You forgot to water the plant. Instead of seeing yellowing leaves, you see a cute plant-shaped pet on a tiny screen, looking sad and dejected. Maybe that'll give you the push you needed to grab the watering can. As you pour water into the soil, the plant pet on the screen gets excited and happy.
That's the idea behind OATs, or Object Agent Twins—micro-agent AI avatars on tiny E Ink displays designed to pair with everyday household objects. The tech was created by Daehwa Kim, a fifth-year PhD student in Carnegie Mellon's Future Interfaces Group. Kim presented the project at the ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology in Detroit in early November, a forum where academics and industry experts explore human-computer interfaces, and she earned two Honorable Mention awards.
