It’s a slightly animatronic mannequin. They’re so garbage. This is what they brought to CES to show off, like they’re proud of it. Tickle Me Elmo was more life-like.
Right before the AI boom really started to take off there was a robot “companion” named Moxie that I thought struck exactly the right balance - it was nowhere near the uncanny valley, staying firmly on the cute robot side, and it used a projected cartoon face that was simple but expressive. Unfortunately the company’s timing was rather poor, they went out of business right before the AI back end would have been able to make full use of an avatar like this. I’d love to see another version of this approach.
You really need to see just how bad these things are:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJlxkLawZrw
It’s a slightly animatronic mannequin. They’re so garbage. This is what they brought to CES to show off, like they’re proud of it. Tickle Me Elmo was more life-like.
Right before the AI boom really started to take off there was a robot “companion” named Moxie that I thought struck exactly the right balance - it was nowhere near the uncanny valley, staying firmly on the cute robot side, and it used a projected cartoon face that was simple but expressive. Unfortunately the company’s timing was rather poor, they went out of business right before the AI back end would have been able to make full use of an avatar like this. I’d love to see another version of this approach.