Despite seemingly having nothing else in the pipeline and the AI Pin being dead on arrival, Bloomberg reports the company is “seeking a price of between $750 million and $1 billion in a sale.”

  • Nommer@sh.itjust.works
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    7 months ago

    So this is scam right? Overpromise on a product that doesn’t work then sell the company for some huge price because it’s cutting edge technology? Because it feels like a scam.

    • voracitude@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Yeah, the product was a boondoggle. Trying to sell the company after that launch, with nothing else in the pipeline, is a scam.

    • mPony@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      remember how over the past few years almost everything brand new had the word “blockchain” shoehorned into it for no good reason?

      This is the same kind of thing. It’s an atrocious boondoggle. There must still be a serious amount of cocaine floating around Venture Capitalist parties, because one of those boys is gonna drop 500M on this company and think they bought the dip, when in fact they, themselves, are the dip.

      • xavier666@lemm.ee
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        7 months ago

        I can’t even remember the last time when some hot new technology changed our lives significantly. I’m inclined to say Android because it was a new mobile OS and now it’s everywhere and various devices but even that is more than a decade old.

        • ඞmir@lemmy.ml
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          7 months ago

          Bluetooth ANC IEMs/earbuds were rare a decade ago, and now I see half the people around me wearing them all day

    • just_another_person@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Anything with “AI” in the title is a cash grab with very little actual technical worth except the models and training data.

      • dustyData@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        Pretty much anything with AI on the tin is a scam. Because when an AI product gets a useful valuable application, it immediately changes name to something else.

  • dinckel@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    This is the same as Ben Shapiro telling people to sell their houses once Florida goes under water from a climate crisis. To who? Neptune?

    • Llewellyn@lemm.ee
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      7 months ago

      He really said that? Lol, I’d listen to that gladly, I despise the moron. Do you have a source?

      • dinckel@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        Here. Classic example of yapping too fast and expecting people to not realize how much nonsense it is

    • andallthat@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      “Spectacular custom built oceanback, home, impressive land views & only a 5 minutes swim to the beach!”

    • kat_angstrom@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Nerds still are smarter than us.

      Unfortunately a cult of managers has arisen to rule over the nerds and they hype with an iron fist.

    • wirehead@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      It’s important to realize that the nerd you saw on the news has always been someone wearing nerd as a costume and the entire history of technology is loaded with examples of the real nerd being marginalized. It’s just that in ages past the VC’s would give a smaller amount of money and require the startup to go through concrete milestones to unlock all of it so there was more of a chance for the founder’s dreams to smack up against reality before they were $230m in the hole with no product worth selling.

  • Tiger Jerusalem@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    This is hilarious, scrambling to get a golden parachute and live off some trust fund from the sale. The sad part is that they will probably get that.

    • dustyData@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      That’s the worst part. They knew the product sucked, everyone knew the product sucked, this was always the plan. Ask for a billion get 200 million. That’s 100 for each founder. Go live on a private beach somewhere.

      • fukurthumz420@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        it’s just rich people’s money that could be used to fund housing for the masses. let me know where that beach is so i can go drop off some karma.

  • EpicFailGuy@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    Who would have guess that another overpriced solution to a non existent problem that no one wants would have been a commercial failure …

    We are in a capitalist dystopia. We could be using AI to predict energy usage and reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, or help in discovering new protein folds … but no … Timmy wants to look like a cool futuristic dude and he’s willing to pay $600 to look cooler than his peers

    • kromem@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      We could be using AI to predict energy usage and reduce our dependence on fossil fuels

      That’s happening

      or help in discovering new protein folds

      That too.

      There’s always been barnacles on the ship of progress. That doesn’t mean it’s only barnacles.

    • fukurthumz420@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      these people live in a delusion, chasing star trek fantasies while the general population can barely afford rent. we are truly due for the chickens to come home to roost.

      i just hope a lot of innocent animals don’t get hurt in the process.

    • guacupado@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Yeah their videos were what everyone wants but their actual product was way more clumsy and primitive. Technology isn’t there yet for what these guys were trying to make.

  • ghewl@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    Their adoption plan was just wrong. Few people want to give up their phones, and the general public has had enough of a learning curve struggle with mobile phones. The device didn’t make sense, at least not in its current state.

    The AI bubble will burst soon, and when it does, real innovation will happen.

  • Corhen@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    who could have forseen that “the app, as a hardware device” wouldnt sell well.

  • Elias Griffin@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    When you find out you were only good because you drank the trillion dollar brand Kool-Aid.

    Here is female founder’s LinkedIn background image, web search result top 20, with that thing on.

    https://media.licdn.com/dms/image/D5616AQEGTRY3gObKdg/profile-displaybackgroundimage-shrink_200_800/0/1700176960650?e=2147483647&v=beta&t=GoILNFlkyeka_159L39sV2nlT57Phcz9ngiMCGm6eQ8

    Demographic is…I mean was?

