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Just need a way to talk to ChatGPT anytime. Microphone, speaker and permanent connection to ChatGPT. That’s all you need: io One need is being able to talk to

Just need a way to talk to ChatGPT anytime. Microphone, speaker and permanent connection to ChatGPT. That’s all you need: io One need is being able to talk to ChatGPT in a whisper or silent voice… so you can do it in public. I don’t think that comes from them, but it will be big when it does. Much easier than brain implants! In an ear device, you need enough data of listening to the muscles and the sounds together, then you can just listen to the muscles… I assume they want to have their own OS that is, essentially, their models in the cloud. so, here are my specific predictions 1. Subvocalization-sensing earbuds that detect "silent speech" through jaw/ear canal muscle movements (silently talk to AI anytime) 2. An AI OS laptop — the model is the interface 3. A minimal pocket device where most AI OS happens in the cloud 4. an energy efficient chip that runs powerful local AI, to put in any physical object 5. … like a clip. Something that attaches to clothes. 6. a perfect flat glass tablet like in the movies (I hope not) 7. ambient intelligent awareness through household objects with microphones, sensors, speakers, screens —

Animats 1y ago
The form factor that suggests is an AR headset. Google, Meta, and others have those. They're all flops. Too bulky. Carmack has said that for VR/AR to get any traction, the headgear needs to come down to swim goggle size, and to go mainstream, it has to come down to eyeglass size. He's probably right. Ive would be the kind of guy to push in that direction.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- hn_throwaway_99 1y ago
  > Carmack has said that for VR/AR to get any traction, the headgear needs to come down to swim goggle size, and to go mainstream, it has to come down to eyeglass size. He's probably right. Ive would be the kind of guy to push in that direction. I agree with the first 2 sentences, but not the last. Everyone and their grandmother knows size and bulkiness are big blockers to VR/AR adoption. But the reason we don't have an Apple Vision Pro in an eyeglasses form factor isn't an issue of design, it's an issue of physics. Meta seems to have decent success with their Ray Bans, which can basically do all the "ask AI" use cases, but true VR/AR fundamentally require much bulkier devices, most of all for battery life.
  - Animats 1y ago
    Right. So the trick is to get people to put up with carrying the necessary hardware around. Ive made iDweebs cool. Even the wired version. Apple already tried a version of their headgear where an additional belt-mounted box and cable are needed. This was unpopular but necessary. It's up to Ive to make wearing a utility belt cool. It just takes marketing.[1] [1] https://previews.123rf.com/images/pressmaster/pressmaster1105/pressmaster110500607/9571928-portrait-of-a-young-woman-jogging-with-a-walkman.jpg https://previews.123rf.com/images/pressmaster/pressmaster110...
  - the_clarence 1y ago
    Tbh I rarely use my meta glasses for AI because most of the time I don't want to ask out loud in public. So I just get my phone out and ask chatgpt or gemini. I think voice is doomed due to that as a UI
  - davedx 1y ago
    > it's an issue of physics Engineering, not physics? I doubt anyone would have believed you could have a phone with AI chips inside it that fit in your pocket 30 years ago.
    - hn_throwaway_99 1y ago
      An aside, but I feel pretty old, because I remember 30 years ago quite well, and no, I don't think people (at least people in tech) would be that surprised by the miniaturization and technological advancement that has occurred. Moore's law had already been churning along for decades in 1995, laptop computers had been out for a while, people (including lots of university students) were browsing the web, and heck, there were even PDAs that could do handwriting recognition in 95. People were already saying "Isn't it amazing that this computer that you can carry around in your hand is more powerful than a giant room of computers that NASA built to send astronauts into space" in the mid 90s, so while people wouldn't necessarily guess the details, I think they fully expected the technological advancements to continue apace.
- darepublic 1y ago
  It's a technical problem right, not design? Make it smaller, make it sexier!
- shafyy 1y ago
  I can't imagine that Jony Ive built a more advanced AR headset than Meta, Apple and all the others in two years.
samtp 1y ago
What exact use cases do I get from being able to talk to chatGPT when I am out in public? I can think of close to 0 value add to have an AI voice in my head when I'm taking a walk in the park or out to dinner.
