e502 — Humane Rabbits

e502 — Humane Rabbits

Author: Michael Rowe, Michael Martine, Andy Piper February 24, 2025 Duration: 40:24
rabbit on lawn
Photo by Michael Martine, Chapel Hill, NC July 2023

Published 24 February 2025

e502 with Michael and Michael – stories and discussion on AI for career recommendations, game generation, enabled devices such as the Humane AI Pin and Rabbit R1 and Agents, as well as Kindle eBook DRM while Andy is in transit to RubyJam.

Michael and Michael get things started off with a story about Google’s Career Dreamer AI enabled tool to help people explore career possibilities, discover strengths and develop skills. 

Turning next to AI Agents, Michael and Michael take a look at the Rabbit Agent and the functionality the software provides.  The team then focuses on the news about HP acquiring Humane, and especially on the AI Pin servers shutting down at the end of the month, putting a severe crimp in the functionality of the hardware devices.  This also signals that HP sees significant value in the Humane software, and reminds the co-hosts of earlier episodes dealing with technology companies shutting down services for hardware, such as the Jibo robot.

Next up is a discussion on the latest eBook DRM situation with books on the Amazon Kindle, and what people can do right now other than back up books before February 26. 

Then the While Waiting game spurs a broader conversation on boredom and screen time before the next topic of AI to generate games spins up.  Michael R wraps up this episode with a discussion on the Swift on Android working group, and language portability.

Do you have another solution to purchasing (or licensing) books to share? Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @gamesatwork_biz@mastodon.social (our home for now) and let us know! 

These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.

Selected Links

AI

PCMag article: Google ‘Career Dreamer’ Tool Uses AI to Help You Explore Career Options

Google’s Career Dreamer

Google AI for Developers Gemini API Additional Terms of Service

Pandora Music Genome Project

The Verge article: Rabbit shows off the AI agent it should have launched with

Rabbit Tech: LAM playground

The Verge article: Humane is shutting down the AI Pin and selling its remnants to HP

Humane News: HP Accelerates AI Software Investments to Transform the Future of Work

HP Newsroom press release: HP Accelerates AI Software Investments to Transform the Future of Work

Games at Work e464: AI Piano Man, touching on both the Rabbit R1 and the Humane’s AI Pin

Games at Work e230: Dance this AR Around, touching on the shut down of Jibo

Surreal.

This com badge “toy” that uses Bluetooth and costs around just $80 has more functionality than the more expensive pin will in a few days.

— David Bisset (@davidbisset@phpc.social)
2025-02-20T13:21:18.755Z

Books – eBooks and paper

You can back up all your Kindle books using this script – federatedfandom.net/@villainou

A lot easier than manually downloading them all.

After that, install the Calibre eBook Manager calibre-ebook.com/

Install the noDRM plugin for Calibre github.com/noDRM/DeDRM_tools

Give the plugin your Kindle's serial number.

Import your Kindle books into Calibre.

Done.

You now have a DRM-free copy of all your purchased eBooks.

You can copy them to your eReader, convert to ePub, save on a backup disk, etc.

— Terence Eden (@Edent@mastodon.social)
2025-02-16T09:23:51.268Z

Treetrum Github repo: amazon-kindle-bulk-downloader

Michael Rowe’s Random Thoughts blog: 10 years of Podcasting

Discover Durham: Books Do Furnish a Room

Bookshelf app

Tom’s Guide article: No Kindle? No problem: 5 places to buy DRM-free e-books

Crowd Supply article: Ink Console

Ink Console

Wikipedia article: Chose Your Own Adventure books

Wikipedia article: Infocom

Games – for waiting and for generating

The Verge article: While Waiting is a playful reminder of the joys of boredom

While Waiting on Steam

metro.co.uk article: Xbox is using AI to make games in a disturbing vision of next gen gaming

The Verge article: Microsoft’s Xbox AI era starts with a model that can generate gameplay

