16 Comments
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Ashley M's avatar

The fact that they chose a classless and trollish way to demo their product makes me want nothing to do with them. Yes of course using AI to get info and insights faster and seamlessly is an excellent goal but their desperate attempt to seem edgy and clever only obscures the actual utility of the thing.

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Not-Toby's avatar

Maybe I'm too charitable but I didn't read "kid fails to tell an implausible lie and woman is flabbergasted" as a straight forward endorsement of the scenario portrayed. The fact that it's played for laughs, seemingly ignorant of the average normie response, does highlight how big a gap there is between the way people who work w/ AI products and the public are thinking about this stuff.

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Rahim Nathwani's avatar

"high-quality, open-source text-to-speech models like Whisper"

Whisper is a speech-to-text model (speech recognition model), not a text-to-speech model.

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Jon Stokes's avatar

Yeah, good catch. I'm pretty sure I meant Eleven Labs there. Eleven launched in January 2023 and the piece with that quote was from February, so in the midst of that whole hype cycle. I'll update.

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Endless Yammering's avatar

>Uses smart glasses to fix water heater.

>Glasses tell me to detach a part for inspection.

>Accidentally open valve. Glasses have misrecognized the part/make/model of water heater.

>Glasses cut out.

>Try to reattach part but have unwittingly broken it.

>Basement floods.

>Try to stop flooding while calling contractor.

>Wait for contractor to arrive.

>Contractor says he’s seen people try to do this with YouTube tutorials, but didn’t realize you bought smart glasses and an AI subscription to do the same thing.

>Glasses reconnect and show an ad for a contractor in the corner of my eye because my subscription includes ads.

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Elena Ivanova's avatar

I like when the people recognize me as a regular precisely because this is a human-to-human interaction.

Enter AI into this, and I'd rather *not* be a regular there.

And even if the AI psrt is successfully hidden from me, if someone I don't recognize is acting as if they know me it's awkward and weird. I don't like feeling awkward and weird.

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rish vee's avatar

I completely agree that I would love to have an assistant to repair a part in my car or install a TV wall mount… but those are first-world problems that can be solved with (1) a little extra elbow grease to set the phone down and/or use a tripod, OR wait for hardware (apple vision pro-esque) that allows us a mixed-reality interface.

Cluely manifesto is leans towards a much more social and interactive use case of this kind of tech/hardware. Their whole idea of “cheating” is not revolving around our ideal hands-free repair situation, it’s aimed at having a social assistant to bypass social hurdles.

I strongly believe Cluely’s manifesto, if we extrapolate it 10-50-100 years, will lead towards a socially unintelligent species.

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Miles's avatar

Yeah I want newly hired waitresses to know customers by name and their recent orders???? This isn’t even an AI thing that’s just weird surveillance. Why can’t a newly hired waitress just try her best and do her job?

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Louis Noble's avatar

I was clueless when I watched the ad. What advantage was he gaining? I couldnt really underatand it. How can the ai give you rizz?

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Not-Toby's avatar

He constructed a false identity and was given reminders of talking points related to it and to her public-facing data.

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Louis Noble's avatar

It seems like one of the least concerning uses tbh

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Endless Yammering's avatar

Lying about your identity in order to sleep with someone (if that’s what he was trying to do) is called “sexual assault by deception.”

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Louis Noble's avatar

Is it against the law? It doesn't seem like it should be. Not saying its morally right just that to involve the state is overreach.

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Endless Yammering's avatar

It’s a bit complicated but all I can say is that there have been convictions in multiple countries of people who have used fraudulent information to gain consent, but it seems there’s still some debate amongst legal scholars as to how to define what information is “fraudulent” and what may be considered “sensitive.” Trans people disclosing their history is one example of this, as some have been murdered as a result of disclosing their gender to sexual partners. I imagine courts would have to prove intent to deceive the victim, as opposed to just withholding sensitive information, but I would just suggest you look this up yourself.

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Louis Noble's avatar

I will. I wouldn't be surprised if some overzealous prosecutors try things like that but it seems quite dangerous.

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