Video: ASIMO burns as Yo-Yo Ma fiddles
By Thomas Ricker 
posted May 14th 2008 1:38AM
posted May 14th 2008 1:38AM
Update: Video added after the break.
[Thanks, Funke]
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I, for one, welcome our robotic symphony conducting overlords.
I, for one, despise our cliché joke posting Engadget readers.
Freaking slashdotter.
What's weird is that people on slashdot actually seem to find those memes funny...
Come on, give Britboy a break. If ever there was a time when this needed to be said, its now...
But can he play Doom?
Bach to the future....
gosh.. you beat me too it lmho
"I am awesomo 4000"
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/2c/802_image_14.jpg
pull my finger
that's ok, Asimo is three laws safe.
you may never know for sure. the laws can be overridden
Not overridden.....reinterpreted... didn't you watch the movie?? ;-)
Sorry, must have read the books...
congrats asimo!
now honda should make more of you
It was all pre-programmed though.
"The Impossible Dream" was in one of Honda's best ads:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fB_1gPRCLCo
That commercial is awesome
I want to know how Honda managed to get one of the most popular living composers to play for a robot. Seriously.
$.
That simple. It works.
Robots are awesome, that's how.
What living composer would that be?
Mr Ma is a cellist.
LOL! Asimo is cute! I wonder if the robot is programmed to check errors of the music too....
I never thought I could see the day a robot could raise his arms up and down to the rhythm of the music and take all the credit and applause.
Thank you Honda. Now you need to get to work the climbing stairs thing...
"Where is the NHK TV camera? Hello Tokyo!"
they took our jooobs!
I found some video from Honda's media site if anybody is interested:
http://www.hondanews.com/categories/1085/search/videos?q=08AsimoDSO&s=honda
they took er jerbs!!!!!!!!!!
more like, "dey took air jooorbs"
@Ridgecity, Asimo already climb stairs.... long ago...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1Y29q9pk30
I think he meant fixing ASIMO so he can climb stairs without falling off.
*it
"while netting the DSO a cool million for the musical education of Gross Point's children. "
Say what?? Those rich little bastards?
I was thinking the same exact thing. Since when did Grosse Point need to raise money... (GP btw is like the OPPOSITE of Detroit).
Indeed, the statement was purposely snide. I lived in Detroit (and Flint) for about 5 years... and drove a Honda.
Thomas
Nobody lives in Flint.
Yeah, I was confused by this as well.
Since when does Grosse Pointe need donations? $1mil would have done the kids of Detroit a lot more good methinks.
Whatever. He's only a semi-conductor.
OMG PWNZ!!!! err... wait... OMG PUNZ!!!!!!!!! ah there we go...
omg i love you
lol Best Comment Ever!!!!!!!!
hahaha, you made my day :)
Oh, and it's Grosse Point, not Gross point.
It's actually Grosse Pointe.
Dammit. I couldn't even correct correctly!
Oh, I know, i just don't want ASIMO to think he's better than us, making classical music and stuff like that...
It's the thought that counts! :)
Dear Honda,
Please make more asimos.
If you sell them for the price of a motorcycle (impossible at this point, I'm sure), this would be the must have gadget of the decade.
decade/SINCE THE BEGINNING OF TIME!!!!!!!
I'm looking forward to see the new version... they should be able to shrink the backpack to make it look less astronaut-ish.
This reminds me when I was a music major and I'd play back things in Finale and they always sounded so mechanical and terrible.
Asimo's are great - hard to keep on top of the the 500 x AAA size batteries it needs to run on though - and boy - have you ever tried to get one out of the packing (all those twist ties etc) :-)
In the end part of the movie they look at him that he is a real human, man this is sick :P
Yeah, they said hello back to it when it played it's hello WAV file.
A million dollars? For Grosse Pointe? That's pocket change to the people who live there. It's one of the only towns in Michigan where you have to be a resident in order to even park your car within city limits! You've heard of being pulled over on a DWB (Driving While Black), right? Well, in Grosse Pointe you can get pulled over for a DWMC (Driving While Middle Class).
Seriously! If you try to walk on the sidewalks in Grosse Pointe and your net worth isn't at least a couple million, they'll run you out of town for disturbing the peace or reminding the muckity-mucks that poor people exist.
