Romanian Prime Minister Nicolae Ciucă brought a surprise guest to Wednesday’s cabinet meeting: his new honorary assistant, a completely Romanian-developed artificial intelligence, Adevarul reported.
Romania, which famously has the fastest internet in Europe, has long been building its image as a technological powerhouse within the EU in terms of new software and innovation, and can now show yet another achievement to add to its inventory.
“The Romanian government is marking a first, I might say, at a national and international level,” Ciucă said while introducing the language model. “The first government advisor using artificial intelligence.”
The robot, which is integrated into a mirror and projects its written answers onto the glass, bears the name “ION” (Romanian version of John), which—according to the PM’s enthusiastic report—is in fact the Romanian word “noi” backward, meaning “us.”
There is a good reason for this wordplay. According to the prime minister, the AI’s primary job would be informing members of the Romanian government in real time about the wishes and opinions of the population by continuously collecting data from social media.
Ciucă also noted that the bot “does not belong to the government, but Romanians who had an initiative worth recognizing.” Indeed, ION has been completely developed domestically by university professors and researchers. “It’s a 100% Romanian project,” the PM said.
The prime minister even demonstrated how the robot works, noting that as an AI, it has a steep learning curve ahead of it. “Hello. You gave life to me, I’m ION,” the mirror said after Ciucă turned it on. “My role is to represent you. The messages to me are a portrait of us, Romanians. What do I need to know about Romania?” “That Romania is a beautiful country with beautiful people,” answered the PM, to which ION almost jokingly replied “I see. I learn.”
The full video can be seen here; the demonstration starts around the 10-minute mark.
