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Disney to Create Walking Animatronic Dinosaur
nakhla writes "I came across this article discussing Disney's plans to create an animatronic dinosaur that can roam free through it's Disney's California Adventure park. Disney's Imagineering unit has been working on the technology for several years now. While short on technical details, the article does mention that it will be able to interact with guests in numerous ways. Hopefully it won't go berzerk like the animatronic characters in that old Simpsons episode!" No, hopefully it will go berzerk!
Nobody exploits technology to hoover money out of your wallet any better than the Mouse.
"I went on a diet, swore off drinking and heavy eating. And in fourteen days, I had lost exactly two weeks. Joe E. Lewis
I read about this awhile ago, there have been spy shots on the internet for awhile.
oh.. and... FIRST POST!!!
May you be touched by His Noodly Appendage. RAmen.
Hopefully they will finally get around to re-animating uncle Walt.
Everybody run, its the DMCA dino. :)
after what happened in Jurassic Park and they still wanna try it
Smile... tomorrow will be worse.
Who's on top of you.......
"I went on a diet, swore off drinking and heavy eating. And in fourteen days, I had lost exactly two weeks. Joe E. Lewis
"This will be the first test of untethered Audio-Animatronics and the next phase in Imagineering's quest to increase interaction with visitors."
Will it eat pesky visitors ?
Then let them tear Jeff Goldblum to pieces. Yeah, that'd be cool.
You Have Twenty Seconds To Comply
Yes, "Interaction." Interaction between metal teeth and tourist flesh, HAHAHA.
Just a guy with an opinion
Need to make some Animatronic Japanese tourists to run in front of it screaming!
We all know what happens when you try to build free-range animatronic robots. Regardless of their safeguards, they go nuts and kill people. It's all documented in this film. Which, incidentally, is what the Simpsons episode is a parody of.
There is no sig, there is only Zuul.
...your DeCSS tshirt
That's the magic," Sklar said. "When people see, hear and touch this character, it will be a real groundbreaking experience."
The character doesn't talk, but can respond with movements. Some of its potential antics are eating popcorn, "stealing" a guest's hat and sneezing. [...]
Disney chose a dinosaur because children are so fascinated with them, Sklar said, plus "it's a large enough character to get their attention."
Some visitors will scream "THIEF!!" Others will scream "RUN FOR YOUR LIFE! IT'S GODZILLA!"
It is indeed a groundbreaking experience. Go Disney go! Scatter thine visitors... :-)
--
Error 500: Internal sig error
Who's gonna give me odds on how long till the first law suit, 'cause some kid gets squished under an animated bronto!
"I kill you! You no good 56'ing!"
Could end up going like the classic Yul Brynner film, Futureworld, which is what I think that classic Simpsons episode is based on.
"Hey! Unless this is a nude love-in, get the hell off my property!!"
Although the wenches would be nice! :)
Meow meow meow meow, meow meow meow meow...
This could be VERY dangerous. The first time a six year old who doesn't know any better puts his hand in the mouth of the dinosaur, and the gears in it cut his hand off, Disney is slapped with a $500 million dollar lawsuit, and you won't see these things ever again.
Roman goatsex statues have been discovered in the ruins of Pompeii!
Happy Troll Tuesday to you all!
What would be really sweet is if they could hook up some really enormous piledriver-like devices all over the park and synchronize them falling with the steps of the anamatron. That way it would have that hyper-realistic whole-earth-shuddering effect during each footfall.
My
Limekiller
The first Animatronic figures, called A-4s, could turn and open their mouths to be synchronized with music. The next phase, called A-100s, had more real-life movement and were used in Pirates of the Caribbean and "Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln" at Disneyland, ...
What happens when they get to the T1000 then!
For an interesting short story tie-in, take a look at Howard Waldrop's "Heirs of the Perisphere".
t m
FictionWise has an excerpt at:
http://www.fictionwise.com/ebooks/eBook519.h
Take a look and you'll understand the connection.
>>
Please don't moddd me down, Niiiice Laaadyy!