    Here is an awkward photo of both Founders: https://images.fastcompany.net/image/upload/w_596,c_limit,q_auto:best,f_auto/wp-cms/uploads/2020/09/i-Bethany-and-Imran.jpg

    • dustyData@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      They wanted so bad to be the next Jobs-Wozniak duo. They even made their marketing and presentations coded to look Apple like. There’s a really cringe presentation of Imran showing the pin, and he literally pauses after grand statements several times waiting for cheers and applause, but the audience is completely silence. Once they applaud out of pity or something after an awkwardly long pause, and the dude says something like “thanks, finally” or something along those lines. They are extremely cringe and awkward all the time.

  • fubarx@lemmy.ml
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    7 months ago

    It’s cool tech that is ahead of its time. 5-10 years from now, a big tech company will make something like this and everyone will cry Huzzah!

    Magic Leap went the same route.


    Edit:

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Leap

    Judging by the downvotes, I didn’t state my point well enough. Magic Leap took a LOT of money, got a lot of hype, and nearly went out of business multiple times.

    But they were also the first ones to demonstrate and kick off overlaying data on top of real world, what we now call Augmented Reality. Their implementation was clunky and the device was expensive, but it showed people a glimpse of what was possible in a head-mounted, immersive form factor. 10 years later, Apple released the Vision Pro which used different tech, but did pretty much what ML1 was trying to do.

    I think the Humane AI pin tried some interesting concepts, but is heading in the same direction. The idea of a small, wearable, AI device is interesting. Ten years from now, when you can run it all on-device and have a hands-free, GPT-8 level conversation with it with no cloud connection may well be a yawn.

      • fubarx@lemmy.ml
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        7 months ago

        https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Leap

        Judging by the downvotes, I didn’t state my point well enough. Magic Leap took a LOT of money, got a lot of hype, and nearly went out of business multiple times.

        But they were also the first ones to demonstrate and kick off overlaying data on top of real world, what we now call Augmented Reality. Their implementation was clunky and the device was expensive, but it showed people a glimpse of what was possible in a head-mounted, immersive form factor. 10 years later, Apple released the Vision Pro which used different tech, but did pretty much what ML1 was trying to do.

        I think the Humane AI pin tried some interesting concepts, but is heading in the same direction. The idea of a small, wearable, AI device is interesting. Ten years from now, when you can run it all on-device and have a hands-free, GPT-8 level conversation with it with no cloud connection may well be a yawn.

      • fubarx@lemmy.ml
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        7 months ago

        https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Leap

        Judging by the downvotes, I didn’t state my point well enough. Magic Leap took a LOT of money, got a lot of hype, and nearly went out of business multiple times.

        But they were also the first ones to demonstrate and kick off overlaying data on top of real world, what we now call Augmented Reality. Their implementation was clunky and the device was expensive, but it showed people a glimpse of what was possible in a head-mounted, immersive form factor. 10 years later, Apple released the Vision Pro which used different tech, but did pretty much what ML1 was trying to do.

        I think the Humane AI pin tried some interesting concepts, but is heading in the same direction. The idea of a small, wearable, AI device is interesting. Ten years from now, when you can run it all on-device and have a hands-free, GPT-8 level conversation with it with no cloud connection may well be a yawn.

      • fubarx@lemmy.ml
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        7 months ago

        https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Leap

        Judging by the downvotes, I didn’t state my point well enough. Magic Leap took a LOT of money, got a lot of hype, and nearly went out of business multiple times.

        But they were also the first ones to demonstrate and kick off overlaying data on top of real world, what we now call Augmented Reality. Their implementation was clunky and the device was expensive, but it showed people a glimpse of what was possible in a head-mounted, immersive form factor. 10 years later, Apple released the Vision Pro which used different tech, but did pretty much what ML1 was trying to do.

        I think the Humane AI pin tried some interesting concepts, but is heading in the same direction. The idea of a small, wearable, AI device is interesting. Ten years from now, when you can run it all on-device and have a hands-free, GPT-8 level conversation with it with no cloud connection may well be a yawn.

    • xavier666@lemm.ee
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      7 months ago

      I understand your point but there is a huge difference between the 2 products.

      Right now, we are basically asking AI pin companies “Why can’t this be an app?” And they are giving us vague dodgy corporate answers. Magic leap is a fundamentally different product from a standard smartphone. It failed because the hardware wasn’t there yet even though there was a lot of interest.

      In 2023, even with a company like Apple, Apple Vision is seeing slow adoption rates of the product. Why? Bulky + power hungry + expensive, similar issues from back then, albeit to a lesser degree. Till the technology becomes accessible, it will remain as a niche. It has the potential to change a lot of things in healthcare and manufacturing but it still has a long way to go.

      The metaverse is also suffering from a similar problem. What can the metaverse do that 2nd Life/Minecraft can’t do? It needs be better than the existing solutions while still having a low barrier to entry price-wise. Do note I’m completely skipping the fact that it’s being heavily pushed by a privacy nightmare of a company.

    • gedaliyah@lemmy.worldOP
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      7 months ago

      It would be pretty useful to have one of those com badges from Star Trek. That seems to be the form factor.