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I have one of these in my bag right now, never turned on though. I understand it's some custom Android hardware and synthesizes a bunch of API-based NN service

I have one of these in my bag right now, never turned on though. I understand it's some custom Android hardware and synthesizes a bunch of API-based NN service providers, and doesn't do anything on device, but I'm not too mad at that -- for this price point this year, it was always only going to be something like that. I am interested in the ongoing form factor experimentation happening, and want to encourage startups to think differently about form factors, so I'm happy to buy stuff that doesn't quite hit the mark, as long as it's got an interesting idea. Anyway, I'm looking forward to giving it a try, and I'll almost certainly never use it once I've kind of pawed through it and seen what seems good and what seems bad. Similar for that humane pin which I think I paid for but never even received. If you read a lot of sci-fi, authors have put an immense amount of time into thinking about what UI looks like as we have supercompute/AI access more broadly, and I think it's clear that a phone isn't the final state for these interactions. What's less clear to me is what sort of compelling mid-way points there are between what we have now and ubiquitous environment-aware AGI (e.g. Minds from Iain Banks). It's one reason I thought humane's projector was really interesting; we do a lot of visual interaction in daily life, so an audio-only earbud isn't likely to be the be-all/end-all. Anyway, hardware startup guys, please make more of these, and figure out what's going to be compelling when we've scaled up bandwidth, scaled down latency and scaled up local compute. I'm looking forward to buying it.

causal 2y ago
I think watch or earbud are still the only acceptable wearable form factor. Add pinhole cameras so it's aware of its surroundings and you could have a very useful assistant that keeps up with what you're doing in realtime.
- vessenes 2y ago
  Banks and others imagine terminals as earrings, with (presumably) beam forming audio in a ‘mid tech’ scenario. How visuals get shown varies, from “holograms created by magic” to “smart walls”. We seem to be pretty close, like a year or two out, from high quality spatially aware “show the human information right here in this room” — I’d bet that a small model could do a great job at picking a place to show info right now, but we don’t really have ‘smart’ environments yet in general.
KoolKat23 2y ago
Aside from something bad like this security hole, I can't understand the hate, it's pretty obvious the R1 was a fun novelty, a gimmick. Anyone with a basic understanding of tech, would understand you're not going to get Apple level breakthrough engineering from a start-up and at that price point. I feel this got swept up in the wave of hatred for the Humane AI Pin (again very obvious what it'd be). Humane's biggest fault was that they marketed it as being at Apple level quality, an impossible goal they set for themselves. Reminds me of Magic Leap.
- darepublic 2y ago
  I speculate the hate comes from the people invested in smart phones as they are today. Magic leap didn't get mainstream hate like the rabbit did afaict
  - RIMR 2y ago
    Because the magic leap was an innovative new product for early adopters. The Rabbit promised to be a smartphone-killer, when all it was was a shitty android phone that only runs one app. I think people are mad about being scammed, not out of having an unsuccessful product.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
  - lancesells 2y ago
    Sure it did. They promised something completely made up and at launch it looked to be about 1/10th of what they were saying it would be like. The Rabbit did the same by promising one thing and shipping another. I think Humane seemed the more honest out of all of them with what actually shipped, but should have probably sold it at $200 instead of the price of a higher-end phone. https://www.theverge.com/2018/8/8/17662040/magic-leap-one-creator-edition-preview-mixed-reality-glasses-launch https://www.theverge.com/2018/8/8/17662040/magic-leap-one-cr...
  - johnny22 2y ago
RIMR 2y ago
I honestly don't understand pretending that there was any value in this project. The founders have a history of grifting, and the product itself betrays the advertising and the software itself appears held together with shoestrings and bubblegum. As the founders beg for a buyout even as the product has completely failed, it can't be any more clear that this was a get-rich-quick scheme by the founders, and never a serious venture. "Experimenting with form factors" is a cop-out for what they actually did.