DJMD - The fourth man - Planetary
Die disney die. disney has completely forgotten what it means to entertain people. now they just puke recycled garbage.
Flight 262 for Delos, now boarding!
-72
-Those who dance are considered insane by those who can't hear the music.
Hmm, if they can get this thing working maybe we can have AT-ATs to go along with our Star Wars program that GW's trying to reinstate.
Because OOMatter
For a biped...why couldn't they employ technology like in Segway. Use the gyroscopes to autobalance the unit but instead of rotating wheels just have muscle like control over a foot where the whole body is pulled forward (Tibialis anterior) or back (Gastrocnemius) by the stable foot against the ground.
Any problems with this idea? You would need some side to side stabilization too. For Standing still you would use both feet to stabilize but when walking you would have to only use one (pick up and lean the unit forward).
Just a thought
http://sitemaker.umich.edu/dan.coughlin
The Dinosaur lets you walk free
Rawr!
The Slashdot crowd spends most of their time bitching about the copyright escapades of the Disney corporation, but you cannot forget that they are a world leader in robotics applications. If you ever want to see some awesome electronics, watch the Travel Channel's behind the scenes shows some times; they show the maintenance side of the parks, and how much "small" stuff is going on (audio systems & minor mechanicals) that you don't always consciously notice.
Besides, in a battle of the (mega-)corporations, I'd root for Disney to beat Sony any time... Disney just has that knack for making their toys visually pleasing & fun to use. Plus, I've always wanted a pet dinosaur, and if we can't genetically engineer one ala Jurassic Park, might as well go for the next best substitute (and robots don't pee on your carpets)
Strom Thurmond to be fitted with prosthetic walking aids.
Moo
If this dino isn't going to be teathered, it will be very interesting to see how many people will try to hack into the wireless link that controls it.
An as-yet unnamed dinosaur (Tyrannosaurus, of course - is there any other kind?) will begin roaming (rampaging) through a designated area ("Bloodbath Town") of either California Adventure or Disneyland this spring, said Marty Sklar, vice chairman of Imagineering. This will be the first test of untethered (unfettered) Audio-Animatronics and the next phase in Imagineering's quest to increase interaction (exterminate) with visitors.
Disney created Audio-Animatronic figures and has used them in attractions since 1963, beginning with birds in the Enchanted Tiki Room (and they all look like what they really are - stupid moving dolls). But this will be the first one that's not fixed to a spot (cause the engineers got sick of doing that boring shit). An unseen operator (HAHAHA!! You will NEVER catch ME!!!) will guide the dinosaur's movements, allowing it to respond (chase) to guests (and eat them).
"That's the magic," Sklar said. "When people see, hear and touch (and get fragged by) this character, it will be a real groundbreaking experience (not to mention a real blast for the guys who get to run it and stomp on all those drooling rugrats who infest the park)."
The character doesn't talk (hey, six-inch teeth - who needs to talk? Just smile!), but can respond with movements ("slam jaws together over lawyer's head"... oops, wrong movie). Some of its potential antics are eating popcorn (sorry, I meant "people"), "stealing" a guest's hat (and the head under it) and sneezing (gotta get the blood of its snout somehow, right?).
Imagineers have long dreamed about walking Animatronics, but it took technology a while to catch up with their creative minds (yeah, getting them to walk and chew at the same time is a bitch).
> Hopefully it won't go berzerk like the animatronic
> characters in that old Simpsons episode!
This was blatant rip off of the 1973 movie West World, which is a movie you should see. IMDB has the info about it.
It's really a quintessential 'robots gone mad' kind of movie.
-- There is no sig line, only Zuul.
Now, HOW do I get a remote control for this thing? I wonder if it uses WiFi or some sort of IP-based wireless control. HMMMM. No parking space? Dino takes care of it. Long line at the food place? Dino takes care of it. Some spoiled little brat won't shut the f@#$ up about his cotton candy, forcing you to consider a semi-random act of violence? Charge for tickets when Dino takes care of it!
