When the Rabbit R1 arrived earlier this year, it was an unfinished product. Engadget's own Devindra Hardawar called it “a toy that fails at almost everything.” Most of the features Rabbit promised, including its signature 'large action model' (LAM), were missing at launch or didn't work as promised. Now, after another twenty software updates since the spring, Rabbit is releasing its most substantial update yet. Starting today, every R1 user now has beta access to Learning Mode, a feature that lets you train Rabbit's AI model to automate tasks for you on any website you can visit from your computer.
Rabbit CEO and founder Jesse Lyu gave me a demo of the learning mode ahead of today's announcement. The tool is accessible through the company's Rabbithole hub and features a relatively simple interface for programming automations. Once you have logged into your Rabbit account, navigate to a website and enter your login details if they are needed to access the service you want to teach the R1 to use for you. Lyu was quick to note that Rabbit doesn't store a username and password you enter; instead, the company saves the cookie from your lesson mode session so that the R1 can use it later. In June, Rabbit had to take quick action to fix a security issue that could have led to a serious data breach.
Once you've named your automation and written a description for it, all you need to do is perform the task you want to automate as you normally would. Rabbit's software translates every click and interaction into instructions that the R1 can later execute independently. When Lyu demonstrated the learning mode for me, he taught his R1 to tweet for him.
Once the software has had a chance to analyze a lesson, you can replay the automation before trying it on your R1 to ensure it works properly. While it's technically true that you don't need any coding knowledge to use Learn Mode, approaching it from a programming perspective will likely yield better results. That's because you can annotate the steps the software records when you show an automation. It's also useful from a troubleshooting perspective, as you can see in the video embedded above.
Once you've tested your automation, all you need to do is ask your R1 to perform a search in learning mode. The resulting process isn't exactly the polished experience most people expect from their mobile devices. The R1 announces each step of a task, and it may take a few moments for the device to process a query. According to Rabbit, some of that is by design. Early testers found it helpful that the R1 reported its progress.
I'll be honest, it's hard to escape the conclusion that some of the R1 automations Lyu showed me, while creative, don't provide a more efficient way to perform certain tasks than the apps people are already familiar with, a point he conceded when I said that during our conversation.
“There are many tasks that don't have a single destination,” says Lyu. Until then, he believes the learning mode will be transformational in interactions involving multiple platforms. Lyu gave an example of an R1 user who taught his device to order groceries. With a little work, that person could use the R1's camera to take photos of the shopping lists his wife made, who would then use the device to order the family's weekly groceries from their preferred stores.
Another area where the R1 could provide a better experience than a dedicated app is in situations where there are competing standards, such as the situation that currently exists with smart home automation. Let's say you're trying to get some HomeKit and Google Home devices to work together. You don't have to wait for the Matter Alliance to sort things out. With Learn Mode, the R1 navigates that mess for you.
“You have to think about speed,” Lyu tells me before laying out Rabbit's endgame with learning mode. For now, R1 users can freely add community lessons they find on Rabbithole to their devices. Lyu envisions a future where users can sell their automations, with Rabbit getting a cut. Additionally, while Learning Mode is currently limited to navigating websites, Lyu suggests that it will eventually learn to use more complex apps like Excel. At that point, Lyu claims that Rabbit will be able to deliver an artificial general intelligence, one that will understand every piece of software ever created for humans.
Of course, questions remain. A key question is whether people will pay for community classes when they could just as easily replicate an automation themselves. Here Rabbit expects things to play out as they have in existing app stores, with most people choosing to download apps they like rather than creating their own. “For the future agent store, we expect a similar situation where each user can learn their own lesson if they want, but most people will likely find lessons or agents created by other users that meet their needs very well,” shared the company me. in an email.
I also asked Rabbit if the company is preparing for the possibility that some platforms may prevent people from using learning mode to automate tasks on their R1. According to the company, bot detection systems such as CAPTCHA will need to evolve to distinguish between “good agents” such as those created by Rabbit users and malicious bots.
“When a user uses LAM to perform tasks on third-party platforms, they log into their own accounts with their own credentials and pay those companies directly for those subscriptions or services,” the company added. “We're just offering a new platform for these transactions to take place, similar to playing music on your phone and on your laptop… We don't see any conflict of interest here.”
I'm not so sure things will go as smoothly as Rabbit hopes, but what is clear is that the company is closer to the future that Lyu promised at the beginning of this year – even if that future seems years away and perhaps will still last. decided by another company. For now, Rabbit hopes that R1 users will enthusiastically embrace learning mode, as it will allow the software to improve more quickly.