- eqmvii 1y ago
  when i think of them, i just call 1-800-chat-gpt
  - no_wizard 1y ago
    Hello and welcome to ChatGPT phone. If you know the query you would like to make, press one now.
- CPLX 1y ago
  I’m as much of a deep Ai skeptic as anyone but I can definitely think of use cases for while driving or walking, like asking questions about my own schedule or what people have emailed or asked me for in the last hour, or where I can get something specific to eat nearby and so on. Not sure it’s worth the hype but there are use cases. I do think it’s an interesting contrast with crypto, where there aren’t really.
  - samtp 1y ago
    For both use cases I don't see how it would be any different that what anyone can currently do on their mobile device. And even if they were novel use cases, they are nowhere near solving a need that causes more than a few hundred people to pay money for a device or service.
    - glenngillen 1y ago
      I mean, you're both right. Being able to chat and iterate on stuff while I'm driving is both more productive and feels more natural than I expected before I did it. It wasn't too far removed from a brainstorming session I'd have with anyone on my team, except it was only me and ChatGPT. So there's probably a whole bunch of similar but adjacent use cases that I haven't even thought of you. But... I can already do this! My phone + CarPlay and/or my headphones actually works great. I don't see how a new device adds value or is even desirable. Unless you're going down the Google Glass/Meta Rayban path of wanting to capture video and other environmental detail you can't if my phone is in my pocket.
lofaszvanitt 1y ago
Here is this vengeful looking, four legged, half bear sized wild cat before me, tell it to turn around and look for a squirrel instead!
CuriouslyC 1y ago
I use mic input with the chat gpt app in public all the time, if you use a low whisper voice and hold the phone close you can be basically inaudible more than 3 feet away and the TTS still does a great job.
cj 1y ago
I’ve been using #5 for a few weeks now (Limitless.ai pendant, clips to clothes, records and transcribes everything all day) It sounds cool, and the idea of asking questions about your day seems like it would be cool, but a few weeks later I’m finding myself forgetting to take it with me. The value just isn’t there yet. (And why have a clip on microphone when everyone already has a microphone in our pocket?) It’s a cool toy though. Also a creepy toy since it can double as an eavesdropping device. I have a feeling these AI companies will fall back to selling our data for advertising purposes once these companies realize their core products aren’t valuable enough for consumers to want to pay for the cost of it.
- dsiroker 1y ago
  (Co-founder & CEO of Limitless) Thanks for trying it and I hope to win you back with the new features we have in the works! As for selling data if consumers don’t want to pay for it: I commit publicly to never doing this. I will shutdown the company and return remaining capital to investors if consumers don’t want to pay for what we are building. So far, so good, and we were actually cash flow positive a few of the last few weeks.
  - cj 1y ago
    Congrats! I actually like your Limitless meeting transcription tool and have a subscription for that reason. I wish your focus was on the software but rather than the hardware. #1 request is simply the ability to export my data so that I can more easily load it into other tools to ask questions against. You have a treasure trove of all of my meeting transcripts for the past year but I’m really nervous they will be lost forever at some point.
- polytely 1y ago
  How does that work socially, is everyone just fine with their conversations with you being recorded? or do you just not mention it.
  - cj 1y ago
    That’s one of the reasons I don’t clip it on and take it with me. I don’t quite feel like justifying or explaining it to everyone.
pcurve 1y ago
thanks for the list. it's brilliant. I can't but wonder though... are we slave to productivity? What do we need this omnipresent help? I'm sure some people do. If you're CEO of a large company, if you are a doctor seeing hundreds of patients in a week, etc. But me? An average middle age guy with 9-5 job doing white collar job at healthcare company? I enjoy doing some things that are 'inefficient'. Is that a really a problem?
- bombcar 1y ago
  Remember hanging out at the pub 20+ years ago? A discussion on who the fastest was, or something (literally what started the Guinness Book of Records) and it would run for a decent time as people mentioned who they thought it was, stories, hearsay evidence. Now you just whip out your phone, look it up or ask an AI, get the answer and move on. The second is more informative in a way, but so boring. The point wasn’t knowing the fact, it was the discussion!
