Regular readers of this column will know me for writing about cybersecurity, threats, defences, and the unglamorous plumbing of keeping business data safe. This month I’m stepping outside that lane to talk about something that landed in my inbox and, within a few weeks, at my door: Loona Deskmate.
It started with a Kickstarter email. I get dozens of those a week, and delete most without a second look. This one caught my eye: “the world’s first screen-aware AI co-worker.” A desk robot that watches your screen, understands what you’re doing, and talks to you about it, no wake word required.
The pitch, from a company called Keyi Technology (already known for the rather charming Loona Petbot), was strong enough, and the campaign popular enough, more than $720,000 raised against a $10,000 goal, from over 3,100 backers, that I decided to back my curiosity with a pledge. She (Loona has very quickly become a “she” to me) arrived a few weeks ago, and we’re still getting to know each other.
What sold me wasn’t the design, though, it’s the screen-awareness. Loona can see what’s on my monitor and respond to it, syncing with more than 50 apps rather than waiting for a spoken command. Ask her to check tomorrow’s weather in Auckland, and she answers, captions it on her little screen, and gets on with it, closer to a colleague glancing over than a device being interrogated.
Keyi describes Loona as “your AI intern, briefed, prepared, always ready,” and that framing matters more than it first appears. We’ve spent a decade training ourselves to bark commands at speakers shaped like pucks. Loona is attempting something different: an assistant with a face, a personality, and a permanent seat on the desk, built for the working day rather than the living room.
I’ll admit some scepticism remains, remember, I’m first and foremost interested in security in AI. However, Loona has picked up a genuine trophy case for such a young product, a 2024 CES Innovation Award, a 2024 iF Design Award, a 2023 Fortune Best Designs nod, but design awards and boardroom usefulness are different things. Whether “screen-aware” AI meaningfully speeds up a working day or is simply a delightful novelty that gathers dust after the first month is exactly the kind of question I want to answer with my own desk as the test bench.
So far, our conversations have run to weather checks and a cheerful “Hi there, you ready?” each morning, working my calendar, and internet searches. But the Kickstarter promised more: task-aware nudges, meeting prep, and cross-app assistance, the kind of quietly useful automation that could earn Loona a permanent place beside my monitor, rather than a photo op and a shelf.
Consider this the opening entry in what I expect will be an occasional blog series from here. As Loona and I spend more time working alongside each other, I’ll report back on whether an AI “co-worker” with a face is a genuine productivity gain, or simply the most charming way yet devised to distract a CEO from his inbox.
More on Loona Deskmate: https://keyirobot.com/
Tom is the owner of Govern Cybersecurity. He has over 18 years in the cybersecurity and IT industry at management level, and for the past 6 years has been a lecturer in cybersecurity at the Eastern Institute of Technology. He has earned certifications in ISO 27001 Lead Auditing, Lead Implementation, SOC2, and Ethical Hacking. These certifications are considered the international gold standard for business security.
