Non-Answer on Armed Robot Pullout From Iraq Reveals Fragile Bot Industry-(aimed at friendlies)

popular mechanics ^ | 4/11/08 | na

[Flavius]

PITTSBURGH — We already knew that iRobot CEO Colin Angle was running the only successful business in the home robotics game, so it was fitting that he closed his keynote at the RoboBusiness Conference here today by asking if there’s really a robot industry in the first place: “Are we sure we’re not just an adjunct to another industry?”

After all, Disney stopped buying its animatronic actors years ago, and started building them. What’s to stop retail chains from adding a robotics division, or an upright vacuum-maker from hiring its own team of roboticists? This is not, we can assume, what audience wanted to hear. This conference, whose founder and biggest sponsor is iRobot, is a place for deals to be made, and an industry to be cultivated. But as the public continues to devour news of Asimo’s latest sprint or stumble, and schools across the country vie for scholarships in national robotics competitions, the industry itself is barely out of the incubator.

[Flavius]

So SWORDS was yanked because it made people nervous.

not to mention, once armored, it will make any round bellow .50 obsolete

[Flavius]

put down your weapon civilian

[farlander]

What’s SWORDS ? Link ?

[Flavius]

http://www.popularmechanics.com/blogs/technology_news/4258103.html

look at the first photo in the article posted

[NonValueAdded]

Ah, but just wait until they unveil Cherry 2000

[higgmeister]

I’m in then!

[sinanju]

Just don’t network them to Skynet.

[higgmeister]

[sinanju]

“Pretty!”

[DannyTN]

For the robotics industry to have it's "PC moment", they have to provide a model that has:

• Enough functionality to provide some justification for buying it.
• An open architecture both for physical hardware and software that allows developers and amateurs to expand functionality.
• A low enough price that's it within reach of at least 10% of households.

  A general purpose robot will not replace an inexpensive specific purpose machine like a dishwasher. Ideally it will use such machines.

  For households, cleaning, organizing, and fetching are ideal tasks. Cooking would be valuable, but would require elaborate testing and advanced detailed software to be safe.

  I think housing construction jobs, and roadwork jobs would be good general purpose robot tasks.

  A lot of small businesses could develop and take back some of the overseas outsourcing, if robotic labor became easily affordable.

[ME-262]

I think housing construction jobs, and roadwork jobs would be good general purpose robot tasks.

Perhaps we could replace the person who holds the sign all day with a remote controlled sign stand. But the Unions will probably want us to pay them double overtime if it runs more than eight hours a day.