Robots Are in the House
They're cute, cuddly, and great for tidying up around the home. But personal robots are just beginning to take shape.Rebecca Freed
If there's not a robot in your home already, there will be one soon. Odds are pretty good there's one living on your block right now. They move, they think, they clean, they entertain. And they do it all (mostly) without your help. But we've just scratched the surface of what these intelligent devices can do. Newer, cooler choices are on the way.
Although live-in robots aren't exactly new, it has taken until the last couple years for products such as IRobot's Roomba vacuuming robot and WowWee's Robosapien and Roboraptor toys to capture mass-market imagination. And they've really caught on: 1.5 million Roombas have been sold to date, and manufacturer IRobot went on to develop the Scooba floor-washing robot. WowWee has rolled out a new generation of robot toys, with still more interesting products in the works.
People have warmed to the current cadre of robots because of two traits: falling prices and, well, friendliness. There are still a handful of robotic vacuums on the market, including the Electrolux Trilobite, that hover in the $1800 to $2000 range. You can also buy robotic lawnmowers such as Friendly Robotics' Robomower for about $2000. And if you have limited mobility and need help with household upkeep, $2000 isn't that outrageous.
But the various Roomba models range in price from $150 to $400, similar to the cost of high-quality vacuum cleaners that you pilot yourself. The Scooba, which debuted around Christmas 2005, is also $400.
Fun-and-games robots have also grown more affordable. Sony's Aibo robotic dog has been available in various models since 1999 and has developed quite a fan base. (In a cost-cutting move, Sony announced in January that it would stop manufacturing Aibo, although the current ERS-7 model will continue to be supported through 2013.) But new Aibos are priced around $2000. On the other hand, WowWee's Robosapien v2 costs about $230 (the company's Robopet dogs go for about $60), so indulgent grandparents don't have to think twice.
More Fun, Easier to Use
Current robots are also easier than ever to operate and interact with. Helen Greiner, IRobot's co-founder, says the Roomba's flashing lights and sounds are designed to be inviting and friendly, and some users report treating the bots as family pets. I personally set a Roomba to work on my kitchen floor, and while I wouldn't call its little signaling tunes endearing, it certainly almost seems alive, especially the longer you watch it.
The WowWee toys' autonomous actions and feisty attitudes have earned them a legion of rabid fans. There are numerous Web forums devoted to them, complete with videos of, for example, a Roboraptor terrorizing the family dog and Robosapien delivering a drink.
So What's New?
But the gee-whiz days of robots may be over: Now things are getting serious. With an attentive market out there, developers are adding newer, cooler features to their products.
Robots were a big deal this winter at the Consumer Electronics Show and the American International Toy Fair. WowWee was previewing the next generation of the Robosapien v2, adding a color screen to its chest and speakers to its hands. And with a USB connection and the robot's media interface, you can load music, videos, or digital images into Robosapien, and program how they will play. You can even edit Robosapien's existing sound, video, and movements.
The upcoming Roboreptile reflects an evolution of the current Roboraptor into a ferocious personality. And like his more docile cousin, the Roboreptile will be programmable. Both the Roboreptile and the next-gen Robosapien v2 will be available later in 2006.
WowWee is developing a new robot with the help of Segway, the folks who make the Human Transporter. Their creation is called the Pea Bot. It balances on two wheels and has a humanoid shape, with an LCD screen where a face would be. The Pea Bot prototype that appeared at CES was about 3 feet tall and had a slot for carrying things on its back. Production of this robot has been pushed back, and there is no scheduled release date.
Scoty Plays Your Music
At the International Toy Fair in New York last month, WowWee also previewed Scoty, a distinctly non-humanoid robot developed with Philips Electronics (it looks like a vertical stack of lighted panels that glow and move in response to stimuli). Expected to sell for about $400, Scoty is an intelligent media hub that can play music from your computer. It responds to voice commands and will read your e-mail to you. Scoty even recognizes and acknowledges faces.
In certain respects, Scoty is reminiscent of another robot called Wildfire, Virtuosity's intelligent voice-mail agent that was hot in tech circles several years ago. It will be interesting to see, when the product launches, whether Scoty can smoothly manage myriad digital media tasks, which aren't exactly simple to execute on a PC without a lot of difficult setup.
More Lifelike
Not attracted to traditional robot aesthetics? Flashing lights not your style? Last month at the exclusive Demo conference in Phoenix, startup company Ugobe introduced Pleo, a robotic baby camarasaurus toy that actually looks like a little dinosaur.
With big eyes and gentle, swaying movements, Pleo is designed to be an electronic pet, and it's aimed at kids and adults. Pleo reacts to stimuli using motion, sound, and light sensors, and will interact with its owner to express emotions and needs. In fact, Pleo was designed to form an emotional connection with its owner, says Diana Stern, the company's director of marketing and operations. One of the biggest hurdles in development, Stern says, was creating fluid, recognizable body language to which people would respond.
With a USB port and a Secure Digital slot, Pleo can be connected to a computer (but doesn't need to be). Presumably this means Pleo's behaviors will be extensible in some way. Ugobe expects Pleo to be available in time for the 2006 holidays at a price of $199.
As consumer-level robots increase in sophistication, the next frontier seems to be the merging of task-focused, or service, robots with entertainment-oriented robots. WowWee's Pea Bot, as well as more expensive experimental robots like Honda's toy Asimo, which the company has demonstrated serving coffee, are pointing the way toward a future in which domestic robots are both companionable and helpful.
Ugobe's Stern expects to see significant developments in robotics in the next five to ten years, and believes that the gap between service and entertainment robots will start to close. IRobot's Greiner agrees that service robots will become friendlier over time, and that robots have a big role to play in elder care, for example, where they can both assist with chores and be companions.
But let's face it: If a robotic dinosaur starts chewing on the furniture, all bets are off. The backlash could be severe.
Rebecca Freed is a freelance writer based in San Francisco.