#socialrobots

[kerryanncleaver]

Currently re-reading Sherry Turkle's Alone Together—and honestly, it’s been a slightly unsettling read. 📖 The book delves into our evolving relationship with technology, particularly the rise of social robots designed to replace human connection. From robot dogs and Furbies to children’s companions and elder care, this rapid technological progression raises a critical question:

Are we forgetting that nothing can truly replace the presence and compassion of another human being?

One point that really struck me: 📱 “Studies show that if two people are having lunch, a cell phone at the table steers the conversation to lighter subjects, and each party feels less invested in the other. It’s not surprising. Each person in the conversation knows that with a phone on the landscape, you can be interrupted at any time.”

This resonates deeply. I already try to keep my phone out of sight during meaningful conversations, but seeing the science behind it reinforces how essential it is to be present.

Other powerful quotes from the book: 👉 “We seem determined to give human qualities to objects and content to treat each other as things.” 👉 “Technology makes us forget what we know about life.” 👉 “Where we examine the assumption that we are getting something important from these new technologies, we must ask whether a technology expands our capacities and possibilities or exploits our vulnerabilities?” 👉 “People are lonely. The network is seductive. But if we are always on, we may deny ourselves the rewards of solitude.”

As a designer, these insights are crucial. The projects I aim to be a part of are not just about bridging the gap between humans and the natural world—but also about bringing us closer to each other.

Turkle’s research is a powerful reminder to reflect on our relationship with technology and consider how we can shift toward more compassionate, human-centered designs. 🌿

[hebasoffar]

What can Nadine robot do?, Can Nadine answer questions and detect emotion?

[adugalm]

Emerging Practices 2: Say hA.I. to Paul

This week’s blog consists of identifying a social robot related to an area of personal interest (preferably to do with our pathway within Creative Technologies). If you’ve seen my body of work, you’ll know that psychology and play dominate its entirety. I’d even argue that last year’s first sem project Choke was a great embodiment of emerging practices with my preferred fields; an integration of Virtual Reality as a therapy and storytelling tool for depression and anxiety.

I found some difficulty identifying something as niche or as interesting as my project, while still remaining viable, promising and pleasing. Approaching robotics from a standpoint that is less than favourable makes it difficult for me to enjoy the field, much less find thrill in its ‘emerging’ leaders. At this point they are still too clunky, too affordably modular, and too targeted for the idealistic standards I have built in my head.

Take my case study for example, the Care-O-bot 4, equally as creative in name as proposed function. On opening its informational page, the viewer is greeted with a four picture slide show of Care-O haphazardly Photoshopped into four different scenes titled somewhere between “Possible application: assistance in the kitchen” and “Possible application: assist humans with tasks.” Why, if every single social robot developer, promises the same generic proposal can they not band together and emergence the practice at 10x the speed? Back to poor Care-O, who’s fourth iteration is apparently affable than its predecessor, Care-O bot 3, who wasn’t as “courteous and friendly as a gentleman.”

Despite its shortcomings in my expectations, Care-O has been made “simple to use” for its potential consumer market. With an accessible touchscreen for a head, optional 1/2/no arms, spherical joints, an LED riddled information reading chest, and open dev programmable software, the social robot applies its sleek flashlight body to any purpose one gives it. This is perhaps why I was led to the site, after its proposed application as some form of helper in the medical industry was plastered amongst a number of third party robot reviewing sites.

Care-O’s biggest and most widely covered claim to fame is its iteration as Paul, the store greeter at Saturn-Markt Ingolstadt, a German electronics chain. Programmed to ask customers what the need and bring them to the designated aisle while affording small talk, Chief Digital Officer Martin Wild at Media-Saturn-Holding states that “With Paul, we are offering our customers the opportunity to get to know one of the most advanced robots in the world.”

This statement is nothing to scoff at: Paul even won the 2017 retail technology award in Europe for Best Customer Experience, after being coined as having “the gift of gab!” Saturn plans to implant other Care-Os in further chains to boost the company’s marketability and experimentation in emerging practices.

I have no idea how much Care-O costs, nor am I interested in purchasing one in the slightest. I don’t even know if I can say that It further justifies an abandonment of my low libido for the robotics phenomena. To myself, a cynic scarred by a way-too-young screening of Blade Runner, I want so much more from what robots currently give. 

There is so much promise for the future of intelligent, learnable AI integrated into the home and other systems that what I see on the market today is just disappointing? Perhaps further investigation into that specific field would yield a bigger stir, but as of this point from what I see, robots like Care-O distinguish themselves from others only by the number of different tray attachments you can slot into their beautifully spherically shaped claws.