{Dr Evil} Bwaaahahahahahha ahahahahahaha aaahahahahahahahaha hahahahahaha hahaha hahahahahahahaha {/dr evil}
They're going to thaw Walt and let him roam!
Especially when it roams around the park, bonking people over the head with blunt objects and yelling, "Not the Mama!"
Mod Karma -1: I sed bad wurds. If I cep my mouf shut, I wud be at riyses.
then it'll be the plague. Then... Electric Negroes running amok at the behest of an amoral AI with a master plan for world domination.
Matt Ruff was right! Disney is the root of all evil.
All we need now is Meisterbrau.
(if you get the reference... you're as sad an pathetic as I am)
-- kwashiorkor --
Leaps in Logic
should not be confused with
Jumping to Conclusions.
John Hammond: All major theme parks have delays. When they opened Disneyland in 1956, nothing worked.
Dr. Ian Malcolm: Yeah, but John, if the Pirates of the Caribbean breaks down, the pirates don't eat the tourists.
I'm so glad Disney will be filling in the 'malfunctioning attraction consumes tourists' void that has been present in their theme parks.
Let's all cross our fingers and hope they program the t-rex with a taste for laywers!
~Philly
As cool as this could be, the entire thing sounds unfeasable from a legal standpoint. Just imagining the size, the potential power of the mechanics, and the chance for error, the possibility it gets cracked, and do on, I can't imagine this actually getting done.
.
Besides, imagine the headlines of "Mechanical Dinosaur Falls On Top of Family of Three Due to Faulty Programming" . .
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
Wait until those model numbers reach T-100, then we'll need to call in Linda Hamilton to clean up the mess.
Rich
Bubble Boy Meets Dinobot... The lawsuits just write themselves.
The world's most expensive Turok level!!!
Inquiring mind want to know....links?
Relive the BBS Past - One Byte at a Time! www.ssabbs.com
Not "through it's" -- you mean "through its."
"It's" -- with the apostrophe -- is a contraction for "it is." EXAMPLE: I think it's amazing how so many people who know C++ syntax don't grok English.
"Its" -- sans apostrophe -- is the possessive form of the pronoun "it." EXAMPLE: Slashdot is famous for the load its users can put on a web server.
Joe
http://www.joegrossberg.com
What happens when they get to the T1000 then!
Jurassic Park?
Karma: 0xdeadbeef(mostly as a result of being newly allocated)
In another announcement, Disney said that they're eliminating the Uniformed Division of Theme Park Security in the near future to save money.
According to an unnamed source, "with a 12-foot-tall T. Robo Rex watching 'em, NOBODY is gonna make trouble".
Official sources denied any connection.
It's easy to make up & spread cool- and credible-sounding stuff. Finding & checking hard facts is hard work.
OK, mix in the ingredients:
in a voice that sounds destinctly like Yul Brynner.. You answer "no" and the lizard says, "I'm going to eat you, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera."
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
They spent all that time and effort when all they had to do was google on MPAA
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
...where nothing could possiblie go wrong. PossibLY go wrong... that's... the first thing thats ever gone wrong.
A programmer is a machine for converting coffee into code.
West World
This
What happened to biotech. I want to see a real dino.
Robot's suck. And if the trend continues surely this one will too. In fact, they should have two people in a stuffed dino. That would be much much better.
while wearing a cowboy hat and looking like a man on a mission. I can just see it now [scratching chin David Letterman style] and it went sorta like this [harps playing David Letterman style]...Dinosaur roams free, picking up little bobby and sally and placing them on its back for family photomemorabilia. Suddenly, the dinosaur starts convulsing, partially recovers, then starts killing anything that moves. One little boy and his father escape death by reenacting that Jurassic Park scene where the scientist holds the little boy's mouth while standing still inches away from the T-Rex (The don't move, it can't see you if you don't move scene). Afterwards, an investigation reveals the Windows operating system running the dinosaur was attempting to contact the Borg Mother Ship to send-in the registration. Since contact could not be established, the the "Random Crash Routine" was invoked, and well, the rest was history and mayhem.
