Robotic Flies May Someday Buzz Around?

Grok Headline matches for Robotic Flies May Someday Buzz Around?

PNI Sponsors Local Robotic Vehicle Team:
Desert Field Test of Robotic Vehicles
Offers $2 Million Prize

PNI Sponsors Local Robotic Vehicle Team:
Desert Field Test of Robotic Vehicles
Offers $2 Million Prize 12/17/2004 06:40 PM
Cobalt Horizons announced that PNI Corporation will support its efforts to win a $2 million prize in a Defense Department research and development initiative aimed at advancing robotics technologies for future military use. The initiative, known as the DARPA Grand Challenge, is a field test of fully autonomous ground vehicles to be conducted in the Mojave Desert on October 8, 2005. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is offering the $2 million to the vehicle that completes the course the fastest within a 10-hour period. [PRWEB Oct 20, 2004]

Someday we'll all look like her

Someday we'll all look like her 09/24/2004 09:40 AM
If you do a Google image search for typical person, this is the first photo of a person listed: Typical Person...

But They Will Want It All Someday, Even
if They Don't Know It Yet

But They Will Want It All Someday, Even
if They Don't Know It Yet 03/06/2004 01:48 AM

Consumers Don't Want It All, and They Don't Want It Now

"Many consumers are not interested in handheld devices that offer multiple functions beyond making phone calls or holding data, according to a survey by Guideline Research, a custom market research firm. The survey of a representative group of online consumers also found that 25% of consumers think these multifunctional devices have limited functionality.

As the market for electronic handheld devices has become saturated, manufacturers of such electronics are driven to add features in an effort to maintain their growth. To this end, they are hoping to add to their general consumer base by offering products to those who are looking for devices that perform two or more functions. Yet, despite their efforts, 49% of consumers surveyed said they have no desire for such a device." [infoSync World]

I think it's a bit misleading to be asking consumers these types of questions just yet. In fact, I'd even go so far as to say that the headline could have read, "Consumers Don't Know that They'll Be Able to Have It All Very Soon."

Whenever I show someone new my Treo 600, I get one of two reactions: 1) I want one and I want it now (followed by shock and disappointment when they hear how expensive it is), or 2) I'm not ready for that yet. The key there is the "yet." After all, I'm sure that 20 years ago, more than 25% of consumers would have said that computers have "limited functionality" and well more than 49% of consumers would have said they have "no desire for such a device."

With the introduction last year of converged devices like the Sony P800, Treo 600, and any number of devices in Japan (along with faster networks in the U.S.), we're finally getting to a point where such a beast is useful and actually works. It won't take anywhere near 20 years for them to become as mainstream as computers have become. Maybe 3-5, but that time is definitely coming, and libraries need to prepare for it.

AIM the Catalog Someday

AIM the Catalog Someday 09/21/2004 12:37 AM

AOL Builds AIM Robots

"America Online is launching a program this week to promote and facilitate the creation of what it calls AIM Robots for its AIM instant messaging system.

AIM Robots are sponsored and operated by AOL and other vendors and appear as buddy icons in the buddy lists of AIM users who install them.

For example, users can send an instant message to the AOLYellowpages AIM Robot with the name of a local business or with simply a keyword and the robot replies with related directory listings. The Wall Street Journal robot lets users set up news alerts to be delivered via AIM, as well as request stock prices. A robot sponsored by the ABC quiz show 'Who Wants to be a Millionaire?' polls users via AIM when a show contestant requests help with a particular question." [PCWorld.com - Latest News Stories]

Hey, AOL - how about working with a library to make its catalog searchable via AIM? Plus, you already localize your service for users, so how about working with the local library to highlight what they have to offer, including reference service?

Someday, Amazon will have an API for
this

Someday, Amazon will have an API for
this 08/19/2004 03:07 PM

A guy (from metafilter which he thanks in the book! woot!) writes an amusing blog post, which gets picked up by an agent, which then becomes a book along with a fake promotional news story to get it up on the charts.

Blogs becoming books becoming news becoming fake news becoming hit books! What a crazy world we live in.