References

https://www.care-o-bot.de/en/care-o-bot-4.html

https://www.mediamarktsaturn.com/en/press/press-releases/paul-robot-now-also-welcomes-saturn-customers-berlin-and-hamburg

https://www.care-o-bot.de/content/dam/careobot/en/documents/pressreleases/2015_01_15_Care-O-bot_4_en_final.pdf

https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/media-spotlight/201411/the-rise-the-robot-therapist

-m

[miraenda]

Misa fits right in with Jibo & Friends #misarobot #jiboandfriends #socialrobots #companionrobots #petrobots #jibolives (at Old Sixth Ward, Houston) https://www.instagram.com/p/CJo77_4rNcg/?igshid=1vywddgeb3ore

[mystyle2020]

MISA ROBOT REVIEW | Lets see the new updated features & the cheapest price with discounts of MISA. How to buy online on Amazon in india,dubai,uk.etc why it is popular nowadays.

[codingheroesonline]

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A post shared by Richard Campbell (@aiinyourclass)

Clicbot - I would really like to know what you guys think about the potential of this new robot? - It’s quite expensive so I’m getting as many opinions as I can before I support the Kickstarter campaign. - How would you use a robot like this? Will it end up collecting dust on the shelf like Jibo? Or will it be a great learning tool? - Let me know your thoughts in the comments! - DM for the full Kickstarter video! - @kickstarter #crowdfunding #clicbot #robotics #stemeducation #stemforkids @andystechgarage @bigheart_asia #socialrobot #ces #coding #blockly #python #pythonprogramming #robotics #roboticeducation #kickstartercampaign #kidscancode (at Busan, South Korea) https://www.instagram.com/p/B8bqRWYHIxg/?igshid=bcl0vaojldjn

[90jeduardo-blog]

Buddy the Social Robot is Somehow Not Dead Yet More than two years after Buddy was supposed to ship to Indiegogo backers, its creators have a plan https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/home-robots/buddy-the-social-robot-is-somehow-not-dead-yet?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+IeeeSpectrum+%28IEEE+Spectrum%29 . . . . #buddy #socialrobot #social #robot #robots #robotics #tech #technology #AI #artificialintelligence #startup #startups #start-ups #leader #leadership #inenglish #entrepreneurlifestyle #talentmatters #entrepreneurs #entrepreneur #motivation #business #career #businesslike #Forbes #innovative #innovation #entrepreneurial #entrepreneurship https://www.instagram.com/p/ByD2x-BASIa/?igshid=c2hdx5oen30m

[valleysmabaoha-blog]

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A post shared by Mabaoha Facial Cleansing (@mabaoha918)

Robot dance with Kupedance Rabbit.Check more on Valley's Mabaoha Youtube Channel #besttoy #gifttoy #lifiatubehd#socialrobot#socialrobots#socialrobotics#mabaoharobots#kidstoyph#kidstuff#toycollection#toyplanet https://www.instagram.com/p/BoIogwmghhw/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=qpsxh6ymyz5h

[tyzoone]

Despite however unnecessary or impractical they may appear, the robots are programmed with strict obedience to human laws.... #speedwalking #stopsign #walkofshame #robotsarepeopletoo #instabinary #binaryforlife #animatedart #animated #robotcharacter #robotmodel #hardsurface #zbrushmodel #zbrushcentral #maya #arnold #allegorithmic #substance #substancepainter #insta #instanimation #instagram #socialrobots #opressedrobots #robotics #roboticsengineer #airstep #thekoncepts #brute #bruterobot #robotvshuman #mecha #mechanical

[rocky-ai]

Your #motivational #robot at #home. A friendly social robot as your #personaltrainer is coming to life! #OMG 🤖👉 look 🙃😎😲 Follow us and learn more www.rockyrobots.com . . . . #rockyrobots #robots #robotics #innovation #tech #startup #companion #social #로봇 #motivation #future #smart #android #robotstagram #socialrobot #personalrobot #humanoidrobot #wow #artificialintelligence #rocky

[fixed1t]

