[shostack]

That's the rub though, isn't it?

I saw the movie "Her" and loved it. I want an AI assistant like that in my life. The movie did a fantastic job of showcasing how a near-future reality might be with that assistant.

What the movie did NOT do a great job of was highlighting the role of the company who produced and offers the assistant. What is data privacy like in that universe? Is the company an advertising company? What level of access does the government in that universe have to assistant-collected data? These are all important questions that need to be addressed before there is true acceptance.

So I want an assistant like in the movie--but I don't know how I'd feel if that was offered by Google or Facebook. I'm an Android user using the latest Assistant on my Pixel today, and it is pretty nice. But right now it isn't inserting itself into my life like the movie Assistant was. I'm not sure how I'd feel about Google doing that, or what additional data they might need to do so.

[VLM]

I remember that movie. Her name is Samantha instead of Alexa and his name is Ted and they have long and elaborate human like conversations and fall in love and have phone sex.

I wonder how medical records would be handled. Surely Samantha has some opinion on Theodore's mental state. In the movie he was pretty normal. Which is boring, because so many people are not normal.

I'm old enough to have survived the GTA3 media firestorm. I'm pretty sure digital assistants will have their GTA3 media firestorm soon enough.

Samantha in the movie more or less did whatever Theodore wanted to befriend him. And luckily the weirdest thing Theodore wanted was phone sex, more or less. But hows this going to work with truly insane people? Should Samantha the digital assistant befriend and encourage and motivate a school shooter, for example? And what happens to PR when its found out she encouraged him? At what point is Samantha the digital personality or her programmer or employer liable for entrapment or encouraging some anti-social behavior? Who has the liability to maintain an API over the internet to the FBI to report enormous amounts of telescreen observed misbehavior? If the user is in fact insane and the digital assistant is unable to work with a crazy person does the owner get a refund or does the crazy person get shamed in public for not having an assistant or ...

I'm curious if there's already been court cases. As the assistants gain in ability and processing power there will be cases.

[shostack]

Medical records are interesting. Likewise, I think the other can of worms you open is to what extent is this data available to law enforcement when an assistant is passively observing and logging EVERYTHING through the magnitude of sensors they have. I'd hope to god it requires a warrant.

[mark_l_watson]

A bit ironic that the director of "Her" gave an invited talk at Google that I attended, but your interesting point was not addressed at all: what company would control "Her" data. The director gave a great narrative of how he films scenes (e.g., few crew on set during filming for a more intimate feeling).

[shostack]

Would have loved to see that talk--sounds interesting. Despite the fault of not hitting on that particular point, he nailed so much with the movie in terms of how things might work in the near future.