  - dr_dshiv 1y ago
    I try to avoid proving facts in pub conversations with my phone until someone has bet at least a dollar on the outcome
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
adverbly 1y ago
> 5. … like a clip. Something that attaches to clothes. I feel like the most natural thing would be basically push-to-talk-to-AI: 1. Some sort of mic + earpiece that you can wear comfortably(e.g. airpods) 2. A wireless button that you can put on a ring to activate the mic in the most ergonomic way possible 3. Any time you press the button, everything you say gets sent to a running AI chat
- eloisant 1y ago
  That's genius! Like a pin. With AI. And it would talk to you like a human, so we could call it the Humane AI Pin. How did nobody thought about that?
  - mattigames 1y ago
    It wasn't connected to your personal phone in any way, it was doomed from the start.
  - adverbly 1y ago
    I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not but: 1. It would be easier to use than a pin because it's connected to your hand. You can press it without anyone knowing that you are pressing it. You can presse it with a single hand in a comfortable motion. It doesn't fall around or look weird on your body. It also just be a ring because it only needs to connect over short-range to your phone. 2. Earbuds give you privacy, volume control, good mic quality, better battery life. Also again they are slightly more subtle than a large pin. 3. You don't make these stand alone hardware. You just have them talk to your phone and have it handle networking, camera, compute as needed. Not at all comparable to humane AI pin...
Geste 1y ago
>That’s all you need. No. They need all the data from your life. They need to see what you see (camera somewhere), hear what you hear (hello microphones) and probably even more. My bet is on some sort of tablet. Maybe kind of a book, or kindle, or something like that.
- aatd86 1y ago
  A bodycam rather
Hnrobert42 1y ago
You want something like this. A sticker placed on your neck that reads the movement of your neck muscles and infers speech. https://samueli.ucla.edu/speaking-without-vocal-cords-thanks-to-a-new-ai-assisted-wearable-device/ https://samueli.ucla.edu/speaking-without-vocal-cords-thanks...
- scoot 1y ago
  No sticker required: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10411110 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10411110
mlindner 1y ago
Yeah this is exactly why I use Grok so much and barely use ChatGPT at all. I always have a device with X on it and it's easy to pop open Grok from anywhere on the site no matter what you're doing as the button is already there.
thomascountz 1y ago
Apple has a patent on #1: https://image-ppubs.uspto.gov/dirsearch-public/print/downloadPdf/20230225659 https://image-ppubs.uspto.gov/dirsearch-public/print/downloa...
- scoot 1y ago
  More accurately, they have a patent on one method for achieving #1.
darepublic 1y ago
I was thinking about this problem once and I thought of some sensor to pick up your finger making typing movements but your hands can be in any orientation, i.e. suspended in the air at your sides as you walk.
KolibriFly 1y ago
The real challenge, though, is going to be trust and usability. Always-on AI devices listening to whispers, watching context… that’s a privacy tightrope
brap 1y ago
>Just need a way to talk to ChatGPT anytime. Microphone, speaker and permanent connection to ChatGPT. That’s all you need So like a smartphone in your pocket connected to an earphone. The whisper thing is nice. Sounds like a feature for next gen earphones.
- scoot 1y ago
  > The whisper thing is nice Amazon Alexa already has this (albeit you need to whisper loud enough for it to hear), and replies in a whisper. It works with any earbuds, but is kinda useless until Alexa+ (LLM integration) is more widely available; and it would be nice to have it reply in a normal voice when using earbuds. Silent speech recognition is already a thing [0], so pairing it up with an LLM would be straightforward. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10411110 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10411110
- newsclues 1y ago
  Don’t bone conduction microphones already exist for this?
andai 1y ago
There was a guy at MIT who made a silent headset a few years ago. It didn't use brainwaves but rather measured electrical activity in the facial muscles. Apparently when you think in words, there's a slight activation of the same muscles you use to speak.
subspeakai 1y ago
Would love to chat more about this with you if you'd be interested!
- dr_dshiv 1y ago
  Sure, hit me up at dereklomas@gmail.com
  - subspeakai 1y ago
    Awesome, will do!

