I wonder why they didn't try to use a "talk button"? Initiating the call by picking up a specific toy and shaking it seems.. I don't know, unnecessarily complicated. I don't know how true or unique it is for dogs to be able to learn to talk with buttons, but there are many YouTube videos showing how they are trained and how the dogs talk with them. Like this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8m-xupLJc4M or this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3njWjIimd4
So a few things would be interesting to see:
1.) Does the system work better if the dogs start & stop calls with buttons instead of shaking a ball?
2.) What if you added _other_ buttons for dogs to talk to other dogs? I think it might be boring for both human and dog because there is no physical aspect, but maybe dogs barking at each other would be interesting for them?
3.) When dogs learn the system, will we observe behaviors and customs change? Maybe they will call certain dogs more often, or create new rituals to start and stop calls. Maybe they will act like children (I mean this literally) where they just turn the video on, go about their day, and once in a while say something to each other.
So a few things would be interesting to see:
1.) Does the system work better if the dogs start & stop calls with buttons instead of shaking a ball?
2.) What if you added _other_ buttons for dogs to talk to other dogs? I think it might be boring for both human and dog because there is no physical aspect, but maybe dogs barking at each other would be interesting for them?
3.) When dogs learn the system, will we observe behaviors and customs change? Maybe they will call certain dogs more often, or create new rituals to start and stop calls. Maybe they will act like children (I mean this literally) where they just turn the video on, go about their day, and once in a while say something to each other.