I think at the very least it's a kind of trend-chasing. If the AI hype dies down a bit will Rabbit AI continue supporting their product and customers or are they going to wipe their online presence and move on to the next trend like with the NFT thing?
I don't even think in this case it's a matter of the AI hype dying down (though it is, and will continue to do so as products like these fail to get actually useful) I think this is just a complete nonstarter. Like, there's just nothing here that isn't better executed with existing tech. If I want to ask my phone to order a pizza, I can set that up in a lot of apps with Siri shortcuts, or, and far more likely, just open the damn app and pick what I want. Why the shit do I want to carry around a Rabbit, and make sure it has wifi access, and keep that also on my person next to my phone that does all that shit already?
It's literally just another smartphone, that you only control with your voice which is the worst way to control a smart phone, and it'll offer suggestions I guess? And I guess if you don't want the suggestions you need to have a whole fuckin conversation with it.
Like, we've already been down this road. It's tremendously easy as a customer to just be presented a list of things to buy, pick what you want, and swipe your credit card. Rabbit is a regression to ordering things with a phone, except instead of talking to a person, you're talking to a robot. But that's not an improvement, and in fact in many ways, it's a step back.
I'm a millennial and I hate talking on the phone, but I don't want to talk to a robot, either. Just give me the damn app with menus and stuff and I'll browse them at my convenience and then pick what I want.
And even if I did want to talk to a robot, I'd rather just use the gadget that I already have for talking into, not yet another thing to lug around, keep charged etc.