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One of Japan's lovable store robots was drunkenly punted
Just one month after Hitchbot was brutally attacked in Philadelphia, a shop assistant robot in Japan has also suffered the wrath of angry humans with a grudge. According to Japan Times, a drunken 60-year-old entered a Softbank store and, after an angry exchange, punted one of the company's cute Pepper robots. The kick-happy individual may not have thought too hard about the unit's humanity (or otherwise) but it's another in a growing list of anti-robot acts. A recent Wired piece points out that people's fears about futuristic AI stealing our jobs might be unfounded, since more people will be required to maintain our new overlords. As for the victim in this incident, Pepper's family have asked for privacy, but Japan Times believes that the robot is currently moving slower than normal, and may have suffered damage to its internals. Aww.
Businesses can rent a Pepper robot for customer service
Folks in Japan might find themselves chatting with Pepper robots in business establishments these coming years. The enterprise version of the gentle-looking humanoid machine will be available for pre-order starting on October 1st, 2015, and businesses in the country can rent one directly from SoftBank. The carrier's robotics division is offering a $444-per-month, 3-year contract to interested parties, which means they'll end up paying around $16,000 within that period. Sadly, they'll have to return the unit once the contract's over.
Robot autopsy shows Pepper's head may be replaceable
Don't worry, the gruesome image (above) of SoftBank's Pepper isn't part of Elon Musk's robot takedown plan. It's actually a teardown by Japanese website Nikkei showing exactly what makes the emotion sensing 'bot tick. The head came off the body easily enough, but Pepper probably won't get an "easily repairable" score as Nikkei's technicians had to drill to get it apart. Once it cracked the cranium, however, it confirmed that yes, Pepper has Intel inside -- an Atom processor, to be exact. The site theorizes that since the head detaches easily from the body, SoftBank might let users upgrade just by dropping in a new one with a different CPU.
SoftBank's cutesy Pepper robot sells out in one minute
If you always wanted a robot butler to greet guests, amuse kids or be a live-action version of Cortana, you're way too late. The Pepper robot that does all that sold out exactly one minute after it went on sale in Japan on Saturday, according to manufacturer SoftBank Robotics. The company built a modest 1,000 units for its Japanese consumer launch, selling it for $1,600 with a monthly $200 fee. The 4-foot robot is not designed to fetch you drinks or do other manual work, but rather to listen, read your emotions, then respond appropriately. It can also sing, dance and tell (corny robot) jokes.
SoftBank's adorable Pepper robot goes on sale this Saturday
Japanese robot Pepper is ready to unthaw the hearts of any consumer who wants one. Maker Softbank said that it'll go on sale June 20th through a partnership with China's Alibaba and Foxconn Technology. As a reminder, the 4-foot humanoid 'bot is designed communicate realistically and even read your body language and tone of voice. It also "enjoys" human contact via touch sensors in the head and hands, and can detect you with an array of high-definition cameras, depth sensors and microphones. The manga-like eyes follow your movement, and the wheeled body -- which moves fairly gracefully -- is driven by 20 motors.
The only thing keeping robots down is you
The robots are coming. And I don't mean to the factory floor, or your kid's toy box. I mean to your living room, your office and your everyday life. The question is no longer a matter of if, but when. Some might even wonder why we don't already have a robot in every home. Designers will tell you they know how to build a successful home robot. They know the key is the ability to build social, if not emotional relationships. And they have a whole bag of tricks and research they can turn to for help. We haven't seen the level of artificial intelligence needed in consumer products yet, but it certainly seems as if we're getting pretty close in the lab. So if it's not a question of technology or design, what's the holdup?
Softbank prices its Pepper robot out of some developers' pockets
Softbank's adorable robot may be short and cute, but it'll still cost the price of a secondhand car to bring one into your home. The Japanese network has revealed that the first Pepper devices on the market will cost just over nine grand to buy. Similar to Google's Glass Explorer project, Softbank will sell the first proper production run of 300 units to developers in the hope that they'll build apps for the automaton.
