Honoring Early HCI Milestones
On September 3, 2026, OpenAI shared archival video footage demonstrating the seminal multimodal interface system 'Put That There', acknowledging the MIT Media Laboratory along with researchers Chris Schmandt and Eric Hulteen.
According to the post on OpenAI's official account, the company credited the clip to the MIT Media Laboratory, Chris Schmandt, and Eric Hulteen. 'Put That There' is widely recognized as a foundational milestone in computer science and human-computer interaction (HCI), pioneering the integration of voice recognition with spatial gesture control.
Multimodal Interfaces in Modern AI
OpenAI's nod to this historical research comes as multimodal interaction combining voice and vision takes center stage in modern AI development. However, OpenAI did not provide additional commentary or unveil any new technical announcements alongside the shared footage.