Robot Marathon Attempt Kicks Off (Video)
Usually in a race powered vehicles are penalized with a delayed starting time allowing the humans to get far enough down the course to make the competition somewhat equal. But VStone's robots are somewhat diminutive both in stature and endurance. They'll need their batteries swapped and perhaps their servos repaired quite a few times before completing their pseudo marathon attempt:
What's it all about? There are several possibilities. The company wants to demonstrate the power and reliability of their robots; they want to set some new humanoid robot records; they want to position Osaka where the company is located as somehow superior by marathon racing robots instead of humans; or perhaps they're trying to leverage the popularity of the Tokyo Marathon - set for this Sunday - to grab some media attention and public exposure.
Whatever their motives, we totally applaud them staging the robot marathon and hope that it encourages more people to get actively involved in robotics here in Japan and around the world.
Get Ready for RoboGames 2011! (Video)
RoboGames 2011 kicks off on Friday, April 15th in San Mateo, California. Yikes! That's only about 6-7 weeks away! Time to get your robots ready, and to register online!
Head on over to the RoboGames website now!
HEXBUG Robot Habitat Bags Toy of the Year Award
In principle we like the cute little HEXBUG Micro Robotic Creatures and can understand how they might be fun to watch and play with, even though we're not sure that they trigger any real long term interest in robotics or technology.
At the same time, the toy community really appreciates the robot bugs enough to honor the HEXBUG Nano Habitat Set as the Specialty Toy of the Year 2010 at the American International Toy Fair held earlier this month in New York City. The organization's annual TOTY awards recognize ",,, the best in toys and children's entertainment and the outstanding achievements made by individuals and companies."
"Local" Robot Boy Makes Good (Video)
ROBOCON Magazine isn't the Wall Street Journal or Scientific American, but among robot builders and researchers here in Japan it has become the go-to resource for the latest in robot news, behind the scenes event reports, interviews with robotics leaders, and great how-to articles. If you want to know anything about robotics, even how to reverse engineer a complex product, you have to read ROBOCON.
So, it was great, totally unexpected, honor when Taylor Veltrop. a talented American robot application developer and consultant living in Tokyo, found himself being interviewed as a part of the ROBOCON article on the recent ROBOT JAPAN event.
’"Local" Robot Boy Makes Good (Video)’ continues
Rear Projection isn't a Robot nor a Hologram (Video)
Manchester Airport has installed virtual assistants that some passengers, and the public, are mistaking for holograms or even actual human staff. The technology is readily available rear projection images on a substrate in the shape of the actor, and has been actively promoted by companies like 3M.
While the virtual assistants are positioned as facilitating and informative, they also help companies eliminate the need for actual employees and decrease costs. From the company, and investors/shareholders perspective that's a very positive strategy, though I doubt that employees share the same feelings.
It won't belong before we see virtual assistants replacing the friendly smiling Walmart greeters...
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