The Star Trek Universal Translator Is Here Now

And now for something a little off the normal beaten path of politics….

Let’s go Sci-Fi for a moment.

I used to love watching Star Trek, especially The Next Generation.

Anyone else?

Back when TV shows were entertaining and inspiring.

Of course now they’re mostly woke and they’re not really worth watching, but back on Star Trek: The Next Generation, the future seemed incredible!

You could go on the Holodeck and invent any environment you wanted….

Meals were created in seconds from the Food Replicator….

Instead of taking a car, you could just “beam” anywhere you wanted and transport….

And everyone wore these “pins” that functioned as a communications device and universal translator:

And when the Universal Translator broke, it led to one of the most beloved ST:TNG episodes in the series: Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra:

Well, as usually happens, life is imitating fiction and we now essentially have the same thing Jean Luc-Picard had.

It’s called the “Humane AI Pin” and you can watch a short intro video here:

More here from Bloomberg:

And a longer 10 minute video here showing all its functions:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Ag5VQT1vUk

Here are more details, from the folks over at Wired:

For months, an odd sight has intrigued a San Francisco cop regularly stationed outside the downtown offices of the startup Humane. Out of its door have streamed employees with a small, square device pinned to their chests, not unlike the officer’s bulkier, department-issued body-worn camera. “Been wondering what those are,” the officer said when WIRED visited the company last week.

Today, the wondering about Humane’s gadget is over. The company is opening up about its high-tech device designed to be fastened to a shirt or blouse—a fit that Humane hopes can become as accepted among people who aren’t sworn officers as sporting wireless earbuds or smartwatches.

Humane’s device, called the Ai Pin, can take photos and send texts, uses a laser to project a visual interface onto a person’s palm, and comes with a virtual assistant that can be as sharp as ChatGPT. By always being ready to search the web and communicate, it is supposed to quash dependency on smartphones.

The Ai Pin goes on sale November 16 in the US starting at $699, plus $24 monthly for unlimited calling, texting, and data through T-Mobile. Humane revealed the device’s look and basic functions, including web search and object identification, at the TED conference and in a Paris fashion week runway show earlier this year. In addition to announcing pricing and availability today, the company released new details about the Pin’s software and how exactly a laser inside the device turns a person’s hand into a screen. Orders will start shipping in early 2024.

The Pin is one of the first of many wearable devices expected to launch in coming months and years that are built around the kind of ChatGPT-like AI services now used by over 100 million people each week. Famed Apple designer Jony Ive is reportedly among the competition.

Whether any of them can become socially acceptable or withstand the scrutiny of the fashion police is a major question. Members of a Discord group created by Humane for its fans can’t wait to buy their Pins. But people consulted by WIRED who have worked on edgy wearable hardware, including augmented reality glasses, view the Pin as more the latest toy for gadget enthusiasts than a device set to establish a new norm for personal technology.

It’s also too early to tell whether Humane’s hope that the Pin can help people to live more in the moment will prove true, or whether it will simply provide a new way to be unhealthily obsessed with technology.

Constant Companion
Humane CEO Bethany Bongiorno is confident of the Pin’s mass appeal, calling it the world’s first contextual computer. “AI now has become something that everyone is curious about and really wants to know how it’s going to change their life,” she says. “We’re offering the first opportunity to bring it with you everywhere. It’s really touching people from every background, every age group, globally, in terms of what we’re feeling and seeing in feedback.”

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When Bongiorno and her husband, Imran Chaudhri, founded Humane in 2018 after long spans working on hardware design and software engineering at Apple, they set strict parameters for their product. It needed to be a standalone device connected directly to the cell network, transparent about when it’s recording, and not always listening for wake words like “Hey Siri” or “OK Google” as smart speakers and some phones do. And the whole package should be affordable. “That really set the tone for where we are today,” Bongiorno says.

Humane’s founders view previous wearable devices like smart glasses and AR headsets as barriers to human connection. The Pin is intended to be less invasive, though just as capable, and something people can comfortably wear all day without ruining their hairdo. “We want to have powerful compute with us at all times, and that’s really what it’s about,” says Chaudhri, the company’s president and chairman. “We want access to more knowledge, more information. We just want it in a way that allows us to remain present.”

