This year, AI hardware is the latest buzzword. And apparently we’re also officially entering the era where your dog might start talking back to you. No, your Labrador hasn’t secretly been working on a stand-up comedy routine. It’s all thanks to a new voice-activated collar from a company called Personifi AI, which is trying to turn your pet into a chatbot-wearing companion.
This isn’t exactly Dr. Dolittle levels of communication. The collar has a microphone and speaker, allowing it to hear your voice and respond with a pre-recorded human voice. That’s the caveat – you’re technically chatting to a cleverly programmed device, not unlocking your pet’s secret inner monologue. So it’s a little less advanced than an AI chatbot like ChatGPT. It can’t think on the fly, but rather uses around 8000 lines of pre-recorded dialogue.
Inspired by McHale’s own close call with his dog, Roscoe, the Shazam collar is packed with safety features as well. It can detect the sound of a rattlesnake’s rattle and warn you, or help you track down your runaway pet. It’s even got the capability to remind you to feed your dog if it detects that morning’s food hasn’t been touched.
As for the conversational side, there are 27 different voice personas to choose from. These range from cutesy and cuddly to, well, mildly annoying. Your dog’s personality will be illustrated by a human avatar, because why wouldn’t it? It’s a bit weird, to be honest, but there’s Bella, the sweet little girl type, and Dr. Gates, a Nobel Prize-winning scientist, naturally. And just to keep things fun, changing the character later will cost you $99 a pop, so choose wisely.
The whole thing sounds like a laugh until you realise it comes with a price tag to match the novelty. If you’re eyeing one for your furry friend, it’ll set you back $495 for cats and $595 for dogs. And just like every piece of tech these days, there’s a subscription. For $195 a year, you get the “feline” or “ultra” subscription. But if you really want your pet to have a fully sentient personality, you’ll need to fork out $295 a year for the BrainBoost service that uses AI.
Fancy giving it a go? The Shazam AI collars are available for pre-order now, but don’t expect to hear your dog quipping about last night’s footy until February 2025.
