Teledildonics, machine-human interaction, sticky wet lubular substances (3-in-1 oil! get your mind out of the gutter) and assorted other, loftier topics, films, conversations and workshops. This occurs This Weekend! In San Francisco! Home of the kinky techsters who delight in your discomfort! (but in a loving way).

Here’s a bit more about this weekend of splendor:

Is it the end of September already? Why, that means that it’s almost time for Arse Elektronika — San Francisco’s annual festival devoted to sex, tech, futurism, and, of course, robots and the people who love to fuck them.
Conference, film festival, DIY workshops, performances.

Oct 1-4, 2009. San Francisco.

With talks, machines and performances by Allen Stein, R. U. Sirius, Noah Weinstein, Randy Sarafan, Uncle Abdul, Jonathon Keats, Ani Niow, Jason Scott, Annalee Newitz, Rainer Prohaska, Douglas Spink, Tatiana Bazzichelli, Violet Blue, Eleanor Saitta, Reesa Brown, Saul Albert, Monika Kribusz, Kim De Vries, Pepper Mint, Micha Cárdenas, Rose White, Elle Mehrmand and many more…

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Up-to-date info on festival site!

Tickets Can Be Purchased Here!

Oh holy heck, you guys, Robots! ROBOTS!

We would like to invite all your hackers, tweaker, circuit benders, kinetical junkies, experimenters and mad scientists bent on world domination to the increasingly annual

INTERNATIONAL ROBOGAMES 2010

Photo courtesy Dave Schumaker (@rockbandit on Twitter

That’s right, you hungry little mechanical demon spawn, RoboGames is back, in its new home at the always delightful San Mateo County Fairgrounds, just mere moments away from San Francisco. Readers familiar with MakerFaire will find this venue extremely familiar.

There are over 80 different events offered at Robogames, even if you have never built a robot before (and definitely if you *have*) there is an event that is right for you! See all the rules and regs over at RoboGames.

Registration info coming soon! Stay Tuned!

Nifty, indeed, Voicebot, nifty indeed.

Use our robot to talk to MPs. Commissioned by v, the National Young Volunteers Service, we’re offering 16-25s the chance to talk to their MPs in an innovative way. They tell us what they care about, and the robot will write it out in Parliament. Nifty, huh?

The Voicebot pt 1 from sidekick studios on Vimeo.

via Adil

We have a video here of the UPITA Mexican minisumo team that competed in 2008 and 2009 at RoboGames. Before we show it to you, however, here is a picture of this fantastic robot team showing off their robots to Felipe Calderón. That’s FELIPE CALDERÓN, the PRESIDENT OF FREAKING MEXICO.
We have never been more proud to engender such a momentous occasion:

This video made in advance of Robogames 2009, of a few competitors from UPITA in Mexico (like MIT here). It’s quite a good video, if you like minisumo and have 5 minutes and 57 seconds to spare today give it a watch!

[Update: the video embed is a little bit cut off, you still get the gist, but to see the movie at full width go here.

[Gracias GIOSER!]