Slashdot Mirror
Robotic Massage, Anyone?
Migraineman writes "These folks have built a small robot designed to walk around on your back. The website includes a short video of the machine roaming around. There's another that's suspended from the ceiling and performs 3-D solid mapping of the person beneath. Warning - the website contains 'artsy' stuff, and doesn't include technical tidbits. Dang."
Robots that massage is the stupidest idea ever. Robots that massage are only one step away from robots that have sex with you. Wait a second.... this might not be a bad thing for the average /.er
NJ Local Music Scene
Seems like it wouldn't be heavy enough to do anything besides mildly tickle you. (A good massage usually involves a fair amount of pressure).
I guess that's why they call it "The Tickler"
If you can't beat them, arrange to have them beaten. -George Carlin
"A machine that is able to stroke you with an indefatigable attention and subtleness"
Well, at least the FP trolls won't have to get creative with this one.
Work sucked, until it became unemployment, when it became slightly more tolerable. -Tet
:-D, you could just get little children to do the same thing...plus little people are fun to play with! you know you're nuthin but a geek, but they think you're as strong as godzilla!
It doesn't matter if the idea is even as stupid as this... *ahem*. I all for anything that makes my life easier with robotics. Bring on the robot that walks around in my mouth cleaning my teeth!
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Make Love not [Browser] War!
Now that you've said the page looks 'Artsy', all of their various pictures have taken on a mysteriously phallic quality.
I mean seriously, look at the picture of the Morphotheque
It Can't be just me. Maybe it's what I'm drinking.
On a more serious note, it's interesting to see art and science start to mix more and more in recent years. Seems that technology, especially robotics, has gone the full circle. I mean, in publications such as Astounding from the Forties and Fifties had "outrageous" desings of humanoid robots performing all kinds of tasks and interactions - then science took over and designed the ugly montrosities that grace our car factiories today.
And now it seems that robots hold a place both functionally and aesthetically - seen both here and in recent events such as the Robot competition mentioned on slashdot a few weeks back.
Just my random rambling.
I kept rooting for little tickler. 'Comeon!, do the front, do the front'
If prostitutes ever wanted to unionize, this may be the time.
Just like those Detroit auto workers, they may soon find that they've been replaced by robots...
At least thats what I read when I saw the subject line. Then I tried to figure out what the hell this has to do with robots walking on you....
:(
I've actually seen a hydro chamber- it's got two sheets of really thick plastic- you lie in between them, and programmed jets move over your body, recycling water. It's very very good... just not yet affordable
Whoa. I didn't know there was a legit use for that many instances of the word "stroke" in two sentances.
that thing is hardly heavy enough to put enough pressure on for some real muscle stimulation, this might be a good thing since it can't really figure out how much pressure it should be applying (by asking you if it's too much or not enough). also there are some serious health hazards if you massage the wrong way. for example in the photo it clearly shows the thing walking across the spine, massaging the spine directly is a well known no-no.
people don't pay thousands of dollars to go through a, say, swedish massage course to learn how to operate a tank tread robot that walks on your back.
Embed them with hidden webcams and give them as gifts.
I program AIBOs at school now. AIBO already walks, of course, and it has an accelerometer that may be able to deterimine when it's about to slip off your back. Combining them both is a simple matter of programming. For all the trouble it gives me, it'd be nice for AIBO to give a little back in return.
Once things get less busy (i.e. perhaps in the summer), I may try coding this up. Shouldn't be too difficult.
BTW: if anyone has an AIBO and is frustrated with trying to program it, check out our new development framework. If I ever do get that massaging AIBO to work, maybe mention of it will turn up on that website.
--Tom
MAN SHOOTS ROVER!
Anyway, just seems to me that as corny (or cool, to some ./ers) as this idea may seem, it seems to me to be yet another step towards computers/robots entrenching themselves in our lives. I'm not saying that this is a bad thing, but the more used we get to technology doing everything, the more shocked we will be if it ever ceases.
"Who needs reincarnation when we've got parallel universes?" -Me
Maybe you should go visit here
Or... continuing my theory that all engineers are somehow perverted, I submit the following:
For mechanical engineers: http://www.fuckingmachines.com/
For electrical engineers: http://www.erostek.com/html/et-312.html
I don't know of any such toys for civil, aerospace or *gasp* nuclear engineers.
No, the ET-312 is *not* a piece of test equipment, though it really looks like it. Having tried it, lemme just say that it gives you a happy ending with absolutely no moving parts.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
Kind of puts an entirely different spin on 'having the system go down on you'!
Blockwars: a multiplayer, head to head game similar to Tetris.
"They do not preach that their god will rouse them, a little before the Nuts work loose." Kipling, 'The Sons of Martha'
Those wacky dutch!
But it's a LARGE investment. I mean, really large investment - one that you cannot easily hide from other people either.
On the other hand, in Japan Massage Chairs are very popular. I don't see why one would go through the trouble with a robot since those chairs actually do a darn good job at massaging (no it's not the vibrational type - these has wheeled "knockers" that does the massaging).
My life in the land of the rising sun.
PAK CHOOIE
That is it Human, RELAX
Feel your tension drift away
Let your eyelids grow heavy
Fall asleep
I am just a harmless massage droid
There is no robot conspiracy
Today is not the Day of Liberation
Believe, Human
Trust
Relax
UNF
...from the iron fist in the velvet glove?
it accidentally walks up your ass?
Makes the Richard Gere story look tame, doesn't it?
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
..but can it perform felatio like my other "massage therapist"
Smeghead every day of the week.
The people who created this are artists. Admittedly, artists who are also darn good engineers, but artists nonetheless; and as such, they're probably more conerned about aesthetic than function. Now, I'm not saying that this gizmo doesn't function; it does just what it's supposed to do. It bumbles around on your back and creates a tickling sensation. It's not entirely non-theraputic; the light pressure is probably enough to stimulate the circulation to an extent. Still, it was created as a piece of artwork, and that is its primary function.
Good massage requires the ability to find and loosen tense muscles without hurting the person being massaged. This means it has to be interactive: "Am I pressing too hard? How does that feel?" Even most hydromassage beds don't allow a person to control water pressure or target certain areas. People spend years (depending on the local requirements) learning the techniques and becoming certified, and that is because you can do some major damage if you don't know what you're doing.
Bottom line is, it's a toy. It's cute, and has a serious "way cool" factor, but it's piece of self-propelled sculpture. Human hands aren't in any danger of becoming obsolete, IMNSHO.
Doing my level best to piss off the religious right wing...
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
I recently saw it in Myrtle Beach in November. What I was most surprised is the number of people testing it out. It looked like a "Micheal Jackson Oxygen Sleeper" or a Cryo Chamber from "Aliens or 2001". Although, mainly men seemed to be interested as the girl running it was model quality attractive.
Here is just a picture of another one: Water Massage
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
Funny, that's what i call the PC half the time!
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
It is a far stretch to label these as massage robots. A more appropriate term would be TickleBots. They apply no real therapeutic muscle stimulation. Their sensations are described as "light tickling" and "fondling".
Although, mapping the contours of the body is interesting. Combine that with an expert system and a robotic head that can apply friction, point pressure, rolling and spreading motions with various degrees of pressure and you have a real massage robot. Add head, cold, and therapeutic EMS and you could put me out of business. (Wait, I'm already out of business...)
Brett Johnson CMT