Animats 1y ago

The form factor that suggests is an AR headset. Google, Meta, and others have those. They're all flops. Too bulky. Carmack has said that for VR/AR to get any traction, the headgear needs to come down to swim goggle size, and to go mainstream, it has to come down to eyeglass size. He's probably right. Ive would be the kind of guy to push in that direction.

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
hn_throwaway_99 1y ago
> Carmack has said that for VR/AR to get any traction, the headgear needs to come down to swim goggle size, and to go mainstream, it has to come down to eyeglass size. He's probably right. Ive would be the kind of guy to push in that direction. I agree with the first 2 sentences, but not the last. Everyone and their grandmother knows size and bulkiness are big blockers to VR/AR adoption. But the reason we don't have an Apple Vision Pro in an eyeglasses form factor isn't an issue of design, it's an issue of physics. Meta seems to have decent success with their Ray Bans, which can basically do all the "ask AI" use cases, but true VR/AR fundamentally require much bulkier devices, most of all for battery life.
- Animats 1y ago
  Right. So the trick is to get people to put up with carrying the necessary hardware around. Ive made iDweebs cool. Even the wired version. Apple already tried a version of their headgear where an additional belt-mounted box and cable are needed. This was unpopular but necessary. It's up to Ive to make wearing a utility belt cool. It just takes marketing.[1] [1] https://previews.123rf.com/images/pressmaster/pressmaster1105/pressmaster110500607/9571928-portrait-of-a-young-woman-jogging-with-a-walkman.jpg https://previews.123rf.com/images/pressmaster/pressmaster110...
- the_clarence 1y ago
  Tbh I rarely use my meta glasses for AI because most of the time I don't want to ask out loud in public. So I just get my phone out and ask chatgpt or gemini. I think voice is doomed due to that as a UI
- davedx 1y ago
  > it's an issue of physics Engineering, not physics? I doubt anyone would have believed you could have a phone with AI chips inside it that fit in your pocket 30 years ago.
  - hn_throwaway_99 1y ago
    An aside, but I feel pretty old, because I remember 30 years ago quite well, and no, I don't think people (at least people in tech) would be that surprised by the miniaturization and technological advancement that has occurred. Moore's law had already been churning along for decades in 1995, laptop computers had been out for a while, people (including lots of university students) were browsing the web, and heck, there were even PDAs that could do handwriting recognition in 95. People were already saying "Isn't it amazing that this computer that you can carry around in your hand is more powerful than a giant room of computers that NASA built to send astronauts into space" in the mid 90s, so while people wouldn't necessarily guess the details, I think they fully expected the technological advancements to continue apace.
darepublic 1y ago
It's a technical problem right, not design? Make it smaller, make it sexier!
shafyy 1y ago
I can't imagine that Jony Ive built a more advanced AR headset than Meta, Apple and all the others in two years.

samtp 1y ago

What exact use cases do I get from being able to talk to chatGPT when I am out in public? I can think of close to 0 value add to have an AI voice in my head when I'm taking a walk in the park or out to dinner.