This is the kind of place where the people haven't seen their shoes in decades because they're unable to see that far down with their nose pointing so high in the air.
This is the kind of place where the police wear Prada.
This is a town in which the paperboy is driven around by a chauffeur.
I mean, when I say these people are rich, I mean they wouldn't be caught dead on a non-private plane. They wouldn't know what a cheeseburger is, even if they ever saw one. They think diamonds are "quaint" and gold is only suitable for automobile trim. They have immaculate lawns, but probably couldn't tell you what grass actually feels like. They build swimming pools for their dogs. They have servants for their servants!
They. Are. Rich!
That is an outlandish over-exaggeration
There are five Grosse Pointes, and not all of them are outlandishly wealthy old-money enclaves. I mean don't get me wrong, these people are not struggling to get by, but I used to live in Grosse Pointe Park and I'm not particularly wealthy. It was entirely for the easy commute into Detroit when I worked for EDS.
There is some truth to DWB, I've seen it more than a few times, but everything else you said is either a ridiculous exaggeration or a lie.
You don't have to be a resident to park in city limits. That doesn't even make sense.
The Prada and paperboy comments are obviously not true. I don't know if that's the case anywhere. I bet the cops in Monaco don't wear Prada.
The median income was about $70,000 last I checked, three years ago, so it's probably lower now. That's far, far, far away from private jets and diamonds. There are plenty of houses being foreclosed and businesses closing down, like everywhere else in the country. It's not a fantasy world where people ride on diamond encrusted segways around their 50,000 sq-ft mansions. That's not to say it isn't a nice community, with well to do people, but you're really exaggerating.
Of course the money wouldn't have been better spent in Detroit, but you really need to get a more realistic idea of what Grosse Pointe is.
Someone's been watching too much Weasel TV.
I never could get why there were 5 Grosse Pointes....though the one I've been in several times is a nice neighborhood.
ASIMO's head looks a bit like one of Daft Punk's helmets, I wonder if there's a connection that explains ASIMO's musical aspirations.
Yo' mama mama ain't the same thing as Yo-Yo Ma!
iRobot
I live in Detroit. Grosse Pointe Schools don't need any more money, but their Orchestras are of poor quality, so maybe this is for them.
Also, does that cellest look asian to you? That's Robert deMaine, not Yo-Yo Ma.
I can see this working.
That is a very expensive metronome.
nice! lol
There's a pretty good reason, I think, that he isnt on a podium like most conductors - he's unnecessary. Also, the intricacies of that piece are far from mind-blowing.
I currently live in Michigan, and was pissed off beyond hell when I heard that the money was going to Grosse Pointe.
For those who don't know, Grosse Pointe is probably one of the more richer communities in Michigan as a whole.
Their schools are nice, the area is clean, one of those typically nice suburbs.
Yeah, they get the money. What about Detroit themselves? Inkster is really bad, and in my school we're using sociology books from the 70s! Our Psychology books don't have covers anymore (Really, who needs the table of contents, and chapter 1? Most of our books aren't usable until around chapter 3).
I'm not even in Detroit, I'm in a farming community south. I can't imagine how bad the city is because no one lives there anymore.
Poor schools, our ability to manage money sucks.
The money should go to us up here in Michigan's Thumb. Our schools are hurting big time.
I love how all the orchestra players aren't even paying a bit of attention to this stupid robot. They're all just staring at their music sheets, and undoubtedly thinking, "Yeah, whatever. We're not taking directions on how to communicate with our instruments from an inanimate object."
Nice try, but it was lame.
they weren't even playing in time with the robot. the ending was not synchronized well
The inanimate object of which you speak was indeed quite animated.
When I said inanimate, I meant it as in "a non-living thing". A car can move, also, but it too, is an inanimate object.
Grant you Asimo can conduct an orchestra but dont think I will get one until it can do laundry, cook meals, wash dishes, mop floors, feed the baby, and take the dog for a walk.
I don't think this money is going to Grosse Pointe. I believe this donation is to the DSOs music program. The Grosse Pointe thing was probably just an attempt to be witty or based on false info. I'm not positive, but I've seen nothing that would back that claim up. So no gold plated instruments for the GP kiddies this year.
So he's just a big, fancy metronome?