De-Pendant
Welcome to an end-of-week edition of Unmade.
Today: I tried wearing the Pendant AI device for a fortnight. It was an unsettling experience but perhaps a glimpse of a new journalism tool. Plus, Seven West Media shares have now jumped 20% in a week.
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The Pendant records and transcribes every word said around you. It’s an amazing, spooky journalism tool, and a privacy nightmare
At least I know where I left it.
Like the last transmission of a space probe going out of range, the final conversation my Pendant captured was with an airport security staffer asking whether I had an aerosol in my carry-on bag. I sounded remarkably cheerful for 5.30 in the morning as I dropped it into the scanner tray with my other stuff.
For the last fortnight - until I left it behind at the airport on Wednesday morning - I’ve been experimenting with an AI-powered device called The Pendant. The slogan “Never forget anything again” does feel a little ironic, considering I forgot it.
Nonetheless, my short time with the device convinced me that I was experiencing a small part of the future. I had, however, begun to suspect that the future is a little dystopian.
The Pendant is a small device, about the size of two dollar coins. It clips to an item of clothing, or can be worn as a necklace. It’s produced in the US by a company called Limitless. I ordered the device more than 18 months ago, in November 2023, back when it was still called the Rewind Pendant.
Pressing a small button on the side tells it to start or stop recording. A discreet light illuminates on the device when it’s in record mode. I doubt most people would notice it.
My main use case for the experiment was journalistic. It is many years since I’ve been able to take shorthand at 100 words per minute. My Teeline has become rusty through non-use.
Instead, when conducting interviews or covering conferences, I’ve evolved to taking notes in a mixture of shorthand and longhand, backed by recording on my mobile phone, and noting the time stamp when I hear something interesting to check the accuracy later.
The problem with that approach is that I also use my phone to take pictures of the speakers, so the recording can get muffled at precisely the wrong moment.
The idea of the Pendant is an alluring one. When switched on, it records everything that goes on around you, and delivers a summary and transcript directly into an app on your phone on only a slight delay. It also allows you to play back that audio. The battery can go for two or three days.
For a journo covering public proceedings, this is incredibly useful. Where it gets spookier is in life admin. The vision on Limitless is for people to wear it all day, every day, as a personal assistant that hears everything and forgets nothing.
However the wearer soon forgets it’s there. At home, I had a brief conversation with the workmen installing solar panels about where to leave my car. Seamlessly, a note to move the car appeared on my to-do list.
The device finally arrived in the post just before our HumAIn AI conference. It seemed appropriate to try it for the day, as we discussed the opportunities and threats of AI facing our industry.
The Pendant was pretty good at delivering transcripts of what was going on on stage.
But during breaks, I kept forgetting to press the button to tell it to stop recording. I would be half way through a conversation over coffee when I’d suddenly realise I was recording the chat, and awkwardly press the pause button.
The legislation around surveillance devices makes that risky territory in Australia, even in a public setting, depending what one counts as a reasonable expectation of privacy.
In the set up instructions, the Pendant suggests that a user should tell people about the device every time and explain it as a tool to overcome forgetfulness. In practice that would not be particularly practical in every little exchange.
I gather there is a privacy mode, which is not activated by default. Then it will only record when it hears each new voice give permission. Before losing the device, I never got round to figuring out how to turn that on.
It began to remind me of the Black Mirror episode, The Entire History of You. Imagine if every argument with a partner about who said what could be settled by asking the AI. That’s now entirely possible. But being able to say “I told you so” is not necessarily best for relationships, I suspect.
Last week, I also wore the Pendant around my neck for the Mumbrella Awards judging at the Hilton. I turned it off for privacy, intending to turn it back on when I started my briefing to the jury. Instead I forgot, and only started recording at the end of the day when my colleague Hal Crawford and I experimented with it in the noisy, echoey Marble Bar downstairs.
We soon forgot it was recording. A few minutes later when we checked the transcript, it had accurately captured our musings about Mark Ritson’s Mini MBA which Hal is currently studying. Like a few moments with AI recently, it felt a little like a magic trick.
Sometimes the accompanying app would be either intrusive or dumb. And sometimes both. Uninvited, one morning the app attempted to coach me on improving my listening skills. Misunderstanding context, it ticked me off for not asking more follow-up questions when I had in fact been a pundit down the line on a radio show, and a member of the public had called in.
I suspect this device will not make it into mainstream use. A little like Google Glass, where the users became known as “glassholes”, talking to somebody wearing one of those things is going to create awkwardness.
That said, the form factor helps. Earlier this month at Meta Festival, the Ray-Ban camera glasses were being demoed and looked stylish enough that you could almost - almost - contemplate wearing them in real life.
At the time of losing the Pendant, I had already come to the conclusion that I would not wear it every day. Although it’s going to be an amazing tool to use as a journo covering public events, friends and colleagues would not welcome the recording of every word they say. Those note taker apps in meetings are bad enough.
Maybe society will decide otherwise. But I kind of hope not.
Seven’s surge continues on the Unmade Index
Seven West Media extended its charge up the ASX into another day, rising by 6.5% on Thursday, taking the company’s gain in share price up by 20% just this week.
SWM now has a market capitalisation of $263m, a long way off its high, but well above last month’s dip to $200m.
On a day when most media and marketing stocks performed well, the wider ASX which was almost flat, Southern Cross Austereo improved by 4.9%, ARN Media by 1.9% and Vinyl Group by 9.1%.
The Unmade Index rose by 0.46% to land on 554 points.
More from Mumbrella…
Mumbrellacast: News Corp, AI and Donald Trump; Anika Wells; and the OMA’s party without a purpose
Google likely to face Australian lawsuits from price comparison sites
Time to leave you to your Friday.
We’ll be back with Best of the Week tomorrow.
Have a great day
Toodlepip…
Tim Burrowes
Publisher - Unmade + Mumbrella
tim@unmade.media
That pendant wouldn’t make it into my jewellery box Tim ! Good read though 🤗