Dabby Is an AI Assistant That Can Find Anything to Watch on TV

Smart TVs and devices like Roku and the Amazon Fire TV Stick are supposed to make it easy to find and watch TV. But how well do they actually do that job? If you decide you want to watch Cheers, do you know which streaming services are currently offering it? If none of the apps you currently have are streaming it, are willing to download yet another app just to watch Sam Malone pick up women? Most modern TVs and set top boxes simply don’t perform in the way we want to use them. But the new Dabby device promises that it will.

Dabby recently launched on Kickstarter, and is just about to surpass its funding goal. At first glance, it looks similar to an Amazon Echo Show or Google Home Hub. Dabby Touch has a large 7" HD capacitive touch display, a built-in HD camera, stereo speakers, and WiFi. By itself, you can use it like many other home voice assistants on the market. But what makes it special is its “Deep Search Engine” that can find and play video content from anywhere on the web. You can either watch that on Dabby itself — which has a battery and is portable — or on the TVs in your home using 4K HDMI Dabby Dongles.

All you have to do to watch something is say something like “Play that episode of Cheers where Coach’s daughter comes to visit, on the living room TV.” Dabby’s artificial intelligence will then search through all of the streaming services you pay for, along with all of the free content sources available on the internet, and find the episode. You don’t have to download a new app for different content sources, it will just play. Dabby even has interesting features like video calling, the ability to act as a second screen and display useful information, and can even provide a shared watching experience with friends who live somewhere else.

If you want Dabby, the Kickstarter campaign will be running until July 30th. Super early birds can get Dabby Touch, along with one Dabby Dongle, for just $149. Rewards are expected to be delivered in December.