The startup has raised $230 million in funding, including $100 million announced in March reportedly valuing it at $850 million. Humane’s investors include OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, who holds the largest outside stake at nearly 15 percent; Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff; Microsoft; and the venture arms of LG, Volvo, and Qualcomm.

After ordering a Pin, buyers log in to a website, Humane.center, to sync their contacts and sign up for extra services like music. They use the Pin’s camera to scan a code shipped with the device to associate it to that online account, where recordings, photos, and histories of calls and messages are accessible. Users’ data won’t be used to train AI systems, Humane says.

Unmissable Wearable
With its housing carved from a single chunk of aluminum, Humane’s device is closer to a brooch, a tin of mints, or a cigarette packet clipped in half than the sleeker items that adorn politicians’ lapels or baseball fans’ caps. No one standing a distance away is going to miss it. Chaudhri says the name “Pin” is meant more as a metaphor to evoke the “sentiment of attaching it to your clothing” than as a physical descriptor.

To put on the Ai Pin involves placing a magnetic battery pack on the inside of a shirt or other piece of clothing, and letting a magnet on the Pin itself hold the system in place. It’s altogether about 55 grams, or 2 ounces, nearly the weight of a tennis ball. People with pacemakers should consult their doctors about potential magnetic interference, Chaudhri says.

A clip sold separately makes it possible to attach the Pin to thicker clothing or bag straps, and a lighter-weight magnet included with the device works for silky outfits or workout gear.

Photography was not allowed during WIRED’s visit to Humane, and the company didn’t provide WIRED a Pin to try. But employees provided several demonstrations of key functions.

Chaudhri says, while sporting his Pin on a warm jacket, that he has worn it from rise until bedtime each day for over a year. He says it can hold up under rigorous activity, noting that he’s been biking with it. In testing, the Pin has held firm during running and jumping, he says, and it has been drop tested from a meter and a half on a variety of surfaces.

The Pin comes in three colors that have fancy names but are essentially black all around, black with silver edges, and white with silver edges. The silver-bordered options are priced at $799. Colorful plastic cases dubbed “shields,” sold separately, can add more flair to edge of the Pin. Bongiorno says they allow the devices to be more durable when dropped, which may be a big fear for potential buyers. “I asked Imran to make those for me,” Bongiorno says, describing herself as clumsy.

The Ai Pin’s most distinctive features reside in the curved top of the device, which houses an ultrawide camera, light and depth detectors, and a laser projector. Humane realized when testing that without that curve, a camera resting on people’s chests would mostly be pointing to the sky. “Everyone’s built differently, and the optics need to actually be angled downward to account for the different shapes,” Chaudhri says.

Google learned a similar lesson in 2018 after it launched Google Clips, a body-worn camera that used algorithms to automatically snap photos. Female users tended to end up with an abundance of cloud shots when they intended to record what was in front of them, because the device was not designed to account for bodies with breasts, according to a person familiar with the findings. Google did not respond to a request for comment on the now discontinued gadget.

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Like Clips and Meta’s smart glasses, Humane’s Pin has a light that indicates to people nearby when the microphone or camera is activated. Chaudhri says this “trust light” is designed such that if it was ever tampered with the device would become inoperable, so it can’t be used for spying.

Candid Camera
The Pin is controlled by taps, hand gestures, and voice commands. A double tap with two fingers on the touchpad on the front of the device snaps photos. The same double-tap and then holding that spot records video, but video capability won’t launch until a software update in early 2024.

Tapping the Pin and then moving a palm into its field of view activates its laser, which projects images and text onto a user’s hand at a wavelength that produces a blueish-green tinge, a 720p-resolution system Humane calls a Laser Ink Display. Tilting the hand navigates between displayed options and a swatting gesture swipes to a different menu. Users “click” on an option by tapping their thumb and index finger together and close their hand briefly to return to a home screen. Chaudhri says controlling the projection is limited to one hand to keep it quick and to prevent the other hand from getting in the way of the projector.

But which future do we have?

Do we have the pollyanna Star Trek future where abundance is plentiful and altruism defines who we are?

Or do we have more of a Book of Revelation and Book of Daniel future, which many believe describes a future for human and machine merge and essentially cancel out our humanity?

Perhaps even leading to, or becoming, the “Mark of the Beast”?

My friend Chris Greene over at AMTV fears the latter — and I don’t think he’s wrong:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pfdEXdwSTk

What do you think?

Beam me up, Scotty?