David Pierce

Rabbit’s not shipping its new AI-powered R1 device until March, but the company just launched it officially today at CES. I got a few seconds with founder Jesse Lyu’s device, which didn’t do much thanks to crappy hotel Wi-Fi. But it’s a really nice-looking little device! The buttons feel good, the orange glows super bright, and the whole package is surprisingly light.

That was the setup, anyway, during this CES presentation. But I was watching Izumi Kawanishi, Afeela’s president and COO, as he was steering the latest prototype onto the stage, and I would swear he didn’t move his thumbs at all. Plus, he then made a comment about how this was just for tech demo purposes. So color me skeptical. But either way, at least someone is trying to make my dream of car controllers come true.

AI gadgets are about to be everywhere. But who owns the AI, and who should benefit when you use it? Who gets paid when my fridge recommends a recipe, is really the question I’m asking. We get into the battle between The New York Times and OpenAI, get excited about what’s coming at CES, and wonder about what happens when your movie theater projector just can’t hang anymore.

If 2023 could just, like, stop with the news now, that’d be great. But there’s still lots to discuss! We talked Watch bans and Beeper battles and streaming mergers and Peloton pivots and a bunch more.