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New 'Friend' Necklace Offers AI Companionship

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AI wearables like the Rabbit R1 and the AI Pin have attempted to capitalize on the popularity of artificial intelligence and have largely flopped, but that isn't stopping the creator of a new wearable device called Friend.


Friend is an AI necklace that is meant to serve as a personal companion, and in a video that could be the start to an episode of Black Mirror, it's shown providing support, encouragement, and companionship to the wearer.

The hardware component of Friend connects to an iPhone via Bluetooth, continually listening to all interactions around the wearer. Pressing a button on the necklace allows the user to speak to Friend, with a message sent to the iPhone in response. Friend is also able to send messages without a conversational prompt, responding to what the wearer is doing.

The Friend and its "memories" are stored on the necklace, with nothing uploaded to cloud servers. Friend creator Avi Schiffmann said in a blog post that the device is an "expression of how lonely" he's felt. In an interview with The Verge, Schiffmann said that Friend is designed to be supportive, validating, and able to encourage ideas. "It's a great brainstorming buddy," he said. "You can talk to it about relationships, things like that."

Friend is available for pre-order for $99, and it is set to launch in January 2025.

Article Link: New 'Friend' Necklace Offers AI Companionship
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2024/07/30/friend-necklace-ai-companionship/
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I almost would buy one just for the novelty... but I know the novelty would last less than 5 minutes, and into the pile of unused tech it would go.
 
t00nish said:
I can see this as a black mirror episode where you're already down on your luck and the AI kicks you while you're down, where you're liable to commit suicide. The AI response where dude is getting wrecked wasn't the response I was expecting tbh
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OK - My reply was independent of yours... so, they nailed the Black Mirror watching demo.

Also - never read the intro piece either.
 
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I get this by hanging my phone on a lanyard and running ChatGPT - to the great relief of my wife, who no longer has to put up with me banging on about cosmology and politics. Plus it's so much better with voice, rather than text. It's the super-encouraging nerdy friend I've always wanted
 
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The ad is cringey and kinda tone-deaf and the form-factor is awkward. Beyond the wrist and the finger, people’s capacity to tolerate wearable tech falls off a cliff. I’m not sure an ugly statement necklace is the next big frontier. And I’m sure, like Rabbit, it’s just a cheap wrapper around Claude or ChatGPT or (shudder) Llama.
 
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Ai companions are the future. Today we all worry about being along, lonely, about getting into abusive relationships and not recognise what's happening, etc. But with a personal AI that's always on, always listening, no one can really mistreat us without our personal AIs pointing it out to us later. We'll all always have someone to talk to that has our best interests in mind. One day anyway, maybe 5+ years from now when we are closer to faking general intelligence.
 
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A necklace AI that acts as your friend? I've seen this before, back in 1979:
Buck-Rogers-in-the-25th-Century-1979-9.jpeg

Thanks to Twiki wearing Dr. Theopolis, prior art has been established.
Also, if it takes off, the estate of Glen Larson should be raking in a lot of dough!
 
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Mr Fide said:
I get this by hanging my phone on a lanyard and running ChatGPT - to the great relief of my wife, who no longer has to put up with me banging on about cosmology and politics. Plus it's so much better with voice, rather than text. It's the super-encouraging nerdy friend I've always wanted
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I was about to say this.

-Surely nothing but a microphone is running inside this $99 neck-friend and all the interpretations are being handled by some iteration of ChatGPT behind the scenes?

They could have just sold this as an app and then shipped a special lanyard for it to have your phone hanging around your neck.
 
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haters gonna hate. I think it's cool that there's brands trying new things. Risking it and trying something new. I'm sure MKBDH is going to trash this but good tech only comes about from people trying and failing first. Wish the best for these guys!
 
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