Shark Tank: Someday My Prints Will Come

Shark Tank: Someday My Prints Will Come 09/10/2004 11:41 PM
Corporate help-desk pilot fish gets a call from the manager at a retail store. The printer is giving an error message: Close back door. "I checked the back door, and it was shut," manager says. ...

Cold Fury » Someday, some way

Cold Fury » Someday, some way 08/05/2004 03:49 PM
How Tom Ridge should answer dumb-ass press questions! .. here

coldfury.com/index.php?p=4713
track this site | 3 links

IBM Chips May Someday Heal Themselves
(PC World)

IBM Chips May Someday Heal Themselves
(PC World) 08/11/2004 09:54 AM
PC World - New technology applies electrical fuses to help identify and repair faults.

Sun plans to open-source Java--someday

Sun plans to open-source Java--someday 06/04/2004 12:15 PM

Sun plans an open-source Java--someday

Sun plans an open-source Java--someday 06/04/2004 12:41 PM

Mark Glaser: The Media Company I Want to
Work For-- Not Someday, But Now

Mark Glaser: The Media Company I Want to
Work For-- Not Someday, But Now 12/19/2004 03:14 PM
Guest writer Glaser is a columnist for OJR: "Time for someone to do it, to make the case for a new way of doing journalism, to stop talking about change in decades and start thinking about change in months and days. To stop complaining about the way things are, and the way things don't work, and to start doing it differently..."

PluggedIn: SmartPhones, Handhelds May
Someday Threaten Laptops

PluggedIn: SmartPhones, Handhelds May
Someday Threaten Laptops 12/06/2003 01:09 PM
Boston Globe Dec 6 2003 11:31AM ET

keeps the flies at bay

keeps the flies at bay 09/10/2004 09:30 AM
New Scientist

newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99996366
track this site | 6 links

Wi-Fi idea flies

Wi-Fi idea flies 12/19/2004 03:28 PM
Usatoday.com - Wed Dec 15, 08:05 pm GMT

Boy, Time Sure Flies

Boy, Time Sure Flies 07/30/2004 03:56 PM

Sorry about the lack of posts lately.  It wasn't that I was busy.  There just wasn't anything to post about.  Having my wife and son revolving and evolving around me again put my mind off my blog also.  It's amazing how fast the days go by when I am not posting.

Zeppelin Flies Again

Zeppelin Flies Again 06/14/2004 10:09 AM

FedEx Flies

FedEx Flies 08/23/2004 02:34 PM
The company packs up an upbeat outlook.

Expedia Flies Away

Expedia Flies Away 12/22/2004 01:10 AM
Investors seem eager to let the untangling begin.

Xeni Flies Zero-G

Xeni Flies Zero-G 09/10/2004 02:08 AM
Xeni Jardin: Next week, on Wednesday September 15, I'm going on a zero-gravity flight about 32,000 feet above earth.

The company operating this flight is ZERO-G, whose founder Peter Diamandis is also the man behind the Ansari X-Prize competition. I invited Dr. Diamandis to speak at Wired Magazine's NextFest earlier this year, met him there, and learned he'd been working on this program for more than ten years.

The flight I'm taking next week (for NPR and Wired News) is part of ZERO-G's five-city media launch. Soon, they'll begin a commercial service on specially-equipped Boeing 727-200s. For about $3,000 US, passengers will be able to experience about 20 doses of parabolic weightlessness during a 90-minute trip.

Nothing like this has ever been offered to American consumers before. ZERO-G is the only company with FAA approval to conduct weightless flights for the public within the US.

NASA operates flights similar to this for training astronauts (Link), but not to the public. Space Adventures -- the company that made space tourists out of Dennis Tito and Mark Shuttleworth (and, almost, N'Sync's Lance Bass) -- sells "vomit comet" flight experiences to paying passengers, but they cost closer to $10K and depart from a remote location in Russia. The combined costs of the flight, the prep, and getting to the departure site add up to a hefty five-figure sum. With the launch of this new service in the US, zero-G above the earth will now only cost a few G.