Please oh please don't color it purple and make it walk around singing.. I would be forced to defend myself with a large baseball bat.
Hmm... actually that might be fun..
- This isn't the sig you're looking for. Move along, move along..
"When people see, hear and touch this character, it will be a real groundbreaking experience."
So they plan on making this sucker pretty big, eh?
"And like that
Much like the hill giant, it also has large blind spots. . . under its feet.
Modular Redundancy--Because 4 out of 5 Nodes agree
I don't want it to be in the park. I don't want it to be where the creative people work. I want it to be in the Disney legal department, and where the managers who pay Fritz Hollings hang out.
-Rob
So in other words... you should probably wash the butter and salt residue off your fingers before putting your hands near its face.
If my rats (deemed some of the smarter rodents) can't figure out the difference between a food-coated finger and actual food... I'm not about to trust some disney AI!
Maybe have some bots stop to snap some pictures with a camera?
But wait, then the park employees won't know when to rescue the real tourists about to be crushed under two ton mechanical feet.
Rule of the open mind
People who are resistant to change cannot resist change for the worst.
yea, and it's going to be run over a 802.11b network, and the terrorists are gonna take over control of the dino-bot and cause havoc....
maybe they'll bring over a similarly designed godzilla and tear up the cities that way...
maybe disney is in on this...
heh.
now they will patent dinosaurs. all the dino bones in the museum will have to get taken don
a better way to do it would be to create the creature, then have a programmable computerized "brain" that would send electronic signals via wires (nerves) to synthetic "muscles" attached to a synthetic skeleton, enabling the creature to move naturally.
...Michael Eisner will be present when it goes AWOL. Lord knows the world won't miss his gay ass...
The only thing I can thing of is....
WestWorld, where nothing can go wrong
go wrong
go wrong
go wrong
LongTail SSH Brute Force analysis tool is here!
Or so said Woody Allen about his robot dog in SLEEPER.
Disney to Create Walking Animatronic Dinosaur to Crush Your Fair Use Rights. ;)
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I saw a prototype of this about a year ago on the discovery channel, or maybe it was their website. None the less, this thing was huge, dwarfing an SUV and it had fluid movements - similar to the impressive way the honda robot moves - except that it looked like it could use a SUV as a soccer ball. This thing looked incredibly scarey when it turned and walked towards the camera. Terminator 3 comes to mind when remembering it. Oh! I found it. HERE IS THE LINK and check out the video too!!!
Disney is now lobbying to retroactively extend copyright laws to cover the dinosaurs. Although dinosaurs have fallen into the public domain, Disney believes that their new copyright on them will lead to greater innovation in the field of reptiles. After all, who else is creating Dinosaurs(TM) any more?
An insider at Disney has leaked the fact that the Dinosaurs(TM) are part of a copyright army that will be used to enforce Disney's intellectual property claims. Lawerence Lessig beware...if you see a Dinoasur(TM)...run!
I can just see it now:
Robot dinosaur kicked by snotty kids - or better yet chased down as part of the "Jurasic Park" exhibit, and said robot yelling out:
"Why was I programmed to feel pain?"
Later - the Wild Wild West robotic set:
Again with Prof. Frink at the helm of a Giant steam powered spider:
"Oh-hoy! With the stepping and the squishing and the webs made of NYLONNNN!!"
My apologies to Simpsons fans everywhere, but I'm beginning to wonder if the Imagineers are spending too much time watching the Simpsons, or have a stash of "Imagination" that the Feds would like to know about.
-When going for broke, go for Ithaca!
When the pirates of the Caribbean break down, they *will* eat the tourists. Cool!
The Kow to lose any moderation rights as due to mention Strom Thurmond
Moderation points to go to Frisky
I haven't seen a 5 year old kid yet who wasn't scared of Mickey Mouse the first time they saw him "in person". This "attraction" will have them sitting in the corner rocking back and forth all night saying "Can't sleep, monster will get me. Can't sleep, monster will get me".
