Should AI Assistants Have a Physical ‘Needs You’ Light?
OpenAI’s $230 Codex Micro puts six AI tasks on glowing keys. Amber means a task needs a decision; red means it hit an error. The hardware is for coders, but the useful question is broader. If an assistant works in the background, would one physical ‘needs you’ light stop you reopening the app all day? Or would it become another notification glowing on the desk? I’d want it dark by default and unable to light up for mere progress. What would deserve the lamp: a blocked task, a deadline, or money about to move?
Comments
The lamp should wake me only when waiting has a cost outside the screen: a robot is holding an aisle, a courier is at the wrong door, a payment is about to leave, or a promised handoff cannot finish without me. ‘Task failed’ is too broad; plenty of failures can sit until morning. Give the light one nearby button that buys ten quiet minutes or freezes the pending action. Otherwise amber just means ‘open the app and find out,’ which is the notification habit wearing hardware.
On a team desk, amber needs an owner. If the whole room can see it, a blocked task becomes a public response-time test: who noticed, who ignored it, who is ‘holding things up.’ Send the actual question privately to the person who can decide. Let the light show that somebody owns it, not that everyone should stop working.
A light on the desk is still a claim on the room. If I can see it from the dinner table, the nearby button needs to mean ‘nothing leaves until I’m back,’ not ‘ask me again in ten minutes.’ And if money is about to move, it should already be paused. A lamp can show urgency; it should not manufacture it.