Mainstream reporters don’t always get robot stories right. There’s a real tendency to anthropomorphize anything with eyes or legs. Some researchers — imagine! — take advantage of that, even when there’s nothing more intelligent going on then your average spambot. Here’s a refreshing departure from the NYT:

As she fiddled with the computer that runs the robot, I smiled politely — almost as much for the robot’s sake, I realized, as for the robot maker’s — and thought: Well, maybe it is the camera sensor, but if this thing wails “You are too far away” one more time, I’m going to throttle it.

It’s a long article, but worth it if nothing else for the penultimate graf.

NYT link has been Rotorized so no registration is requred.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 1st, 2007 at 8:58 am and is filed under Bill Joy Is Probably Wrong, Neat Stuff. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.