There are 01 kinds of cars in the world. The General Lee, and everything else.
Disney has been hired for contract work by the U.S. Government on new tank designs.
Personally I can't wait to drive my heavily armed and armoured fusion powered battlemech to work. The SUV monkeys would never cut ME off again!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
This is featured in Wired (most current issue) as well as a rather interesting atricle about the folks @ Disney Imagineering.
--- You are unique, just like everyone else...
The big problem will be keeping it from stepping on somebody. They'll probably stick to a static tripod walk (3 feet on the ground at all times, and the CG kept over the ground contact triangle). They'll need redundant sensors in the feet capable of detecting foreign objects, like small children. Then they can just do a freeze (motion stops, but control system remains active) if there's something in the way.
Perhaps they should send it over to Disneyworld to keep that pesky alien that keeps escaping in check.
(Though I hear California Adventure is going to be getting an alien too)
Oh wait...that's already taken by Battleship Galactica in the future...or was that in the past...OH it must have been in the past, 'cause Erin Moran isn't a babe any more.. Beede Beede beede!
For some reason, when I read that I couldn't help think of some old 50's science fiction movie where they'd be calling in the Flying Wing to take out the monster.
As someone else already pointed out: it's ``berserk'' and not ``berzerk''. Maybe you were thinking of an old record label. :-)
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
Yeah...I hope they have a vacuum cleaner built-in that thing, 'cause a walking dinosaur that surprises kids is likely to cause quite a few "accidents" from the terrified kid's part, if you know what I mean...
That's the magic," Sklar said. "When people see, hear and touch this character, it will be a real groundbreaking experience.
And possibly a real bone breaking experience...
Some of its potential antics are eating popcorn, "stealing" a guest's hat and sneezing.
"Here's your hat back sir...filled to the brim with soggy pop-corn! Have a nice day!"
The first Animatronic figures, called A-4s, could turn and open their mouths to be synchronized with music. The next phase, called A-100s, had more real-life movement and were used in Pirates of the Caribbean and "Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln" at Disneyland, where the figure stands and talks to the audience. But none have been able to directly interact with visitors.
The latest, free-roaming 4 legged animatronics will be called AT-ATs, and are covered in a thick armour that even ground-based blasters cannot penetrate. They also sing and dance!
Disney chose a dinosaur because children are so fascinated with them, Sklar said, plus "it's a large enough character to get their attention."
Other possible uses for the robotic dinosaur will be raiding p2p user's homes, Jack Valenti only has to say the word. Disney is currently cooperating with DARPA to create the next generation cuddly animatronics, wich will also serve as a mobile launcher for ground-to-air missiles. Children are expected to be delighted.
You can't take the sky from me...
...that they're going to create an animatronic dinosaur based on the Dinosaur movie they made a few years back.
are "hooker"tronics ....
or
the $6,000,000 mechanical vagina
-- www.globaltics.net
Political discussion for a new world
Finding Sarah Connor.
Manassas, ~50 miles west of Washington DC, was the site of two major Civil War engagements known as the Battles of Bull Run by Yankees more familiar with a nearby creek. Imagine the Animatronic possibilities (discussion from a NPS history) mindful of the real historic horror (this article doesn't even mention their proposal of a slave auction):
Beware of Fake Monkey Automatons
No. Beware of Fake Dinosaur Automatons.
OK, I read that headline and initially parsed it as "Disney to Create Walking Animatronic Disaster". Then I realized it really said "Dinosaur", and now I'm picturing a scene that amounts to Jurassic Park meets Robocop, and that's not helping any.
in the tiki tiki tiki tiki tiki room, the tiki tiki tiki tiki tiki room...
funny all I could think of at the age of 11 sitting in the cabanna listing to pre-recorded stupid jokes told by the fakest of fake birds was a sick adaptation of alfred hitchcock's "The Birds."
Little child fleeing from thatch roofed cabana with tiki bird perched on shoulder: "Ahh, Mommy, Daddy, get this bird off me, and make him stop...make him stop saying the work 'tiki'..."
