e522 — Pointing at Doomed Fish

Published 28 July 2025

e522 with Michael M and Andy – stories about AI in multiple forms: bees that listen, a cat that chats, and then some fun with animating fish you draw, a GameBoy you build and a whole lot more.

Andy and Michael M get things rolling while Michael R is away with a story about Amazon acquiring Bee, the wearable AI company.  After a quick reference back to earlier wearable AI examples, the co-hosts turn to Lumo, the AI cat chatbot (catbot?) from Proton.  This sparks a rich conversation on search, and the need to find that receipt or email about the upcoming event.  A 404 media article covers Google’s AI Overview, and Michael shares how he routinely passes over the sponsored links, which is where the AI Overview currently resides.  Andy noted that Google announced Web Guide this week, and the pair give that a once over.  Andy also harkened back to his SearXNG aggregator and udm14.com. 

Next up, the co-hosts show that we can still have fun things, starting off with an(other) iteration of Doom.  This is followed up with Draw A Fish, a simple and fun experience where your drawn fish is animated by the site and placed in a fishtank for you to watch and feed.  Then, a delightful experience on Pointer Pointer, where the service gives you a picture with people pointing where you have your cursor.

Andy and Michael wrap things up with another LEGO video game exemplar – this time it’s the Nintendo Game Boy, which sadly doesn’t play a game, but looks very realistic down to the custom LEGO buttons.  And of course the pair is excited to see Spinal Tap 2: The End Continues when it comes out.  

Will Spinal Tap 2 go up to 12?  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

The Verge article: Amazon buys Bee AI wearable that listens to everything you say

Bee.computer

Games at Work e502: Humane Rabbits (for the Humane AI Pin, Rabbit Agent, R1 and more)

9 To 5 Mac article: Proton throws shade at Apple Intelligence privacy as it launches AI chatbot

Proton post: Introducing Lumo, the AI where every conversation is confidential

Vivaldi post: #10 Andy Yen (Proton) – For A Better Web

Search

404 Media article: Google’s AI Is Destroying Search, the Internet, and Your Brain

SearXNG

Tedium post: One Extra Click

Google’s The Keyword post: Web Guide: An experimental AI-organized search results page

udm14.com 

We Can Have Fun Things

Draw a Fish

Pointer Pointer

The Verge article: Here is Lego’s official Nintendo Game Boy — with lenticular display

Entertainment Weekly article: Rob Reiner applauds Paul McCartney’s ‘really funny’ improv skills in first look at Spinal Tap sequel

IMDb: This Is Spinal Tap (1984)

IMDb: Spinal Tap II: The End Continues (2025)

Web 11.0 mashup junkie, and co-founder / co-host of the GamesAtWork.biz podcast. My views are my own.

Michael Martine