Many attending the annual Capital Days celebration downtown, were exposed to a little more than they expected Saturday afternoon, when a new Phxicom presentation service malfunctioned displaying snippets of inappropriate videos to the assembled crowd. The incident happened during an appearance of noted author, and Lahaina native Kevin Morrow, who was promoting his newest book, “Aloha and You.” Officials say the adult-oriented videos and charts were only visible for a few minutes before the system was shutdown, however a number of official complaints have been filed. Phxicom says they are looking into the incident.
Commemorating Lahaina’s designation as the capital of the Kingdom of Hawaii in 1820, Capital Days is a celebration of heritage, history, and all things Hawaiian. Morrow was one of the first guest speakers booked by organizers this year. His most recent project, “Aloha and You” looks at the ancient beginnings of the Aloha spirit, examining how it penetrated into modern society, and the future of peace, love, and compassion. Because it is such a wide ranging topic, the author decided to make use of a new automated assistant service offered by Phxicom, and things quickly went down hill.
Promising to “change the way you prepare your presentations,” Presentmate Plus harnesses the power of Phxie, Phxicom’s AI, to offer real-time research and graphics to any speech or presentation. The service promises seamless integration of facts and figures, freeing up hours of tedious research and organizing slides, so presenters can just lay back and enjoy the ride, while the system does all the hard work.
Scott Parata, Phxicom’s Regional Operations Manager, says the system is terrific and is usually very reliable.
“Presentmate Plus is the future of public speaking. Phxie is able to research any subject and delve into vast stores of data much more quickly than is humanly possible. The system is completely neutral and non-partisan. It simply finds the perfect graphic or image for whatever you are addressing. No matter what your take on an issue, Presentmate Plus will find the information to back-up your position, and the figures and graphs to help sway your audience. Business is moving faster than ever, and the first to get out their ideas usually wins. Our system allows for complete, penetrating, professional quality presentations, leaving our customers completely satisfied. Unfortunately, in this toe curling case, something obviously went wrong. We apologize for anyone who was offended. We’re adding a number of protocols, and a safe word that will shut everything down in a hurry.”
Witnesses say that Morrow’s symposium on the Aloha Spirit was uneventful for the first few minutes with appropriate slides and images appearing behind him, but things soon heated up. Private emails between Kevin and ex-partners began to appear, “The whole thing went to hell pretty fast,” says George Harwell, a tourist visiting from St. Louis. “It started with old messages Kevin sent to his ex, asking for her back. To be honest they were pretty pathetic, lots of whining and promising to change. It was so embarrassing that I thought about turning away for a minute. I’m glad I didn’t! Then, charts about the STD rates in Maui over the last 20 years popped up, and some of the guy’s prescription information. People started laughing, and then the adult stuff came on. Most were of Morrow and his ex-wife. I guess some of those old emails worked. Morrow was screaming, “End Presentation!” over and over again, while trying to cover up the most graphic parts with his body and hands. Well, that just made it worse, people were doubled over laughing, and a few got mad and left. Finally, the video stopped and organizers began to apologize. I’m not sure if I know anything more about the aloha spirit than I knew before, but I do know I’m never going to use anything like Presentmate Plus at work or around decent company.”
Morrow says that he is disappointed that his message was overshadowed by the unfortunate incident, “It goes without saying that this was not what I meant by going out of your way to love all of your neighbors. I personally do not endorse or encourage the sorts of group activities that were on display behind me at the presentation.” Despite the obvious flaw in Phxicom’s technology, Morrow doesn’t completely blame the AI for the debacle. He says a faulty interface, and the system’s designers should shoulder the blame for the unfortunate incident.
“A clearly marked, and easy to use settings menu would have gone a long way here. With so much of our daily routines depending on technology, companies are pushing innovation faster and harder than ever, but that same vigor for new features doesn’t seem to be translating to basic user controls. If there were a “don’t display personal correspondence” or a “don’t play adult oriented video” box for me to click, I would have certainly done so. In fact, after careful review there are a number of troubling and salacious subjects that have no opt-out option in Presentmate Plus. If Phxicom had a more complete settings menu, or more prominent “Stop” button, I might have been able to end the obscene display and charts behind me, and people could have stopped recording the event quicker. I believe that this would have limited the number views of the YouTube video documenting my embarrassment, which stands at no less than 250,169 at this point.”
