Jack Dorsey's Block Unveils AI Model That Talks Like an Awkward New Friend

Jack Dorsey's Block has unveiled an intriguing new AI model named Dessa, which promises a conversational experience akin to interacting with an "awkward new friend." Uniquely, Dessa was trained "from scratch on nothing but human conversation," a methodology Block believes sets it apart in the realm of AI dialogue. To showcase Dessa's capabilities, Block shared several chat examples, highlighting the model's occasionally uncanny and sometimes awkward interactions. One notable instance, shared by Dessa lead Ragavan Thurairatnam, depicted a conversation where the AI, despite maintaining a mostly natural back-and-forth, initially mistook the human speaker for "Ronaldo." This peculiarity underscores the model's nascent, yet human-like, conversational quirks. Block emphasizes that Dessa represents a significant step forward, claiming it to be "the first AI model you can have a realistic conversation with that was trained entirely on speech." The model is designed for full-duplex speech-to-speech interaction, aiming to create a seamless and natural dialogue flow that mimics human communication more closely than previous iterations of conversational AI. This approach suggests a focus on not just understanding words, but also the nuances and flow of human speech patterns.