samatman 2y ago
> I think it's clear that a phone isn't the final state for these interactions That isn't clear to me at all, although continuing to experiment is worthwhile. "Battery powered computer which fits in a pocket, having a screen/speakers/radio/microphone/camera/vibrator" is a hard form factor to beat. There's a lot of room to improve the specifics of how they work, but I would bet on something recognizably similar being in widespread use hundreds of years from now, provided that industrial civilization continues. Voice-driven ambient computing will probably become more prominent than it is now, but that doesn't cover anything visual, so a device which can provide images on command will stay relevant. For something like a map, audio can only provide an inferior experience, and maps are one of the non-negotiable uses of a personal device, and likely to remain so.
GooglyThird 2y ago
Re Humane Ai Pin - did you never receive it because you cancelled your order? Or did you never onboard? There's a bit of an unusual process with ordering the Ai Pin where it won't ship until you "onboard" i.e. set up your account/service with Humane
- vessenes 2y ago
  I never onboarded. I should hunt through my emails though is what this makes me think of.
- al_borland 2y ago
  What’s the goal of this? Front loading a frustrating web based setup, so the out of box experience can be smooth and seem magical? Is that the goal? Kind of like how Amazon can pre-register a Kindle with a user’s account if they select it while ordering. You’d think this would be part of the order process instead of a completely separate and detached step.
miki123211 2y ago
To me, glasses seem like a very interesting form factor, perhaps with a smart watch or wristband for better hand gesture recognition. You can wear them all the time, even if your hands are busy, it won't look weird, they're the perfect place for a microphone and a camera, and the frames are just in the right spot for delivering sound to your ears via bone conduction. Input is probably going to be the biggest hurdle, just like it was with touch screens, especially in situations where using your voice isn't acceptable. I think Google had the right idea with Google Glass, but they were far too early, just like IBM had exactly the right idea with Simon[1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Simon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Simon
- vessenes 2y ago
  Apple Vision Pro is unbelievably good at figuring out what you’re looking at, seamlessly adjusting for eye saccades and a host of other weird things our bodies do. I imagine the tech will eventually get shrunk down. I think the question is: what’s hardest of the following: * Knowing what you’re looking or pointing at * Getting you private audio * Getting you public video * Getting you private video And we’ll get hardware constraints based on that list. It seems to me like private video is hardest in hardware without glasses, but public video might be harder in terms of capex - e.g. we need different materials in our spaces, or a lot of projectors, or … Anyway fun to speculate about all this.
  - miki123211 2y ago
    Private-ish audio is solved with bone conduction, see the new Meta Rayban Glasses or the Bose Frames for example. There's more leakage than you get with normal headphones, it's not something you could use in a church, library or cinema without annoying people, but it's private enough for most use cases.
endofreach 2y ago
We are working on something very different. To be honest, i got mad when i saw the rabbit released. It was clear it's just a gadget & a grifter product. And i hate, that we spend much more time on really creating something and now will be much later than the grifters who rushed something. But then i guess, they are smarter. We are running out of money (bootstrapped) & don't have a working product yet to pitch to investors. But i'd rather fail than releasing a half-assed product to make a quick-buck and lie about it constantly. I just don't know where to find potential investors to talk to, who are up for a high risk consumer hard- & software, early stage, in europe... If anyone got some tips, they'd be greatly appreciated. Not much time left before we're dead & i think it's better to die close to a prototype than close to a potential funding. But as i said, i'd love any tips.
- anonzzzies 2y ago
  Maybe some more (contact) information would be helpful? It is not quite clear what you are doing but it sounds interesting. If you fold, please open source, however I don’t think you have to (there is money in Europe but it depends what you need).

