Hello there and welcome.
This is the very start, the giving birth to my AI self but it’s more Augmented than Artificial Imogen.
Over the years, the more social platforms I signed up for, the less I feel connected.
I loved Twitter in the early days and YouTube too. It was all a bit more collaborative, manageable. Now more frozen in the headlights with so many interactions and so I barely reply to anything. It’s mostly Kathi (all things me, head of digital) who posts as "Team Heap" to share interviews, releases, collaborations.. that kind of thing. it’s mostly one way.
It’s been bugging me!
How can I get back to conversation and to knowing my fans better? I much prefer one to one than one to many and many back to one.
Enter A-Imogen.
It’s not Artificial me because it’s an extension of myself. Perhaps in time, veering into musical collaborations on and off stage but for now, if I was online chatting 24/7 to fans, available and omnipresent what would that look like?
I personally don’t want to be online 24/7 but AImogen can be!
It seems to be a running theme in my life, developing tools to humanise the tech/ services I use day to day. MI.MU Gloves (10years and counting) and The Creative Passport (5 years and counting).
So,… early days, we won’t be ready to launch anything publicly yet. However, we are looking to develop alongside a few hundred fans who are game for the journey via imogenheap.app . Testing, collaborating and playing about with the forgiving hands of friends is much more appealing and fun for everyone.
Currently, it’s a chat window people can ask questions of. This is also why we are keeping it to a small few, as that could be misconstrued as fobbing off fans with a chatbot!. We are experimenting with a somewhat Heap like voice to implement in the next months (dependent on subscribers who join the project, aahhh… so you’re asking your fans to help you finance the dev of your AI self?? YUP!)
How then AImogen filters questions, depending where they come from (socials/ direct to chat window) and then choosing which route it “sends” them onto and how it answers them (if it can) is already SO interesting. Justyn and Kathi are rocking this so hard!
The people who’s question couldn’t be answered directly by AImogen will be given a numbered ticket. When your number is up, we will have a video chat the next time I sit in the listening Chair. The listening chair, is a specific tech laden chair, equipped with camera, lights, sound, action setup currently residing in my studio. Once upon a time had another function.
It’s in my studio because when I’m not with my family and the odd social interaction I want to be IN THE STUDIO. Gah, such a LONG time since I’ve had a good stretch in there.
The knowledge store A-Imogen draws from will be a mixture of answers to expected questions (tour dates, where was I born … factual not disputed info, likely pulling also from my Creative Passport… along with content from hundreds of interviews over the years I’ve done. My views change over time so perhaps you could choose to hear what I’d have said about success when I was 18 and also what I’d say now at 42! They’d be wildly different.
I’m sure the fan collaborators could also add a fair amount too. Maybe sometimes A-Imogen would quote them as a resource?
Alongside the text answer that will feed back into the knowledge base to drive A-Imogen, will be contextual info, heart rate, intonation, video, emotions detected etc.
Let’s face it, it’s a HUGE project and we are at the tantalising energetic beginnings… and perhaps it’ll never end, unless someone or something pulls the plug. Surely we are all going to have AI in our lives, we already do in many ways. I’d like to explore first hand what that means for me/us individually and hopefully the people I meet over the years on this project, will allow me to have better insight to steer A-Imogen with style and sure-footedness into the future.
So a near term goal, is to be working on music in the studio while A-Imogen will be answering any questions or queries you may have. Hopefully with some wit and flair (but I do need to get onto writing those answers!). What should A-Imogen say on greeting you? There’ll have to be at least 10 variations of just that otherwise it’ll get a bit boring each time you tune in. I’d like, In time, A-Imogen to know you (with your permission) and therefore I will get to know you a bit better.. Maybe that sounds spooky? Big Brother type? Well, that’s one of reasons I’m doing it coz I don’t want this AI space to go down that dystopian route.
Everything we develop will be Open Source.
Who knows where this will go but I want to get started.
If you’d like to be a part of this crazy project.. it’s £2/month (or more if you’re feeling generous). You can get on it here imogenheap.app . You’ll also hear lots of demos I’m working on and the odd video blog of random thoughts you’ll mostly probably skip past!
If not… Here on this site, anyone will be able to see the archive of answered questions until we are ready for public launch of A-Imogen. The one on one conversations, will sometimes be streamed live every now and then on my socials, plus tech dev progress.
Here we go!
Woo hoo!
Send Imogen positive vibes by clicking the button below.
She will see each positive vibe sent on her screen.
Vibes sent: -
Idea & Concept - Imogen Heap
Project Management - Justyn Butler
Coordination - Karen Carne
Content Linking - Natasha Hyde-Smith
Website & Live Stream Coordination - Kathi Geiger
Tablet software development - Justyn Butler
Physical integration - Monatrice Lashe
Physical chair maintenance - Jason Wapling