeebeqn 3y agoWhat - you don’t want big tech (and their intelligence partners) tracking your every move with facial recognition from 4k “AI” cameras on every lapel?
- m3kw9 3y agoGPT3.5 turbo wrappers are gonna get steamrolled
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- drexlspivey 3y agoThey must be using at least GPT4.5 since it can see images right?
- ben_w 3y agoIt reminds me of the Segway: Lots of hype, "meh" reaction for the reality… …but 20 years later, our cities were changed by the widespread arrival of cheap two-wheeled battery powered personal transport devices with almost the same footprint and handle post. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorized_scooter#E-scooters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorized_scooter#E-scooters And now I think about it, I recon a Segway would solve several of the problems that e-scooters have. If we've not all been turned into paperclips and/or got chips in our brains and/or global thermonuclear war, I can believe the tech improves to enable the hype.
- rrr_oh_man 3y ago> And now I think about it, I recon a Segway would solve several of the problems that e-scooters have. By `problems that e-scooters have` you mean being light, mobile, cheap, and not dorky? Edit: just found this gem: "So there may be a way to capture more of the market Segway hoped to reach: make a version that doesn't look so easy for the rider. It would also be helpful if the styling was in the tradition of skateboards or bicycles rather than medical devices." [1] [1] https://paulgraham.com/segway.html https://paulgraham.com/segway.html
- mikestew 3y agoI own several electric scooters. That said, "not dorky" is not a feature I think of, especially when my middle-aged ass is riding it.
- rrr_oh_man 3y agoHah, add cargo shorts and tucked-in polo for the trifecta :-)
- LegitShady 3y agoAnd socks with sandals.
- CuriouslyC 3y ago
- jamesmcintyre 3y agoIf I'm putting myself in the shoes of the founders or executive team- just wondering how many parameters being dialed differently could have shaped the launch for the better (or worse). I'm imagining all the stakeholders arguments: "the laser projector adds X more development months, X less hours of battery life, and X more costs to manufacture due to higher power needs therefore bigger battery, more heat management.. should we launch v1 without it? We can just push-notify your phone if we detect they need a display and they're reaching for their phone, they swipe notification and we take them to exactly what we were trying to show them. Or we can show it on their watch and it would serve as a forcing function for us to build out the voice UX to try and do more with voice." "I get that we're introducing a new ux modality but shouldn't we give user's a pathway that blends between already heavily embedded habits (smartphone, watch) to ours? User's should be able to carry on existing txt conversations from their phones, call from their existing phone numbers, hear notifications from their phone, etc. In fact- these could be great hooks for us to get them used to using our natural language UX more frequently." "I get that the device needs to look like beautiful jewelry but metal is heavier- can't we find a way to make a fully plastic enclosure look high-end?" "Our software stack isn't ready! We can put compute and llms closer to the edge to reduce latency, train 'micro-llms' for very specific tasks that will run faster and cheaper, etc. etc." For all of these hypothetical contentions I can equally imagine very valid reasons for choosing the paths Humane has chosen. Letting these objections always drive the product development could have resulted in a much worse outcome. There's a plethora of anecdotes about Steve Job's refusing to compromise on the many facets of the original iPhones design but if I had to guess there are less stories repeated about how many compromises he was ok with. It's been notoriously difficult to introduce new consumer product categories- if it was easy or more obvious the Apple watch would already be at-parity with 80-90% of the features (which one would assume is what will happen in short order, watch & airpods as proxies to an embedded+edge llms on iPhone). I can understand viewpoints from both those who are trashing the Humane ai pin and those excited about it but one thing I'm happy to see is a team of this caliber making bold moves (and a investment ecosystem to support it). With v1 out (remember, a lot of hardware startup never make it this far) and the community responding it will be interesting to see how deftly they can navigate rapidly iterating and improve the ux.
- 3y ago
- TheBlight 3y agoIf I understand this correctly, the idea is for us all to wear cameras and microphones pinned to our chests and pay them for this honor?
- schainks 3y agoMass surveillance is best propagated through "nifty" consumer devices.
