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Launch HN: Halluminate (YC S25) – Simulating the internet to train computer use

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21–30 of 51 posts

Re: Launch HN: Halluminate (YC S25) – Simulating the internet to train computer use

#21
post #20

Interesting name for an AI company - one letter away from hallucinate..

Not too late to change the logo to a friendly piece of halloumi :) (best i could find from a quick google image search https://www.redbubble.com/i/poster/Halloumi-by-PaulSDesign/1... )

Was disappointed to discover no cheese was involved in this venture

Re: Launch HN: Halluminate (YC S25) – Simulating the internet to train computer use

#22

Curious to see how this works out. The flight booking example is interesting because it’s one of the last purchase powers I’d want to hand over to an AI. If it gets a major travel detail wrong, purchases a business class ticket on accident, etc. and I need to adjust the booking by calling the airline, then I’m way less happy than I was if I just bought the ticket myself. Not to mention what happens when Google flight…

Why are flight bookings the go to example always? For most people, booking a flight happens infrequently, is a non-trivial expense (to your point), and is not that burdensome to do yourself.

It's because most people have done it; and it's infrequent and sufficiently expensive that makes it enough of a pain point to make for a good example. Because it's infrequent, most people don't have a rigorous well-practiced system for how to go about it to get the optimal ticket for their particular circumstances for that flight, and because it can be somewhat expensive, there's a bit of a burden taken on in order to optimize for price as well, especially given all the shenanigans airlines play with pricing.

If you're rich, you can just look for the ticket at the time you like on your preferred airline and buy a first class ticket, whatever the price, for whenever you want to fly, even if it's tomorrow. For the rest, that's not practical. So the flight search has to begin a few months out, with the burden of doing multiple searches (in incognito mode) across various airlines and/or aggregators, in order to optimize various factors. This takes a non-trivial amount of time. Add in looking for hotels and rental cars, and for some it's fun, for others it's an annoying burdensome chore that stands in the way of being on vacation.

It's just an example use case though. Similar to how "robot maid" that folds clothes isn't the be-all or end-all for robotics, if an AI is able to perform that task, it's going to have capabilities necessary for performing a wide variety of other tasks.

Re: Launch HN: Halluminate (YC S25) – Simulating the internet to train computer use

#24

Are these simulations shared between your customers, or are you building bespoke environments per client/user? How does the creation of environments scale?

Theses are really good questions!

we share the public/consumer simulators, but we also build bespoke environments on a per customer basis (think enterprise sites or even full VMs loaded with applications and data).

environment creation scalability is a big priority for us. we currently automate most of the process, but it still takes a fair bit of manual work to finish them and to get the details right. there is some reusability across environments, for example, we can use the flight results generation code in any travel/flightbooking sim. we also have some semi-automated approaches for creating tasks and verifiers. but still lots of work to be done here.

Re: Launch HN: Halluminate (YC S25) – Simulating the internet to train computer use

#25

Are these simulations shared between your customers, or are you building bespoke environments per client/user? How does the creation of environments scale?

Theses are really good questions! we share the public/consumer simulators, but we also build bespoke environments on a per customer basis (think enterprise sites or even full VMs loaded with applications and data). environment creation scalability is a big priority for us. we currently automate most of the process, but it still takes a fair bit of manual work to finish them and to get the details right. there is some…

Super interesting, thank you.

Re: Launch HN: Halluminate (YC S25) – Simulating the internet to train computer use

#27

Interesting name for an AI company - one letter away from hallucinate..

Yea haha ... early idea was illuminate + hallucinations. Naming isn't our strength :)

It's a great / memorable / and tongue-in-cheek name that anybody seriously in the space will instantly get and appreciate.

Re: Launch HN: Halluminate (YC S25) – Simulating the internet to train computer use

#29
post #20

Interesting name for an AI company - one letter away from hallucinate..

Not too late to change the logo to a friendly piece of halloumi :) (best i could find from a quick google image search https://www.redbubble.com/i/poster/Halloumi-by-PaulSDesign/1... )

might to make some merch from this!

Re: Launch HN: Halluminate (YC S25) – Simulating the internet to train computer use

#30

Curious to see how this works out. The flight booking example is interesting because it’s one of the last purchase powers I’d want to hand over to an AI. If it gets a major travel detail wrong, purchases a business class ticket on accident, etc. and I need to adjust the booking by calling the airline, then I’m way less happy than I was if I just bought the ticket myself. Not to mention what happens when Google flight…

Airlines will love it too. How long until an AI company gets paid to prefer a certain company
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