Pepper, the humanoid robot, wants to sell you a Nescafe coffee machine
Softbank's Pepper, the robot with a line in cheesy jokes, hand gestures and oddly expressive poses is branching out from offering awkward banter to smartphone shoppers . Now, ahead of going on sale early next year for roughly $2,000, it's looking to help sell coffee machines in department stores like Bic Camera across Japan. A Nescafe spokesperson told CNET Japan that the robot will be able to bore you reel off the special qualities of Nescafe's capsule machines, as well as offer up quizzes and games -- presumably to distract younger, less caffeine-focused shoppers. It's just a shame it's not hooking up with a Poursteady just yet.
The rise of the robotic servant
Chores are the bane of domesticity. Dull and repetitive tasks have already been farmed out to robots in industrial workplaces, so why not our homes, too? On a small scale, they've already arrived, just not quite in the way film and TV promised. For this week's Rewind, we take a look at some of the highlights in the history of robotic servants.
Yup, robots are coming to take our retail jobs, too
Elon Musk may be terrified of self-controlling robots, but the retail industry is clearly hoping they'll save cash in the long term. Nestle, for instance, has purchased 20 copies of Softbank's Pepper robot as the new spokes-droid for its food business in Japan. If successful, then the food manufacturer could have up to 1,000 of the cute yet disturbing devices pimping Nestle vending machines across the country. It's not just limited to robot-friendly Japan, either, since Lowe's has announced that it's hired a robotic employee to help customers find stock in its San Jose Orchard Supply store. The OSHBot comes with a pair of displays, one to bombard you with offers and another to let you video conference with an in-store expert hiding in the back. That said, it's hard not to be concerned for all of the workers who could be handed a pink slip in favor of the Terminator's doe-eyed cousin.
SoftBank's humanoid helper robot will come to the US within a year
Good news: you won't have to book a flight to Japan to try SoftBank's Pepper robot for yourself. The telecom now expects the helpful humanoid machine to launch in the US within a year. There's no mention of American pricing so far, although you may not want to use the ¥198,000 ($1,883) Japanese price as a yardstick -- it's bound to change at least a little bit. The company's attention to both home and business customers remains the same, though, so you may well have a robotic companion in a matter of months.
Engadget Japan's #egfes: drone races, robots, dry ice and a Dyson fan
Just north of Akihabara, Tokyo's tech epicenter, our Japanese colleagues took over an art gallery (and cafe and basement...) for its premier Engadget Fes. As well as the chance to play with Microsoft's newest console and Surface Pro 3 (both still not yet on sale in Japan), there was a surfeit of robots, hobbyist gadgets, toys and 3D printers. Oh and a Google X Lunar Prize-winning drone, which heads to the moon next year. Given the price of flights to Tokyo (and despite the weather: torrential rain), we've pulled together the best bits below.
Caturday: Pepper approves of iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite
Earlier this month, Apple fans from around the world eagerly watched WWDC 2014 to see what Apple had in store for iOS and OS X. As shown in this wonderful Caturday photo from a TUAW reader, people weren't the only captivated members of the audience -- some felines were curious about Apple's big announcements, too. This lovely black and white cat, named Pepper, was spotted catching up on the latest WWDC news using an iPad owned by a family friend. Judging by the look on Pepper's face, Apple's keynote was just purrrfect. We'll be starting up our Dog Days of Summer feature on July 5, so we'd like to ask our canine-owning readers to start sending in those pics of their favorite pups hard at work on "their" Apple devices. If you have a Dog Days nominee to share, let us know via our feedback page (and please remember that the photo has to have some sort of connection to Apple and its products -- don't just send us a photo of your canine buddy). For security reasons we can't accept inbound attachments, so you should host the photo (Dropbox, Flickr, iPhoto Journals, etc.) and send us the link. Many thanks to Lauren Neilly for the picture of Pepper perusing Apple's presentation.
This robot's customizable OS doesn't make it any better at soccer
Softbank's Pepper robot is hard not to love, even if we haven't quite grasped the point of the adorable thing. We're having much the same issue with the Asratec bot shown above, also part of Softbank's broad robot business. As you can tell, it isn't very responsive right now, and in fact it can't even walk, but it possesses an OS that is claimed to be customizable enough for healthcare, entertainment or even construction robots. Asratec is hoping to make money from this software, rather than the 1.2-meter ASRA-C1 prototype hardware, but the robot still has a couple of notable features, including an extra pair of arms on the front, with which users can "drive" the robot around, or possibly teach it physical tasks by showing how it's done. Though ASRA-C1 probably won't be scoring any goals at the next Robot World Cup (it's a thing), you can see its current skillset demonstrated in the videos below.
