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Show HN: AI toy I worked on is in stores

(www.walmart.com)
156 points Sean-Der | 2 comments | 12 Oct 25 14:15 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source

Alt link: https://mrchristmas.com/products/santas-magical-telephone

Video demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0z7QJxZWFQg

The first time I talked with AI santa and it responded with a joke I was HOOKED. The fun/nonsense doesn't click until you try it yourself. What's even more exciting is you can build it yourself:

libpeer: https://github.com/sepfy/libpeer

pion: https://github.com/pion/webrtc

Then go do all your fun logic in your Pion server. Connect to any Voice AI provider, or roll your own via Open Source. Anything is possible.

If you have questions or hit any roadblocks I would love to help you. I have lots of hardware snippets on my GitHub: https://github.com/sean-der.

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deanputney ◴[13 Oct 25 22:15 UTC] No.45573915[source]▶
What happens when you use up the 60 minutes of talk time?
replies(5): >>45573976 #>>45574228 #>>45575329 #>>45576721 #>>45577039 #
bithive123 ◴[13 Oct 25 23:00 UTC] No.45574228[source]▶
"Ho ho ho! I'm sorry but our time is up. If you'd like to keep talking to me, please provide a credit card number. Merry christmas!"
replies(2): >>45574289 #>>45576355 #
BeetleB ◴[13 Oct 25 23:07 UTC] No.45574289[source]▶
Better would be something along the lines of "You were only so good this year, and the time is up. If you want to talk more, you need to earn more good points with your mom and dad!"

No idea how you'd monetize that, though.

replies(1): >>45574350 #
1. hagbard_c ◴[13 Oct 25 23:16 UTC] No.45574350[source]▶
With 'in-app' purchases of course: 100 brownie points now only $10, hurry this offer won't last.

Somehow this device fits well with the Don't be a sucker video linked to elsewhere on this here site [1]. Good advice, valid in many contexts. Don't.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45573025

replies(1): >>45574509 #
2. BeetleB ◴[13 Oct 25 23:36 UTC] No.45574509[source]▶
Nah - I want something that one can monetize and actually makes the kids be good (somehow).

Perhaps a parent commitment that if the kids earn X many goodie (goody?) points, then the CC is charged, and let the parent control how they earn those X points.

Gamifying good behavior has been shown to be pretty effective with kids. See Kadzin.