I've never done anything like this before. What will weightlessness feel like? A rollercoaster? Or floating in water, but without the water? When I was little, I used to have lots of recurring dreams about flying -- the dream-sensation of weightlessness felt so vivid, once I half-woke-up and sleep-jumped right off a flight of stairs. How is it that our bodies already know what zero-g feels like? Are we remembering what it felt like to float in utero? That waking dream of flight and floating -- it's something each of us physically understand. I'm looking forward to feeling the real thing.

My grandfather was an amateur astronomer. He taught me a lot of things about stars and space when I was a kid. He was there, downstairs in the living room, when I realized I couldn't fly that day -- about halfway down the stairs. He picked me up, held me in his arms, wiped my tears, and probably had to work really hard at not laughing.

Later, after lots of band-aids and kleenex, he explained what gravity was. I remember feeling really sad and crying all over again when he told me, "Honey, people just can't float like that." I wish he could still be here now, and float with me next Wednesday.

Nothing Robotic About Robo-Art

Nothing Robotic About Robo-Art 09/21/2004 06:37 AM
The ArtBots show in New York this past weekend proved that robots can wax artistic, too -- or at least carry out the instructions of their artistic creators. Cyrus Farivar reports from New York.

Robotic Librarian

Robotic Librarian 02/17/2004 10:26 PM
The new Librarian at the Valparaiso University in Valparaiso Indiana will be a Robotic Librarian. The books will put in specially designed metal bins and the students can select any of the obscure books from the internet that they want then the robotic crane device goes fetches selections and drop them to an accessible location for the students to pick up at their convenience. The school hopes to eventually have about 600,000 books in their system for check out. (Other colleges also have installed simlar devices.) The high tech library building will cost about $33 million. I don't think they have such a cool robotic librarian at my old alma matter. :-/

Robotic Scientist

Robotic Scientist 01/16/2004 11:02 AM
Robotic Scientist - Scientists created a closed, automated system to conduct simple labor intensive scientific experiments in molecular genetics. The robot creates hypothesis and tests them. Supposedly it works more efficiently (picks less expensive experiments, and fewer of them) then its human counterparts (graduate students in biology and comp sci.). More detailed article in Nature here (institutional access / subscription required). I for one, welcome our new robot overlords.

"Robotic Dance"

"Robotic Dance" 12/20/2003 09:47 PM

Robotic wheelchairs

Robotic wheelchairs 05/27/2004 11:02 AM
BoingBoing reader Roland Piquepaille says,

Traditional wheelchairs used by the elderly and people with severe disabilities have some limited functions and flexibility. Their users often need help from nurses or relatives. Several teams are currently at work to develop robotic wheelchairs to overcome these limitations. For example, researchers from the University of Essex and the Institute of Automation at Beijing are developing the RoboChair.

RoboChair will be equipped with a vision system and a 3G wireless communication system. It will be able to avoid collisions and to plan a path. Meanwhile, Professor Ray Jarvis of Monash University’s Intelligent Robotics Centre in Australia, is building another robotic wheelchair which will help people to travel off the beaten track (PDF format, 1 page, 131 KB). His prototype system combines robotic navigation with a four-wheel drive. It automatically ad apts itself to the user’s capabilities and takes control when needed. You'll find more details and a picture in this overview. Keep in mind that there are still major issues to solve, such as security and costs, before these robotic wheelchairs become available.

Link

DIY Robotic Exoskeleton

DIY Robotic Exoskeleton 12/24/2004 12:54 PM
CNET, Slashdot, and Boing Boing are reporting on Carlos Owens, a 26 year old steelworking in Anchorage, Alaska who is building an 18 foot, hydraulic exoskeleton. The soon to be finished unit, named NMX04-1A, will be equipped with a flame thrower and other fun accessories. The CNET article mentions several other exoskeletons both real and fictional that have been inspired since Robert Heinlein invented them in his novel Starship Troopers. Photos of NMX04-1A and a log of construction progress can be found on the builder's website. CNET also has a photo gallery of giant robots in a sidebar.