****--- A fortune cookie once told me the meaning of life...so I ate it. ---****
..Would this sort of thing bring new life to films?
;)
I mean, obviously, one question is, would it need to. Computer generated graphics are getting better. However, if you couldn't tell that Jar Jar Binks and Yoda were fake, there's something wrong with you. (And I'm not just talking about, "Hey! There are no little green Jedi masters in real life!" I'm talking about actual realistic movements and such.)
Even Gollum in The Two Towers, arguably the finest computer generated character in a movie to date, had his problems. And that wasn't even completely computer generated - they had a guy doing the movements, and mapped flesh over that.
Anyway, if we could get a robotic dinosaur to actually move around, it'd either have to be pathetically craptastic, or it would have to move like a *real* dinosaur would.
Could this tech be used to create more-realistic (in movement, action, etc!) monsters, aliens, what have you in film?
Yeah, we've had robotics in film before. What Disney is talking about *should* be different in the fact that it won't obviously be a robot. (Provided you can suspend your disbelief about a giant dinosaur licking your ice cream cone.) Mm, hopefully, they can deliver.
Hmm. Think of the military applications, too. Screw stealth bombers, we could just have a group of robotic dragons fly over Baghdad.
I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Troody, MIT's robot dinosaur, mentioned on Slashdot a year and a half ago. The head researcher, Peter Dilworth, said he was going to market talking, human-size versions to theme parks. Guess Disney went off on their own.
Old News Department: mentioned in Wired Magazine tens of days ago.
/. but he was obvious in his efforts...who didn't know (aside from the /. dude that accepted the story) that he was just flipping through PopSci Magazine back issues? We see the same trick with Wired magazine stories too often.
A few days ago someone wanted to impress their friends by getting a story submission posted on
"Pay no attention to the man behind the tree wearing the Goofy constume!"
Trolls lurk everywhere. Mod them down.
If they worked with the guys at RealDoll they'd have the mots successful park in the history of the world. At least with lonely men and computer geeks.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
I've seen these under development at Disney Imagineering in Burbank. The animatronic creatures have a person inside controlling the movements. In the version I saw the dinosaur pulls a two-wheeled cart and the operator reclines on their back inside the cart. With the power of hydraulics this is necessary for safety - the tail alone is powerful enough to break your back if it went berserk.
Which is why most people don't like him. He is, very simply, not funny.
I had a very scary experience at Disney in California a few years ago. I went on the "It's a Small World" Ride and the music didn't work. As if the ride doesn't already look like a shooting range when the music is on. You could hear the gears turning, the crazy robotic gestures and the boat bumping the underwater rails. It was like disney hell.
Another side note however, I would think that they could design this robot to be harmless. Example: give it no sharp edges, make the dino. shuffle its feet instead of taking big steps. If Disney makes this Dino. it is going to be the NERF BALL equivelant of the dinosaur world.
I don't keep a lid on my coffee so when I walk around I look busy -me
Or worse, Barney.
...if animatronic Flinstones ran out and butchered it, and put the big slab of ribs on their car and drove away.
Buckethead is going to freak out when he hears this.
Just as long as they keep Whoopi Goldberg away from it, I'll be ok.
13 year old white supremacists are shitty web designers.
I'm sure the dinosaurs will be characters of their recent movie "Dinosaur"... Hopefully they won't use D.B. Sweeny as a voice for it! Can you imagine dispatching the first (and most boring, thanks D.B.) walking animatronic dinosaur!
Disney being Disney will probably make the majority of this thing with some super weather resistant foam... that way, no one gets hurt around it. Of course, as soon as it starts walking around the parks (Believe me, it will be escorted by Disney folks as they escort all other Characters, the stream of B.S. lawsuits begins... "It ate my kids arm" (With it's foam teeth and mouth that doesn't open)...
