The Craving for Unseen and a Next-Gen AI Product

Summary: From Marilyn Monroe’s iconic “flying skirt” to a Chinese creator's viral series, this article explores the power of capturing the "unseen." It then imagines a futuristic AI product designed to push this concept to the cosmos—and beyond.

The Power of Unseen

A famous photo of the iconic actress Marilyn Monroe took the world by storm—millions of people taken aback by this image. If a photo like it were released today, its timeless beauty would still be apparent, but it would not have the same power to shock.

So why? Why were people so excited over this photo?

If it had something to do with her status or beauty, that alone doesn’t explain why this one image rose so far above all her others. I believe it was not because of what you could see, but because of what you could not. People chase sensation—the thrill of knowing something, of seeing something others haven’t. And in the 1950s, a flying skirt was simply not seen. Anything above the knee was scandalous. Forbidden. It is because of that unspoken rule that this photo captured such intensity. It wasn’t just about her, or the skirt, or even the breeze—it was about how that moment tore through the norm.

In this sense, to see is not just what the eyes process—it is to perceive what was once withheld. We’re drawn to what breaks boundaries, where seeing becomes perceiving the once-hidden. This desire to witness the unseen fuels the heart of every audience. Satisfying this desire is the secret to success in the attention economy.

Wawa Li, a Chinese post-2000s self-media content creator, taps into this with her "Experiencing 100 Careers" and "Midnight Scenes" series, which have amassed over 600 million views. She immerses viewers in lives they’d never otherwise know, from factory workers to poets, from hospitals to train stations. Her success lies in revealing the unseen, much like Monroe’s fleeting moment, proving that capturing the unseen is the key to thriving in today’s digital economy.

A few years ago, Meta tried to build a virtual empire. But few people truly stepped inside. The unseen perspective explains why: The world they imagined was just a recycled version of the one we already have—virtual offices, digital meetings, and mundane workspaces. It was nothing new. A digital copy of their 9-to-5 routines wasn't interesting; people crave what they've never seen before.

In a world where everything is seen, streamed, and shared, what else deserves our attention? It’s the spark of the unfamiliar—the rare glimpse of something new that rekindles our curiosity and keeps us looking.

A Futuristic AI product for unseen

Now imagine this: Every SpaceX rocket launch leaves behind unused volume and payload capacity, while artificial intelligence awaits a truly groundbreaking purpose. What if we use one to solve the other? We could create a new category of product: a human observation agent, a proxy designed to capture the unseen. This lightweight, self-contained pod—equipped with a battery, a Starlink communication module, an AI brain, and a camera—would launch into orbit, or even deeper into the unknown deep space.

For those who crave wonder, this product becomes a personal observer in space. It’s an AI-powered extension of "you"—flying among the stars, offering a cheaper and safer way to travel to the cosmos.

What will you see out there? We don’t exactly know. And that’s the thrill. Your proxy might circle the Earth, or it could drift away and encounter a black hole. Launched far beyond this world, it becomes your eyes in the cosmos.

The product design seems perfectly tailor-made for Elon Musk's business empire, as he already holds all the keys: SpaceX for the launch; Starlink for communication; batteries for energy; And xAI's Grok—installed inside your virtual body. It could compress dull cosmic footage while you sleep and deliver only the most breathtaking scenes back to Earth.

This product is full of wonder, but its vision doesn't end in space. The same concept could be applied here on Earth: diving into the deep ocean, dancing with lightning in a storm, or even swimming through your own blood vessels. It offers people a gateway into the visually impossible, a new world of unseen realms.

The value of the unseen isn't limited to what we see with our eyes. It also applies to the perspective of unlearned insights. In her interview, Wawa Li shared her personal interpretation of climbing Mount Tai alone at midnight to watch the sunrise: "Life is a journey of one person. The only thing worth chasing for me is the sun." This 90-second video went viral, earning over 100,000 subscribers and 2-3 million views. Imagine how many insights could be generated when this product brings you digitally into a new, unseen vista.