DailyDirt: Better Robots Keep Coming

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Robot research has made some remarkable advances over the years, but we don't quite have Star Wars servant droids or helpful general-purpose household bots from the Jetsons yet. While we've gained some autonomous vacuum cleaners, there's still plenty of room for improvement. Here are just a few robotic advances to be aware of before droids try to conquer their wetware creators. If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: artificial muscles, automation, bigdog, droids, robots
Companies: boston dynamics, darpa


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 9 Apr 2013 @ 5:45pm

    bigdog can play catch with itself...

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 9 Apr 2013 @ 8:27pm

    "If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, "

    yes, I would like to read interesting and awesome stuff, when you propose to post some ???

    "Mechanical computers aren't too common nowadays"

    yes, right.. !!! you think.. (oh clearly no you don't).

    what is described there is a mechanical realisation of a digital computer in mechanics.
    Something that is don't ALL the time, in millions upon million of daily, and constantly used applications.

    A mechanical computing element, such as the gear box of your car for example. Or the volume control on your analogue radio. (performing logarithmic calculations on an analogue signal). Billions and billions of analogue computing elements are used ALL THE TIME..

    possibly one day you'll find some 'interesting' and even awesome stuff. But so far... we'll no.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 9 Apr 2013 @ 10:58pm

    Roxxxy the Sex Robot

    How could you not include Roxxxy.

    US Roxxxy, a $7,000 to $9,000 interactive doll that was unveiled at an adult entertainment expo in 2010, can be programmed with different personalities such as frigid Farrah and wild Wendy, Mars noted."

    http://health.discovery.com/sexual-health/videos/first-sex-robot.htm

    link to this | view in chronology ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.