It’s becoming hard not to see the Humane AI Pin as one of tech’s worst and cautionary tales. After reviews raised questions about why it even exists, high returns from its sales and warnings that its charging case could pose a “fire safety risk,” the company is now recalling it. The problem stems from the case’s battery cell, supplied by a third-party vendor, which can overheat and pose a fire risk.
Humane posted Thursday that it’s conducting a voluntary recall “out of an abundance of caution.” The startup says its charging case is the only accessory that’s affected — not the battery booster, charging pad or pin. “The problem is limited to the battery cell used in the charging case accessory,” Humane wrote.
“It is not related to its hardware design.” The company says one of its battery suppliers is to blame. Humane wrote, “Our investigation found that the battery supplier was no longer meeting our quality standards and that battery cells supplied by this vendor may pose a fire risk.” The company says it has severed ties with the supplier and is currently evaluating a new supplier.
In fairness to Humane, this recall was (in its words) the result of only one incident where a user plugged it into a third-party USB-C cable and power source. It has not received any reports of injuries or damage. As easy as it is to poke fun at an overhyped company’s other mistakes, at least it’s informing consumers and voluntarily conducting the recall instead of trying to bury it for PR. Perhaps Humane can take inspiration from Samsung in recovering from a product that catches fire — and not in a good way.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) posted a blurb with more details about the recall. It says that consumers who bought the charge case separately will get a $149 refund. Those who got the case as part of the Humane AI Pin Complete system will get $129 back. In addition, Humane will supply replacement charging cases, but don’t expect them anytime soon: The estimated wait period is three to six months. The CPSC says about 10,500 units are affected.
Humane advises charge case owners to “dispose of the product in accordance with any applicable local and state laws” rather than tossing it in the trash. Presumably, this is to avoid an actual dumpster fire that matches the metaphor in Humane.
While the use of generative AI in games seems almost inevitable, as this medium has always toyed with new ways to make enemies and NPCs smarter and more realistic, watching several NVIDIA ACE demos back to back really gave me a stomachache.
It wasn’t just slightly smarter enemy AI – ACE can create entire conversations out of thin air, simulate voices and try to give NPCs a sense of personality. It’s even doing this locally on your PC, powered by NVIDIA’s RTX GPUs. But while this might all sound great on paper, I hated nearly every second I saw the AI NPCs in action.