Software Development

swift.org forums: Swift on Android Working Group


The weekly conversation hosted by Michael Rowe, Michael Martine, and Andy Piper, Games At Work dot Biz, explores the intersection where our digital play and professional lives collide. This isn't just a review show; it's a deep dive into the technology that powers our hobbies, the business behind the leisure, and the cultural news shaping both worlds. Each episode feels like pulling up a chair with three friends who are as passionate about the craft of game development and the evolution of hardware as they are about the pure joy of finding a great new title. You'll hear specific discussions on everything from the latest graphics card impacting performance to the narrative design of an indie darling, all filtered through the lens of professionals who live in the tech space. The Games At Work dot Biz podcast operates on the belief that the games we play and the tools we use are inextricably linked, offering listeners a consistently thoughtful and engaging analysis that goes far beyond a simple score. Tune in for a regular dose of insightful commentary where the serious business of technology meets the serious fun of games.
Author: Language: en-us Episodes: 50

Games At Work dot Biz
Podcast Episodes
e521 — We Like Big Drives [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 29:35
Photo by benjamin lehman on Unsplash Published 21 July 2025 e521 with Andy, Michael and Michael – stories about expressive robots (Shoggoth Mini, Apple ELEGNT, SpiRob & facehugger), newly reengineered Commodore & Sinclai…
e520 — Cold Fusion Gaming [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 26:13
original photo, by Michael Martine, Sandwich MA June 2025. Animated by Google Veo3 July 2025 Published 14 July 2025 e520 with Michael, Andy and Michael – stories about AI advertising, still photo animation, anime agents,…
e519 — Clippy Kittens [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 27:56
Photo by Mike Stimpson on Unsplash Published 30 June 2025 e519 with Michael, Andy and Michael – stories about AI conversations with pets and people, LLM data retention, AI slop, Clippy-esque prompts, AI workloads in spac…
e518 — The Old Ones Are The Best [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 32:19
Photo by Boris Langvand on Unsplash Published 23 June 2025 e518 with Andy, Michael, and Michael – stories about Atari adjacent AI, a new Emotiv experience, Midjourney video magic, Bondi blue, visionOS persona improvement…
e517 — Where Every AI Knows Your Name [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 34:07
Photo by Hasnain Sikora on Unsplash Published 9 June 2025 e517 with Michael, Michael and Andy – stories about Atarino microcomputing, AI through movie and television metaphor, AR running, screens and zombies, Skyrim Gran…
e516 — Model Behavior [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 27:06
Photo by insung yoon on Unsplash Published 2 June 2025 e516 with Michael and Michael – AI prompts, browsers, model collapse & automation along with a teeny tiny pico Mac nano, and a whole lot more. While Andy is away, Mi…
e515 — Seeing Through Walls [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 28:52
Photo by Mihály Köles on Unsplash Published 26 May 2025 e515 with Andy, Michael and Michael – the Fortnite Darth Vader NPC, IO, both from Google and Open AI, AI hardware, an intriguing Vision Pro use case, infrared conta…
e514 — Leroooooy Jenkins! [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 36:50
Photo by WTFast on Unsplash Published 19 May 2025 e514 with Michael R and Andy – generative ads & LEGO, Aston Martin x Apple CarPlay Ultra, new Vision Pro UX, an Internet Roadtrip, Leroy Jenkins and so much more. While M…
e513 — Not Dead Yet [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 39:26
Photo by Hande B. on Unsplash Published 12 May 2025 e513 with Michael and Michael – Clippy + LLMs, social AI, first person video, Duck, Pong & other games, and so much more. While Andy is away, Michael and Michael start…
e512 — Sounds Good, On Paper [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 26:58
Cartoon versions of Andy and Michael M, generated by ChatGPT Published 5 May 2025 e512 with Andy and Michael – E Ink monitors, Agent run companies & towns, winning arguments with AI assistants, pixellating reality and mu…