- bhhaskin 3y agoI mean we already have cameras and microphones in our pockets & homes. Hell even at tables of most restaurants.
- JohnFen 3y agoThe cameras and microphones on our phones are hard to use to record others with surreptitiously, and there are pretty strong social mores against doing so. A pin (or eyeglasses, or other such wearables) is a beast of an entirely different color. But even if there weren't such a difference, I'd argue that just because a bad thing exists doesn't mean we shouldn't fight against more of that bad thing. > Hell even at tables of most restaurants. What sort of restaurants are these? I can't remember seeing one at the table of any restaurant I've been to.
- bhhaskin 3y agoAll of the self serve tablets/kiosks have mics and cameras. Are they actively used? No idea. But they are there.
- JohnFen 3y agoAh, I've never seen self-serve tablets/kiosks (outside of McDonald's, anyway, which doesn't count and aren't at the table) in restaurants, so I have no idea what their capabilities are. I've heard of them, of course, but thought they were incredibly rare, thus my confusion.
- mvdtnz 3y agoObviously there's some missing context here. Dude is making a huge assumption that we know what the hell he's talking about with > And now that it has shipped, and appears poised to go down in history as an Edsel-like infamous bomb Is there a better link I can read?
- ahahahahah 3y agoSure: https://www.google.com/search?q=humane+ai+pin+review https://www.google.com/search?q=humane+ai+pin+review
- ahahahahah 3y agoLike it's not even hard to find this information, you don't even need to click. The headlines I see are: YouTuber trashes Humane AI Pin, sparks firestorm over damage to startup Humane AI Pin: much-hyped gadget rocked by bad reviews Humane Ai Pin Review: Too Clunky, Too Limited Humane AI Pin review: the post-smartphone future isn’t here yet Humane AI Pin review: not even close The Worst Product I've Ever Reviewed... For Now The Humane AI Pin solves nothing and makes me feel stupid __________ Like i don't know, authors need to be able to assume their readers have some context and the ability to independently research the things that they don't understand.
- narag 3y agoTry this review, he highlights the positive aspects, but then concludes that execution is subpar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TitZV6k8zfA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TitZV6k8zfA
- oco101 3y agoHis review is called "The Worst Product I've Ever Reviewed... For Now" maybe be subpar in understatement
- narag 3y agoA youtuber being a youtuber, but that's his opinion. He not only tells, but he also shows and I can still form my own opinion. To be more specific: the 3D gestures interface seems great to me. I'm not interested in the AI assistant, much less at that price point, when it's within reach of my 130€ phone. But that particular interface could be reused in a cheaper device.
- ado__dev 3y agoHumane AI pin has the same problem as all other voice-first devices. Discoverability is trash. So many basic things don't work reliably and in the case of Humane don't work at all (setting timers for example). Talking to a device makes you look like a total dork. It's slow. Add AI indeterminism to it and you got a recipe for potentially the worst product ever. And they're asking for $700 + $25/mo for this. This is a device looking for a problem to solve and failing miserably.
- atleastoptimal 3y agoall these AI wearables underestimate just how useful cell phones are
- rfwhyte 3y agoYet more fuel on the bonfire that is the fact that basically all tech journalism these days in thinly veiled "Sponsored content" that places the interests of advertisers above the interests of the reader. The trust consumers once had in the institutions that were supposed to be working for their benefit has been utterly and completely eroded in service of clicks and short-term profit. Every website we visit, every online review we read, every social media post we see and every YouTube video we watch has been bought and paid for, and the concept of "Journalistic integrity" has been willingly sacrificed at the alter of corporate profits. We can't trust anything anymore and it's all just another stage in the great late stage capitalism enshitification of everything cycle.
- vunderba 3y agoVoice as the primary form of interface is going to WORK fantastic when you're at the library, in a crowded subway, in a noisy environment, etc etc. But don't worry because it'll have a projector that I'm sure will look fantastic in any environment outside of a dimly lit theater.
- kkoste 3y agoDon't worry about that. Everyone else will also have an AI Pin. So everyone(except me) will be yelling into a microphone. I support this wholeheartedly. This is the kind of chaotic dystopian future I want.