eqmvii 1y ago
when i think of them, i just call 1-800-chat-gpt
- no_wizard 1y ago
  Hello and welcome to ChatGPT phone. If you know the query you would like to make, press one now.
CPLX 1y ago
I’m as much of a deep Ai skeptic as anyone but I can definitely think of use cases for while driving or walking, like asking questions about my own schedule or what people have emailed or asked me for in the last hour, or where I can get something specific to eat nearby and so on. Not sure it’s worth the hype but there are use cases. I do think it’s an interesting contrast with crypto, where there aren’t really.
- samtp 1y ago
  For both use cases I don't see how it would be any different that what anyone can currently do on their mobile device. And even if they were novel use cases, they are nowhere near solving a need that causes more than a few hundred people to pay money for a device or service.
  - glenngillen 1y ago
    I mean, you're both right. Being able to chat and iterate on stuff while I'm driving is both more productive and feels more natural than I expected before I did it. It wasn't too far removed from a brainstorming session I'd have with anyone on my team, except it was only me and ChatGPT. So there's probably a whole bunch of similar but adjacent use cases that I haven't even thought of you. But... I can already do this! My phone + CarPlay and/or my headphones actually works great. I don't see how a new device adds value or is even desirable. Unless you're going down the Google Glass/Meta Rayban path of wanting to capture video and other environmental detail you can't if my phone is in my pocket.

lofaszvanitt 1y ago

Here is this vengeful looking, four legged, half bear sized wild cat before me, tell it to turn around and look for a squirrel instead!

CuriouslyC 1y ago

I use mic input with the chat gpt app in public all the time, if you use a low whisper voice and hold the phone close you can be basically inaudible more than 3 feet away and the TTS still does a great job.

cj 1y ago

I’ve been using #5 for a few weeks now (Limitless.ai pendant, clips to clothes, records and transcribes everything all day) It sounds cool, and the idea of asking questions about your day seems like it would be cool, but a few weeks later I’m finding myself forgetting to take it with me. The value just isn’t there yet. (And why have a clip on microphone when everyone already has a microphone in our pocket?) It’s a cool toy though. Also a creepy toy since it can double as an eavesdropping device. I have a feeling these AI companies will fall back to selling our data for advertising purposes once these companies realize their core products aren’t valuable enough for consumers to want to pay for the cost of it.

dsiroker 1y ago
(Co-founder & CEO of Limitless) Thanks for trying it and I hope to win you back with the new features we have in the works! As for selling data if consumers don’t want to pay for it: I commit publicly to never doing this. I will shutdown the company and return remaining capital to investors if consumers don’t want to pay for what we are building. So far, so good, and we were actually cash flow positive a few of the last few weeks.
- cj 1y ago
  Congrats! I actually like your Limitless meeting transcription tool and have a subscription for that reason. I wish your focus was on the software but rather than the hardware. #1 request is simply the ability to export my data so that I can more easily load it into other tools to ask questions against. You have a treasure trove of all of my meeting transcripts for the past year but I’m really nervous they will be lost forever at some point.
polytely 1y ago
How does that work socially, is everyone just fine with their conversations with you being recorded? or do you just not mention it.
- cj 1y ago
  That’s one of the reasons I don’t clip it on and take it with me. I don’t quite feel like justifying or explaining it to everyone.

pcurve 1y ago

thanks for the list. it's brilliant. I can't but wonder though... are we slave to productivity? What do we need this omnipresent help? I'm sure some people do. If you're CEO of a large company, if you are a doctor seeing hundreds of patients in a week, etc. But me? An average middle age guy with 9-5 job doing white collar job at healthcare company? I enjoy doing some things that are 'inefficient'. Is that a really a problem?

bombcar 1y ago
Remember hanging out at the pub 20+ years ago? A discussion on who the fastest was, or something (literally what started the Guinness Book of Records) and it would run for a decent time as people mentioned who they thought it was, stories, hearsay evidence. Now you just whip out your phone, look it up or ask an AI, get the answer and move on. The second is more informative in a way, but so boring. The point wasn’t knowing the fact, it was the discussion!
- dr_dshiv 1y ago
  I try to avoid proving facts in pub conversations with my phone until someone has bet at least a dollar on the outcome

