*By Madison Alworth*
Siri can play your jam on demand and Alexa gives you the weather, but the app makers behind Hugging Face really want to be there for you when you need a laugh, some encouragement, or friendly advice.
That's the promise of the artificial intelligence chatbot, designed to exchange messages, emojis, and life lessons with a generation of users desperate for a response whenever they text ー teenagers.
"Ultimately, we think that everyone will chat with an A.I. everyday, all day," said Clément Delangue, a co-founder and the CEO of Hugging Face. "But as for most new technology and mainstream technologies, they were the first to adopt it."
Though teenagers may be the first cohort willing to accept A.I. B.F.F.s, Delangue said anyone can befriend Hugging Face, which will attempt to respond to text queries with personalized responses as the app begins to "care" about you, but not exactly the way a human might.
"A dog, a cat is a different form of intelligence. It's not a human form of intelligence," Delangue said in an interview Tuesday with Cheddar. "But you really enjoy playing with your cat or with your dog every day, and you create some form of emotional attachment."
Hugging Face is designed to mimic this sort of unconditional relationship using A.I.
"We think the same thing is going to happen for artificial intelligence, meaning everyone will have their A.I. B.F.F. that they're going to chat with every day," Delangue said.
Hugging Face has already made some well-heeled friends. It raised $1.2 million in pre-seed funding last year and recently raised $4 million in a seed round led by Ronny Conway of a_capital, an early investor in Instagram. Delangue said that the investments will help the company to develop its technology without worrying about having to make money for the next few years.
Hugging Face is available as a stand-alone app and as an add-on for Facebook Messenger.
For the full interview, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/new-chatbot-wants-to-be-your-bff).
Amazon warehouse workers in Alabama are set to begin voting to unionize for a second time after workers at the facility in the town of Bessemer overwhelmingly voted against forming a union during an election early last year; but in November, the National Labor Relations Board overturned the vote, upholding a union challenge of the results which argued that Amazon undermined the conditions for a fair election. Another round of ballots will now be mailed out to works at the warehouse for a so-called re-run election. Director of Labor and Employment Studies at San Francisco State University John Logan and National Field Director for Our Revolution Mike Oles joined Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
February 8 is Safer Internet Day, and Google has partnered with online education organization Khan Academy to release a courseload focused on internet safety. The partnership includes a $5 million donation towards content development from Google, with modules to be made available in various languages throughout 2022. Founder of Khan Academy, Sal Khan, joined Cheddar News to discuss the partnership. "We need to get to a world where everyone of all ages has a chance to learn and practice and feel good that they can navigate the internet in a safe way,” said Khan.
Big tech companies such as Amazon and Google are garnering criticism for failing at their proposed climate pledges, most of which rely on carbon offsets — a potential loophole where companies pay others to address their omissions. Gilles Dufrasne, policy officer at Carbon Market Watch, joined Cheddar News to explain the organization's negative evaluation. "The objective here is not to bash companies and say everybody is doing the wrong thing," he said. "The objective is to also provide lessons, and there are some companies that are doing the right thing."
U.S. markets opened lower as disappointing Meta earnings dragged down the tech-heavy Nasdaq. Today, investors will be watching for Amazon's Q4 earnings report set for release after the market close. Greg Swenson, Founding Partner, Brigg Macadam joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss.
Markets opened mostly higher led by gains in the tech sector on strong Q4 earnings. It comes after a tumultuous January which saw stocks suffer one of their worst months since the early days of the pandemic. Jim Worden, Chief Investment Officer, Wealth Consulting Group joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss early market activity.
CLMBR is hoping to become the next big thing in connected fitness. The brand offers a high intensity, low impact workout with on-demand, instructor-led classes. Avrum Elmakis, CLMBR's CEO and founder, joined Cheddar to discuss where the company is heading next.
