I have a thesis: the current state of Cloud AI is a lot like the timesharing systems of the mainframe era. We're accessing massive, centralized models through terminals, and our data is often the price of admission.
I believe the "PC revolution" for AI is already here, but we're missing a key component. The "Personal Computer" is already in our pockets: our phones and PCs. They have powerful chips capable of running incredible local AI. What they lack is the right input device—a peripheral designed to seamlessly feed our thoughts and experiences into this personal AI.
That's the philosophy behind Sein Clip. It's not another computer. It's the 'mouse and keyboard' for the Personal AI era.
How it Works: The Sein Clip is a small, wearable device obsessed with one thing: high-fidelity audio capture. It uses a custom-tuned, dual-microphone array to capture the nuances of your voice far better than a phone in a pocket ever could.
It then securely transmits this data to the Sein app on your phone or PC. This is where the magic happens. The app leverages your own device's powerful processor (like the Apple Neural Engine) to run our local-first AI models. Your phone becomes your private AI server.
The core functionalities—transcription and basic emotional insights—happen 100% on your phone, completely offline. For extremely demanding tasks, there's an optional, user-controlled connection to external models, but the system is always private by default.
The Business Model: It’s simple: you buy the hardware (the "mouse" for your thoughts), and the companion app with all its local AI software is yours forever. An optional subscription is for those who choose to use the "mainframe" (cloud) for a power boost.
I'm launching on Kickstarter soon. I'd love to hear the HN community's thoughts on this thesis—that our phones are the new PCs of the AI era, and what we need now are the right peripherals to unlock them.
Pre-launch page: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/sein/sein-the-first-wea...
atmanactive•5mo ago
We already have thousands of wireless microphones available, what would be the most advantageous features of your device? Latency? Battery life? On-device wake word?
Iger•5mo ago
You are absolutely right. On the surface, Sein seems like a wireless microphone, and there are thousands of those. But just as you said, we see our device as the 'mouse and keyboard' for the Personal AI era. While the specs of a mouse are important, its true power is measured by the operating system it controls.
First, to directly answer your question, we obsessed over the hardware details to make it a best-in-class "input device":
It's designed for all-day battery life.
It's incredibly discreet and lightweight: at 3x3cm and only 30g, it’s about half the weight of an Ai Pin, making it truly wearable.
Iger•5mo ago
1. Your Privacy, Our First Principle. We don't want our every tap and utterance to be uploaded, analyzed, and logged. We believe you feel the same. That’s why we’ve worked tirelessly to bring cloud-level voice and intent recognition capabilities to run entirely and smoothly on your local device. This fundamentally solves the privacy issue—your data belongs to you, and only you. This isn’t for our convenience; it’s for your protection.
1. True Intelligence is an 'Always-On' Companionship.
The "Hey Siri" or "OK Google" model is fundamentally a 'summoning' ritual, building an invisible wall between you and your AI. We tore down that wall. Our AI is designed as an "always-on" companion that, through contextual awareness, intelligently discerns when you are communicating with it. Without any wake words, your thoughts can be captured anytime, frictionlessly, allowing interaction to return to the natural and seamless flow of a conversation between friends.
3. Emotional Intelligence: How AI Becomes a True 'Friend'. Having solved the 'when' of seamless interaction, we now focus on the 'how'. Through advanced emotion recognition, our AI can perceive your "emotional map" to understand your current state. It knows when to be proactive and when to remain silent; it knows the most appropriate way to encourage and assist you, rather than coldly executing commands. It forges a deep bond with you, becoming an intelligent companion that truly understands you, adapts to you, and grows with you.
4. Our Vision: And We're Just Getting Started. But this is just the beginning. Our vision extends far beyond creating the perfect individual companion. In the future, built upon our foundational MCP, we will enable a more open and interconnected ecosystem, unlocking collaborative AI experiences you've never imagined. The best is yet to come.
atmanactive•5mo ago
To an IT expert like me this translates to: an always-on wireless microphone fed into a specially crafted LLM app. Sure. What mechanism is there to ensure my personal life data is not being sold to the highest bidder?
It seems that the more the civilization is progressing in computerized living, the more the question of privacy, trust and transparency becomes paramount.
Iger•5mo ago