Engadget Daily: surviving Aliens on the Oculus Rift, a guide to drones and more!
Today, we fight off aliens on the Oculus Rift, meet SoftBank's new robot, Pepper-kun, investigate the reality of commercialized drones in the US and go hands-on with Samsung's Galaxy Tab S. Read on for Engadget's news highlights from the last 24 hours.
Are you ready for your first home robot? Meet Pepper
The path to mainstream home robots is strewn with the battery-drained corpses of AIBO and lesser-known, Dalek-esque robots like Wakamaru. But now Japan's SoftBank, flush from the purchase of Sprint, has introduced its robot game changer, teaming up with Aldebaran Robotics (the team behind NAO) to make sure it gets it right. This is Pepper-kun. He's adorable... and a bit of a ditz. Is it finally time, like it was for the home PC, for the home robot revolution?
Softbank's 'Pepper' robot understands feelings, will cost less than $2,000 next year
Japanese telecom Softbank and its CEO Masayoshi Son have never been afraid to push the envelope, and now the exec is presenting a new development: robots. Presented at a press conference earlier today in Japan (take a peek at the live video stream embedded after the break) it's called Pepper, and uses technology acquired from the French robotics company Aldebaran. Those are the folks behind the Nao humanoid robots we've been covering for years, from their first steps to the inevitable dance-offs that followed. Aldebaran CEO Bruno Maisonnier credited Son for believing in its vision, saying robots that can recognize human emotion will change the way we live and communicate -- and this is a big step towards getting bots into daily lives, at least if you live in Japan. The robots will debut at two stores tomorrow in their customer service capacity, but Softbank is planning to put them on sale to the public next year, priced just shy of $2,000.
Epic Games' Unreal Engine 3 now working on Linux through Google Chrome, more or less
A Holy Grail of Linux gaming has been an Unreal Engine 3 port. Getting one for the OS would unlock a world of games that has been the province of, well, just about any other mainstream platform. Thanks to Google preserving Flash on Linux through Chrome, that dream is alive in at least a rudimentary form. Experimenters at the Phoronix forums have found that Chrome 21 has support for the Stage 3D hardware acceleration needed to drive Epic Games' Flash conversion of UE3. Tell Chrome to enable support as well as ignore a graphics chip blacklist, and suddenly you're running Epic Citadel from your Linux install. When we say "running," however, we're taking a slight amount of poetic license. Performance isn't that hot, and certain configurations might not show the medieval architecture in all its glory. We've confirmed with Epic that it works, but it's still firm on the stance that there's no plans for official UE3 support on Linux "at this time." It's still promising enough that maybe, just maybe, gamers can embrace an open-source platform without having to give up the games they love.
Sony Xperia Sola hits the FCC, gets dissected by regulators
Sola, Pepper, MT27i -- it's got many names, and now it's got the official thumbs up from American regulators. The Sony Xperia Sola made an appearance at the FCC, got itself torn asunder and even dragged along its user manual. Beneath the rather underwhelming 3.7-inch 854 x 480 LCD is quite a collection of antennas, including NFC, 802.11n, Bluetooth 2.1 and a quadband GSM radio. Of course, all that is being powered by a serviceable, but hardly barn-burning, 1GHz dual-core processor and saddled with Gingerbread. (Though, Sony promises an ICS upgrade will be delivered this summer.) Check out the source link for all the regulatory filing fun and to see the Sola splayed open on a table.
Mobile World Congress 2012 preview: what will we see?
Without hesitation, February always seems to be the most hectic time of the year for the mobile industry, thanks primarily to the annual Mobile World Congress held in Barcelona, Spain. The show has long been considered the proper venue for phone and tablet vendors to show off their latest and greatest innovations. Naturally, the internet is been set ablaze with plenty of rumors and even a few official product announcements from companies hoping to benefit from some solid pre-show buzz.In this guide we'll take you on a tour and walk through the hardware we already know will be shown off at MWC, as well as what we should likely expect to see and the things we'd really love to hear more about but probably won't. Join us after the break, won't you?