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

adverbly 1y ago

> 5. … like a clip. Something that attaches to clothes. I feel like the most natural thing would be basically push-to-talk-to-AI: 1. Some sort of mic + earpiece that you can wear comfortably(e.g. airpods) 2. A wireless button that you can put on a ring to activate the mic in the most ergonomic way possible 3. Any time you press the button, everything you say gets sent to a running AI chat

eloisant 1y ago
That's genius! Like a pin. With AI. And it would talk to you like a human, so we could call it the Humane AI Pin. How did nobody thought about that?
- mattigames 1y ago
  It wasn't connected to your personal phone in any way, it was doomed from the start.
- adverbly 1y ago
  I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not but: 1. It would be easier to use than a pin because it's connected to your hand. You can press it without anyone knowing that you are pressing it. You can presse it with a single hand in a comfortable motion. It doesn't fall around or look weird on your body. It also just be a ring because it only needs to connect over short-range to your phone. 2. Earbuds give you privacy, volume control, good mic quality, better battery life. Also again they are slightly more subtle than a large pin. 3. You don't make these stand alone hardware. You just have them talk to your phone and have it handle networking, camera, compute as needed. Not at all comparable to humane AI pin...

Geste 1y ago

>That’s all you need. No. They need all the data from your life. They need to see what you see (camera somewhere), hear what you hear (hello microphones) and probably even more. My bet is on some sort of tablet. Maybe kind of a book, or kindle, or something like that.

aatd86 1y ago
A bodycam rather

Hnrobert42 1y ago

You want something like this. A sticker placed on your neck that reads the movement of your neck muscles and infers speech. https://samueli.ucla.edu/speaking-without-vocal-cords-thanks-to-a-new-ai-assisted-wearable-device/ https://samueli.ucla.edu/speaking-without-vocal-cords-thanks...

scoot 1y ago
No sticker required: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10411110 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10411110

mlindner 1y ago

Yeah this is exactly why I use Grok so much and barely use ChatGPT at all. I always have a device with X on it and it's easy to pop open Grok from anywhere on the site no matter what you're doing as the button is already there.

thomascountz 1y ago

Apple has a patent on #1: https://image-ppubs.uspto.gov/dirsearch-public/print/downloadPdf/20230225659 https://image-ppubs.uspto.gov/dirsearch-public/print/downloa...

scoot 1y ago
More accurately, they have a patent on one method for achieving #1.

darepublic 1y ago

I was thinking about this problem once and I thought of some sensor to pick up your finger making typing movements but your hands can be in any orientation, i.e. suspended in the air at your sides as you walk.

KolibriFly 1y ago

The real challenge, though, is going to be trust and usability. Always-on AI devices listening to whispers, watching context… that’s a privacy tightrope

brap 1y ago

>Just need a way to talk to ChatGPT anytime. Microphone, speaker and permanent connection to ChatGPT. That’s all you need So like a smartphone in your pocket connected to an earphone. The whisper thing is nice. Sounds like a feature for next gen earphones.

scoot 1y ago
> The whisper thing is nice Amazon Alexa already has this (albeit you need to whisper loud enough for it to hear), and replies in a whisper. It works with any earbuds, but is kinda useless until Alexa+ (LLM integration) is more widely available; and it would be nice to have it reply in a normal voice when using earbuds. Silent speech recognition is already a thing [0], so pairing it up with an LLM would be straightforward. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10411110 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10411110
newsclues 1y ago
Don’t bone conduction microphones already exist for this?

andai 1y ago

There was a guy at MIT who made a silent headset a few years ago. It didn't use brainwaves but rather measured electrical activity in the facial muscles. Apparently when you think in words, there's a slight activation of the same muscles you use to speak.

subspeakai 1y ago

Would love to chat more about this with you if you'd be interested!

dr_dshiv 1y ago
Sure, hit me up at dereklomas@gmail.com
- subspeakai 1y ago
  Awesome, will do!