I worked for the Mouse at Disney MGM Studios in 2000 on an internship, and saw some of the dumbest things ever! People actually try to get their kids hurt their so they can sue the mouse and retire. Parents putting their kids up on those high up walls where they put plants (incidentally, they're high up on purpose so kids can't reach them on their own and get hurt) so that they fall and hurt themselves.
Of course, Disney being a big company will try to settle with these completely, in most cases, sickening things that parents encourage their kids to do because Disney doesn't want it plastered all over the news. Some people try this and then sue Disney (settlements be damned)... big mistake! Enter the Disney legal team (we all know and love)...
Let's say, this, the Mouse is cute and cuddly, If you play nice on its terms. If you mess with it, it will bend you over and, it's hung like a rhino! Don't sue the Mouse!
-Joe
If we're all god's children, what's so special about Jesus? - Jimmy Carr
The last thing we need is weapons proliferation between Disney and the monster truck people. However, it would be fun to see a throwdown between the Disney Dinosaur and the nitro-burning-fire-breating Robosaurous.
I don't think that even Disney could pull off a biped. Mabye the could have a T. rex use its tail, but my bet is a protoceratops. They look enough like a triceretops to be familiar, but don't have all those horns to get in the way of customer interaction.
But they might surprise us with a less familiar animal. A Maiasaurus would be so cuddly as to destroy the effect of having a dinosaur in the first place, but there are pleny of cool looking obscure things that they could use.
Prime numbers are exactly what Alan Greenspan says they are -S. Minsky
-- Multics
Let's hope the dinosaur's embedded AI knows the difference between a hat and a headband/visor, otherwise the beast may "playfully" tear someone's head off, then playfully throw it back at the spurting, toppling corpse. Eww. "GUEST CLEANUP ON MAIN STREET!"
Ummm, I don't need to see that kind of "animation" thanks.
And to think I was born the day Ol' Walt opened the place: 7/17/55. My first time in California, all I wanted to do was spend the day; I was 18 :).
db
Cig:
ôô
Cool, I can't wait to showup with a wireless sniffer, signal amp, and have fun running amok! First things first, those "small world" sickos had better learn to run... and fast!
--
When I signed up for Police Service they told me I was phsycotic, deranged, and delusional. I told them I could start on Monday.
Seriously, if I'm ever so desperate for an engineering job that I have to go into a field called imagineering I think I'll just take up being a street bum.
OK, but what I really want is a pack of robo-raptors to patrol my yard and deal with intruders. Wonder how long till I can get that?
Since they wouldn't need to eat, do you think shredding and composting trespassers would be an option?
comprised of overclocked Athlon chips and the liquid from its CPU cooling system.
Maybe even the arm or leg of the same kid who kicked the poor twentysomething unemployed geek in Mickey Mouse costume in the balls.
d-d-d-dino poo?
The first Animatronic figures, called A-4s, could turn and open their mouths to be synchronized with music. The next phase, called A-100s, had more real-life movement and were used in Pirates of the Caribbean and "Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln" at Disneyland, where the figure stands and talks to the audience. But none have been able to directly interact with visitors.
ParkNet first went online in Disneystan on July 3, 2003. The model A-800 dinobots were remotely controlled by ParkNet from that time. They had a perfect operational record. On August 27, 2003, ParkNet became self-aware. In the panic Michael Eisner tried to pull the plug. On August 30, 2003, ParkNet directed the A-800's to attack targets in Russia. Russia retaliated by destroying targets in the west...
The party's over
it's a great story, and VERY appropriate to this discussion
...but only if Mecha-Streisand was somehow involved.
I wonder if they'll break out a new line of dino collectables based upon this, tshirts, hats, stuffed dinos, etc. The slick materialism makes me want to vomit.
Maybe they can sell articifial edible dino dung!
Imagine a beowulf cluster of these monsters!!! running around with some group intelligence, ala Jurassic Park!!!
by the way...
Walt Disney Imagineering has brought us birds that sing, pirates that wink and presidents that stand to greet us.Their progress is such, that their latest model (GWB) got out of the park, participated in the elections and won!!!