causal 2y ago

I think watch or earbud are still the only acceptable wearable form factor. Add pinhole cameras so it's aware of its surroundings and you could have a very useful assistant that keeps up with what you're doing in realtime.

vessenes 2y ago
Banks and others imagine terminals as earrings, with (presumably) beam forming audio in a ‘mid tech’ scenario. How visuals get shown varies, from “holograms created by magic” to “smart walls”. We seem to be pretty close, like a year or two out, from high quality spatially aware “show the human information right here in this room” — I’d bet that a small model could do a great job at picking a place to show info right now, but we don’t really have ‘smart’ environments yet in general.

KoolKat23 2y ago

Aside from something bad like this security hole, I can't understand the hate, it's pretty obvious the R1 was a fun novelty, a gimmick. Anyone with a basic understanding of tech, would understand you're not going to get Apple level breakthrough engineering from a start-up and at that price point. I feel this got swept up in the wave of hatred for the Humane AI Pin (again very obvious what it'd be). Humane's biggest fault was that they marketed it as being at Apple level quality, an impossible goal they set for themselves. Reminds me of Magic Leap.

darepublic 2y ago
I speculate the hate comes from the people invested in smart phones as they are today. Magic leap didn't get mainstream hate like the rabbit did afaict
- RIMR 2y ago
  Because the magic leap was an innovative new product for early adopters. The Rabbit promised to be a smartphone-killer, when all it was was a shitty android phone that only runs one app. I think people are mad about being scammed, not out of having an unsuccessful product.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- lancesells 2y ago
  Sure it did. They promised something completely made up and at launch it looked to be about 1/10th of what they were saying it would be like. The Rabbit did the same by promising one thing and shipping another. I think Humane seemed the more honest out of all of them with what actually shipped, but should have probably sold it at $200 instead of the price of a higher-end phone. https://www.theverge.com/2018/8/8/17662040/magic-leap-one-creator-edition-preview-mixed-reality-glasses-launch https://www.theverge.com/2018/8/8/17662040/magic-leap-one-cr...
- johnny22 2y ago

RIMR 2y ago

I honestly don't understand pretending that there was any value in this project. The founders have a history of grifting, and the product itself betrays the advertising and the software itself appears held together with shoestrings and bubblegum. As the founders beg for a buyout even as the product has completely failed, it can't be any more clear that this was a get-rich-quick scheme by the founders, and never a serious venture. "Experimenting with form factors" is a cop-out for what they actually did.

samatman 2y ago

> I think it's clear that a phone isn't the final state for these interactions That isn't clear to me at all, although continuing to experiment is worthwhile. "Battery powered computer which fits in a pocket, having a screen/speakers/radio/microphone/camera/vibrator" is a hard form factor to beat. There's a lot of room to improve the specifics of how they work, but I would bet on something recognizably similar being in widespread use hundreds of years from now, provided that industrial civilization continues. Voice-driven ambient computing will probably become more prominent than it is now, but that doesn't cover anything visual, so a device which can provide images on command will stay relevant. For something like a map, audio can only provide an inferior experience, and maps are one of the non-negotiable uses of a personal device, and likely to remain so.

GooglyThird 2y ago

Re Humane Ai Pin - did you never receive it because you cancelled your order? Or did you never onboard? There's a bit of an unusual process with ordering the Ai Pin where it won't ship until you "onboard" i.e. set up your account/service with Humane

vessenes 2y ago
I never onboarded. I should hunt through my emails though is what this makes me think of.
al_borland 2y ago
What’s the goal of this? Front loading a frustrating web based setup, so the out of box experience can be smooth and seem magical? Is that the goal? Kind of like how Amazon can pre-register a Kindle with a user’s account if they select it while ordering. You’d think this would be part of the order process instead of a completely separate and detached step.

miki123211 2y ago

To me, glasses seem like a very interesting form factor, perhaps with a smart watch or wristband for better hand gesture recognition. You can wear them all the time, even if your hands are busy, it won't look weird, they're the perfect place for a microphone and a camera, and the frames are just in the right spot for delivering sound to your ears via bone conduction. Input is probably going to be the biggest hurdle, just like it was with touch screens, especially in situations where using your voice isn't acceptable. I think Google had the right idea with Google Glass, but they were far too early, just like IBM had exactly the right idea with Simon[1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Simon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Simon

vessenes 2y ago
Apple Vision Pro is unbelievably good at figuring out what you’re looking at, seamlessly adjusting for eye saccades and a host of other weird things our bodies do. I imagine the tech will eventually get shrunk down. I think the question is: what’s hardest of the following: * Knowing what you’re looking or pointing at * Getting you private audio * Getting you public video * Getting you private video And we’ll get hardware constraints based on that list. It seems to me like private video is hardest in hardware without glasses, but public video might be harder in terms of capex - e.g. we need different materials in our spaces, or a lot of projectors, or … Anyway fun to speculate about all this.
- miki123211 2y ago
  Private-ish audio is solved with bone conduction, see the new Meta Rayban Glasses or the Bose Frames for example. There's more leakage than you get with normal headphones, it's not something you could use in a church, library or cinema without annoying people, but it's private enough for most use cases.

endofreach 2y ago

We are working on something very different. To be honest, i got mad when i saw the rabbit released. It was clear it's just a gadget & a grifter product. And i hate, that we spend much more time on really creating something and now will be much later than the grifters who rushed something. But then i guess, they are smarter. We are running out of money (bootstrapped) & don't have a working product yet to pitch to investors. But i'd rather fail than releasing a half-assed product to make a quick-buck and lie about it constantly. I just don't know where to find potential investors to talk to, who are up for a high risk consumer hard- & software, early stage, in europe... If anyone got some tips, they'd be greatly appreciated. Not much time left before we're dead & i think it's better to die close to a prototype than close to a potential funding. But as i said, i'd love any tips.

anonzzzies 2y ago
Maybe some more (contact) information would be helpful? It is not quite clear what you are doing but it sounds interesting. If you fold, please open source, however I don’t think you have to (there is money in Europe but it depends what you need).