The Next Big Thing: AI for your toothbrush! (Yes, you read that right)

We’ve been hearing a lot about Artificial Intelligence lately, but so far all we’ve learned is how AI will help out the eggheads — enhancing the fluidity of medical devices, or mapping wooly mammoth genomes and whatnot.

But what about us, the consumer? Don’t we deserve a little AI love too? Of course we do!

So fear not, because for just $400, The Washington Post reports, you too can get the benefits of a toothbrush powered by Artificial Intelligence, with the Oral-B iO Series 10 that provides “Personalized coaching for an expert clean.”

Finally, our days of limping along without a tooth-brushing coach are over.

According to Amazon, this toothbrush allows you to “GET A PERSONALIZED CLEAN with iOSENSE: real-time coverage, time and pressure GUIDANCE DIRECTLY VIA THE CHARGER without opening your Oral-B app.”

Wait, what? Your toothbrush needs an app? I mean, it did, before Oral-B figured out a way to bypass it. That’s how you know your toothbrush is truly innovative: when its technology allows you to avoid its technology.

I couldn’t help myself; I had to go to the Apple store to see what the Oral-B app looked like. I was unable to find it, although I did find BrushBuddy (which records your brushing times) and The Oral Cigarettes App (no clue).

The Oral-B website was too advanced for me to figure out, despite printed instructions to “simply” do this or that to get it to work. But it did advise that “The Oral-B iO delivers a clean uniquely yours with detailed feedback after every time you brush.”

Better do it right, or your toothbrush will tell you to “drop and give me 20.”

I hope all this sensitive tooth data is at least password protected. You would hate for Russian hackers to get ahold of your personalized toothbrushing experience and do who knows what with it.

“Businesses large and small are racing to show off to their employees, shareholders and you that they are all-in on new magical AI,” writes Shira Ovide for the Post. “I’ve seen a lot of tech frenzies come and go, but AI mania is truly out of control.”

Ovide writes the toothbrush boasts “‘AI Position Detection’ — which sounds like a straightforward sensor to detect which teeth you’re brushing and for how long. There’s also ‘3D teeth tracking with AI’ to show whether you’ve brushed successfully.

Perhaps you’re stopping at this point to wonder what Artificial Intelligence has to do with what is basically a glorified stopwatch. You’re not alone. “If you’re jazzed about nightly grades for your brushing” go for it, she writes. “But this toothbrush doesn’t seem to have AI even under the squishiest definition of that term.”

So “Now With Artificial Intelligence!” is a new marketing term, like “Now Gluten Free!” appears on foodstuffs that never have gluten to begin with.

Naturally though, an AI toothbrush is just the tip of the spearmint.

Another example is Amazon’s cashierless shopping technology which, in theory, eliminates the need for a checkout line because your shopping total is updated with each product you pull off the shelf, and then charged to your credit card or bank account when you’re done.

But Ovide writes that the technology was expensive and buggy, and required human oversight to make sure AI wasn’t screwing up by, say, mistaking an apple for an orange.

I saw a variation of this in an Interstate convenience store, which was obviously trying to save money on cashiers by replacing them with a bank of screens and gadgets somewhat similar to the self-checkout aisle in the supermarket.

But it was so advanced that the store needed five human employees (where previously it would have had two) to show puzzled shoppers how to work the equipment and keep the line from backing up all the way to Mars.

No one ever said progress would be easy.

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Tim Rowland is a Herald-Mail columnist.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: AI is not just for nerds: Now you can get AI for your toothbrush