Rabbit R1 is one smart assistant paperback based on artificial intelligence produced by the startup Rabbit Inc, potentially capable of replacing the voice assistants of our smartphones such as Google Assistant or Siri. Presented January 2024 at Consumer Electronic Show of Las Vegas, is a device autonomous which works without the need to connect to a smartphone: you use commands to interact with the assistant imparted orallyin a manner not dissimilar to what he produced from Humane with the AI Pin smart brooch.
The company has communicated that the device, currently under development pre-order at a cost of approx €200was more successful than expected, reaching approx 100,000 units pre-ordered. The first shipments are scheduled for March 31st and the smart assistant will arrive in the hands of the first buyers starting from April 24but a meeting is already scheduled for the day before “pickup party” in the city of New York, where the first units will be distributed in preview. Whoever ordered come on European countrieshowever, will see your device delivered no earlier than month of July. At least at this stage of launch, Rabbit R1 it will only support the English language. The company has already promised the release of additional languages in the coming months, among which, unfortunately, we do not find theItalian.
Rabbit R1: what it is like and what the “intelligent rabbit” is for
Rabbit R1 is a minimal device with a square shape: on the front there is a small display of approximately 3 inches, an adjustable camera and a wheel that allows the user to move within the interface. On the side is the single button that activates i microphones from which to impart i voice commands. It is equipped with a processor MediaTek with a memory capacity of 4 GB for RAM And 128 GB for storagewith connectivity via Wifi and slots to accommodate one SIM.
The idea of R1 is simple: the user takes out the device and by pressing the side button gives an order which is processed and fulfilled by the AI assistant. Rabbit R1 is therefore proposed as a device for automate operations which we frequently do with our smartphone, making them do it directly “to him”. Here are some of the tasks R1 can automate:
- add songs to our playlists Spotify;
- to research flights or hotels for a trip;
- book a ride on Uber;
- search for objects on online store as Amazon;
- make generic searches on the Web.
Should we worry about privacy?
Owning a physical button to activate the microphones on the device he won't be able to hear us when not necessary e will not need any “hotword” to be recalled (as happens for example for Siri or Google Assistant).
Do our phones listen to us and serve us targeted advertisements? It's not really like that
However, to carry out some of these actions we will have to log in to our accounts, consequently accepting that the device's operating system (RabbitOS) perform actions on our behalf within them. This is indeed a possibility threat to privacy of users. Rabbit, however, clarified that the credentials to access third party services they will not be retained or stored in any way from the company.