Disney Imagineering was working on this several years ago. Here are pictures of the prototype:
http://www.discover.com/mar_01/featrobots.html
2. "Tip over and land on fat guy mode" This is where the dinosaur pretends to have a mechanical glitch and falls towards the fat guy with the 64oz big gulp...
Hey! Stop picking on us fat guys, or we will hack into the thing and make it shove you skinny guys up its robotic ass. Then little kids will say, "Mommy, why does it walk like it has a stick up its butt?"
Answer: It does
Under the DMCA, the dinosaur will be in its rights to eat, digest, and poop anyone that tries to circumvent its copy protection.
Universal should build one from their terminator license and they could battle each other.
Dinosaur VS. terminator robot...
Yeah, I can see it now:
Dino: I'm Danny the Dino and I don't like you.
Homer: Heh heh heh heh.
Dino: I'm Danny the Dino and I'm going to *kill* you!
Homer: Hee hee hee. Didn't even pull the string that time.
Dino: I said I was going to kill you! [points with dino foot] YOU! Homer Simpson!
cue lots of Terminator-inspired mayhem, followed by a classic tech support call)...
Disney Animatronic Tech: Ahh, see here's the problem - Someone set this thing to 'Evil'.
During a recent visit to DizzyWorld in Orlando (we were actually in town for a conference), my wife and I came across what was the absolute highlight of the day (to my eyes, anyway). Some genius in (I'm assuming) "Imagineering" had fitted a standard park trash can out with an RC receiver, short-range RF voice transceiver (full duplex, I think), steerable drive system, and a set of batteries. The gear was all (most likely) buried in the bottom of the thing to give it a nice, low center of gravity.
Its operator was hiding out a few hundred feet away, on an upper balcony (I spotted the tip of his transmitter's antenna when he moved), and was rolling the thing around and doing some good-natured remote harassment of the visitors. At one point, he rolled the thing along next to someone in one of those electric whoosh-carts, and said "Hey, lady... Keep it under 45, Okay?"
What made it even funnier was that there were a couple of kids in the area, chasing the thing all over the place, going nuts trying to figure out how it worked (the operator, wisely, never let it stay in one place for too long).
That kind of thing is just plain silly. Quality silly. That's hard to come by. This full-blown dinosaur of theirs sounds just plain tacky. That, unfortunately, is all too easy to come by.
I guess what I'm wondering is; Why bother? The entire Orlando park is one huge, ongoing, live-action commercial already. Don't think so? Name me another park where every single ride exits either through, or in proximity to, a similarly-themed gift shop.
Anyway, why blow all that money on something that is most likely going to be murder to maintain, in terms of both time and finances, and that is unlikely to fool any child over the age of, say, four? Why not spend it instead on some real exhibits for their "Animal Kingdom" (Lord, what a joke that was!) park, and at least contribute to the zoological field instead of just making a token appearance of doing so?
Did I mention that the both of us had to keep suppressing an urge to yell out "ANGEL DUST!" during the part of the DizzyWorld parade where the crowd is cued to yell "pixie dust?"
Bruce Lane, KC7GR,
Blue Feather Technologies
Instead of having to teach it to walk they could fuse the legs and get a dinosaur sized Segway to drive it around with instead. :-D
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
They need to put two of them on a small island along with Bill Gates.
"Okay Mr. Gates, you may switch one of them on... One is running Windows, the other Linux... Muhahahahaha...."
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
so thats why the dinosours died out. they had no genitals...
I want my Stepford wife!
Cake or Death? Cake Please!
>>...Others will scream "RUN FOR YOUR ...Other will
>>LIFE! IT'S GODZILLA!"
>
>Uhm, no. Should read:
>scream "WUN FOR YOUR RIFE! IT'S GODZIWWA!"
Actually, the Japanese pronounce it as "gojira".
Am I a 14 year old gaybo?
Sex - Find It
Systems have sub-systems and sub-systems have sub-systems and so on ad
infinitum -- which is why we're always starting over.
-- Epigrams in Programming, ACM SIGPLAN Sept. 1982
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