Ask the Robotic Psychiatrist

Ask the Robotic Psychiatrist 04/19/2004 12:20 PM

Erotic Robotic

Erotic Robotic 05/16/2004 03:40 AM
JANE PINCKARD -- It's interesting that so many seem to find cold shiny steel arousing. I mean, robots and sex? Robots are, like, the antithesis of the best sex - messy, sweaty, sweet and tasty. BUT - and maybe this is something for Fleshbot to grapple with - there is...

Robotic skin

Robotic skin 07/03/2004 04:42 PM
Interesting article about a new design for "electronic skin" as sensitive to touch as our own:

"Recognition of tactile information will be very important for future generations of robots," says Takao Someya at the University of Tokyo who developed the skin. A sense of touch would help them to identify objects, carry out delicate tasks and avoid collisions. But while a lot of effort has gone into vision and voice recognition for robots, touch sensitivity is still fairly rudimentary.

Our own skin contains a battery of touch receptors that produce nerve signals when pressed. For gentle pressures, the main sensors are tiny bulbs of layered tissue called Meissner's corpuscles. Their behaviour is mimicked in plastics such as polyvinylidene fluoride, which generate an electric field when squeezed and are used to make pressure-sensitive pads for computer keyboards and other touch-triggered devices.

Link (via Beverly)

Remote-Controlled Flies

Remote-Controlled Flies 04/11/2005 08:21 PM

USS Enterprise Finally Flies

USS Enterprise Finally Flies 05/21/2004 11:12 PM

Flies of Refined Taste

Flies of Refined Taste 07/02/2004 01:16 AM
Abcnews.go.com - Thu Jul 1, 07:58 pm GMT

Data flies, bullets too

Data flies, bullets too 07/06/2004 01:54 AM
USA Today Jul 6 2004 6:08AM GMT

Guantanamo delegation flies to US

Guantanamo delegation flies to US 03/06/2004 02:00 AM
Families of Guantanamo Bay detainees fly to the US to put pressure on President Bush to ensure they are treated fairly.

Coach Flies First Class

Coach Flies First Class 09/08/2004 11:07 AM
Leather specialist Coach continues to produce welcome surprises.

Captain Grunge Flies Again!

Captain Grunge Flies Again! 04/14/2005 03:50 PM
Captain Grunge Flies Again!
The first trailer for Gus Van Sant’s “Last Days” has just been posted (with sub-titles). “Last Days” is inspired by the tortured final days in the life of Kurt Cobain. Of the film, Van Sant says, “There are a lot of hypotheses about what happened, but I don't know of any full eyewitness account, just tiny momentary ones. Everyone has a different opinion, but there's not one true, authoritative account. He was just kind of missing." Much like the Cobain biography “Heavier than Heaven,” the film takes the stance that Kurt, who has grown increasingly uncomfortable with his fame, is resigned to his death, not accelerated into it by a chain of events concluding with his suicide. Leonardo look-alike Michael Pitt (“Hedwig and the Angry Inch”) plays the lead role, with Asia Argento playing the Courtney Love-like character. And here’s a good article about the film.

Britannia Flies High With Wi-Fi

Britannia Flies High With Wi-Fi 07/20/2004 01:06 PM
How Britannia tapped iAnywhere Solutions, its channel partner for in-flight updates.

Hyatt Flies High on Wi-Fi

Hyatt Flies High on Wi-Fi 05/10/2004 05:51 AM
Tackles wireless challenge smartly.

Fly Over Mars... in a Robotic Balloon

Fly Over Mars... in a Robotic Balloon 02/12/2004 01:24 AM

MIT and GM Develop Robotic Smart Car

MIT and GM Develop Robotic Smart Car 09/02/2004 09:34 PM
The MIT Media Lab and General Motors will be presenting a new, robotic concept car next week. The MIT smart car, which is still in development will have all sorts of futuristic properties such as a programmable exterior than can change appearance, embedded intelligence that can help the driver avoid impending danger, and automatic parallel parking. The car's AI will also learn the driving habits and city streets of the driver. For more info, see the Smart City Cars in the 21st Century exhibit info page.
Grok Description matches for Robotic Flies May Someday Buzz Around?
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Robotic Flies May Someday Buzz Around?

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