I’ve been following Humane’s Ai Pin device with cautious interest for the better part of a year, waiting for this ChatGPT and iPhone challenger to become a commercial product. Co-founded by former Apple employees, husband and wife Imran Chaudhri and Bethany Bongiorno, Humane generated plenty of interest even before it showed what the team had been working on for so many years.
Leaks teased a personal AI device that Chaudhri then briefly teased at a Ted Talk earlier this year. This was apparently the company’s best idea for creating buzz around this unique product. The stunt worked briefly, but we quickly forgot the Ai Pin. And yes, the lowercase “i” is intentional, in case you’re wondering.
Humane has now repeated its stunt, deciding to give the Ai Pin a prominent placement at the Paris Fashion Week ahead of the gizmo’s November 9th unveiling. This is another marketing trick from the company for a device I believe will have a tough time competing against ChatGPT and the iPhone. But Humane also shared a few additional details about the Ai Pin, and I’m intrigued.
I keep saying that the Ai Pin is a ChatGPT and iPhone competitor because that’s exactly what Humane is going for. The device runs a custom AI operating system that will offer a personalized artificial intelligence experience. Therefore, it’ll work a lot like ChatGPT, only with much better privacy protections in place.
Humane’s Paris Fashion Week cameo
I have many questions about Humane’s product that are left unanswered. But I can partly explain why Humane chose the Paris fashion show for its latest marketing trick. The Ai Pin doesn’t have a display and doesn’t require a connection to your iPhone or Android device. You wear it on top of your clothes, which immediately makes me worry about losing such a potentially expensive gadget.
What better way to show how good the Ai Pin looks on clothing than to have professional models display it proudly during one of the most anticipated weeks in fashion? It so happens that Naomi Campbell became the first person outside of Humane to be seen rocking the gadget.
Humane partnered with Paris fashion house Coperni to showcase the Ai Pin. But that was it. We only got to see the official design of the wearable. We still haven’t seen it operate in any way.
It sort of looks like an Apple Watch Ultra without the band. However, there’s no screen on the Ai Pin. Instead, we have a trackpad of sorts on the front (I think) and a camera cutout similar to the Dynamic Island on the iPhone. That notch-like area also has to feature a projector, from what we saw at that Ted Talk presentation.
It’s unclear how you attach the Ai Pin to clothing. I’d assume magnets will help you keep it in place. And, again, I’m worried about losing this thing in a crowded place. Not that I plan on buying one.
More Ai Pin features teased
Humane also teased a few Ai Pin features in its Paris Fashion Week stunt announcement:
The Humane Ai Pin is the screenless, standalone device and software platform built from the ground up for AI.
The intelligent clothing-based wearable uses a range of sensors that enable natural and intuitive compute interactions and is designed to weave seamlessly into users’ day-to-day lives.
The device is privacy-first, with aspects such as no wake word and therefore no ‘always on’ listening, reflecting Humane’s vision of building products which place trust at the center.
The Ai Pin, which does not need to be paired with a smartphone or other companion device, includes AI-powered optical recognition and a laser-projected display, all powered by an advanced Snapdragon platform from Qualcomm Technologies.
That’s all we get for now. The proper Ai Pin launch event is set for November 9th. It’ll be interesting to see how soon buyers can purchase Humane’s new Ai Pin.