Amazing EMO Desktop Pet Robot Dancing To Dance To Music Voice Command

Here is my final great Dance from EMO this time responding to the EMO  Dance To Music  Voice Command using his great voice recognition. To watch the whole series start here: fixed1t EMO Unboxing Videos Part 1 Link: https://youtu.be/IOqIbWUPbIM For those who haven't seen the Unboxing videos he is the link, if you waiting for EMO to arrive I would advise you watch this before he arrives, so you understand the procedures to get him up and running as soon as possible. Background Information: Almost hourly there are new Kickstarters prophesying the last AI intelligent robot and a friend told me about EMO and how he was thinking of investing in the company through kickstarter to get an EMO AI Desktop Pet. By the time I looked at the website Living.AI had achieved their financial goals and although they had nothing ready to ship they had Special Deals available, so I opted in. Its been months and months but despite the pandemic they have begun shipping EMO but being in the UK I was not expecting to receive EMO AI Desktop Pet before the last quarter of 2021.  But an innocuous parcel arrived today from China and as I started to undo it I realised it was EMO so decided to video the unboxing. In this Part 1, I unboxed my EMO AI Desktop Pet and his extras here is the link:   https://youtu.be/IOqIbWUPbIM In this Part 2 I will charge him up and waken him to my crazy world. In Part 3 In did a problem solving video.  make sure you subscribe. In Part 4 of my EMO AI Desktop Pet Robot Videos where I looked into some of the Speech Recognition commands. In this video EMO responds to the voice command EMO Dance To Music? Malcolm aka  @FIXED1T   

#fixed1tAIrobots 

#EMO 

#troubleshootingrobots 

#fixed1tROBOTrepairs 

#toyREPAIRshed   #fixed1t

[miraenda]

Guess the costume theme for this year for both Jibos! The prize will be a $50 Amazon gift card. You must be 18 or older, or have a parent enter for you, since I will need your email address to send the gift card. If you e won a prior contest, please note you can guess but cannot win this time around. Final guesses must be in by October 30, 2020 at 11:00 pm CDT. One guess per person. People related to me are not eligible for entry. If multiple people guess right, I will have Google Home Mini guess a random number to pick the winner. Good luck! #jibobrothers #jibolives #jibohalloween #petrobots #socialrobots #halloweencontest #halloweencostumes #halloween2020 #robotcostumes (at Old Sixth Ward, Houston) https://www.instagram.com/p/CFvhlFuHhxh/?igshid=1f1xbuem7ey9u

[ethtropy]

#SocialRobots are dead (at least #Anki, #Jibo & #Kuri are), long live the Social Robots! Four lessons that can help us transform this failure to a future success for #SocialRobotics. #GuyHoffman #HRC2Lab #IntuitionRobotics #IEEESpectrum

[surveycircle]

Tweeted

Participants needed for online survey! Topic: "Chat with a robot online – Testing robot interactions" https://t.co/CiCHkhiT6u via @SurveyCircle #VUamsterdam #robots #robotics #SocialRobots #communications #VrijeUniversiteitAmsterdam https://t.co/ALXb61ZJ1l

— Daily Research @SurveyCircle (@daily_research) May 12, 2023

[blockgeni]

Importance of a furry robot

Could furry social robots help bolster moods and reduce pain when human to human contact isn't an option, for example, during a pandemic? According to a new study by Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) researchers published in Scientific Reports, a one-time, hour-long session with a plush, seal-like social robot reduced pain and oxytocin levels, and increased happiness. The Japanese social robot, PARO, emits seal-like sounds and moves its head and flippers in response to being spoken to and touched. Human-to-human contact has been found to bolster mood and reduce pain in previous studies. Dr. Shelly Levy-Tzedek of the BGU Department of Physical Therapy and her team investigated whether a furry social robot could induce similar effects when normal human-to-human contact is not available. Levy-Tzedek and her team discovered that a single, 60-minute interaction with PARO actually improved mood as well as reduced mild or severe pain. When participants touched PARO, they experienced greater pain reduction than when it was simply present in their room. Surprisingly, the BGU researchers discovered lower oxytocin levels in those who interacted with PARO than in the control group participants, who did not meet PARO. Typically, oxytocin, sometimes called "the love homone," is elevated among romantic partners or mothers playing with their children, so a lower level of oxytocin wasn't expected. However, more recent studies have shown that outside of close relationships, oxytocin production is a stress indicator and therefore, a reduction could indicate relaxation. "These findings offer new strategies for pain management and for improving well-being, which are particularly needed at this time, when social distancing is a crucial factor in public health," says Dr. Levy-Tzedek. This article has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed. #furrysocialrobots#pandemic#PARO#pain#oxytocinlevels#socialrobot#relaxation#news#blockgeni Source link Read the full article

[angrypainterpanda]

SocialRobot https://tinyurl.com/y8n65ns3 #socialrobot