The annual tech industry exhibition, CES, has shown an expanding trend of putting artificial intelligence (AI) into daily appliances. Generative AI was prominently featured among the unusual gadgets exhibited at this year’s CES in Las Vegas, following past years’ dominant trends such as the metaverse, voice assistants, and linked home gadgets.
- Motion Sleep, a South Korean startup, has created an AI pillow that detects snoring and adjusts to reduce it.
- Capella, an AI software company, demonstrated an app that will cost customers $10 per month and claims to use AI to “translate” a baby’s screams with “95% accuracy” to determine whether they are hungry, in need of a diaper change, or uncomfortable.
- For cat owners whose felines enjoy bringing dead mice into their homes, Swiss firm Flappie demonstrated an AI-powered cat door that the company claims would keep your pet outside unless it drops a dead animal in its mouth; the product costs $525 (CHF 450).
- For folks who want AI to help them snore, Chinese company DeRucci has revealed a $8300 mattress and a $1000 pillow that claim to solve the problem by repositioning a person’s body and head.
- Seergrills, a British firm, introduced their $3,500 Perfecta grill, which the company claims utilizes AI to cook excellent steaks and other meat in 90 seconds—though the one shown off at CES did not cook any actual meat, according to CNET.
- Volkswagen was one of several companies at CES this year that elected to incorporate the most popular generative AI product, ChatGPT, into their devices, with the automaker including the OpenAI tool into its in-car voice assistant, IDA.
- Other AI-integrated goods include Samsung’s vacuum cleaner and washing machine, which can detect different sorts of surfaces and materials.
- Several additional products, such as a smart toothbrush, a mirror that purports to improve people’s moods, and a $4,700 set of binoculars that can recognize birds and animals in their sights, were all part of the AI hype.
What to look for
It is uncertain how many of the items introduced at CES will be available to the general public, or how many will be able to maintain their service offers. Weird tech chasing the current trends is a yearly mainstay of CES shows, but very few of the out-of-the-box concepts become widely available goods, and even fewer have any permanence.
Tangent
A collection of privacy, right-to-repair, and consumer rights organizations named BMW and Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant, which is being integrated into the company’s cars, is the worst privacy technology at CES 2024. Users will be able to utilize the voice assistant to control their car thanks to this connectivity. Cindy Cohn, executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, stated that the technology allows for “creepy tracking” and has “the potential for domestic abuse.” Cohn said that persons fleeing abusive relationships may be targeted by their partners using this technique.
Some firms, such as Rabbit, are shifting away from the term AI because of its misuse and ambiguity, instead referring to ‘foundation models’ or ‘Large Action Models’.
However, it is skeptical of the real usage of AI in these goods, citing the lack of a broadly acknowledged definition of AI.
The Federal Trade Commission in the United States has issued advisory letters against corporations that make false claims regarding their products’ AI capabilities. Also, the usefulness of some AI-enabled items, such as a fridge that recommends meals based on its contents is a challenge. The non-AI products imply that most consumers will do the same.
