Robotic Bubble Baths for Japan's Elderly

LukePieStalker writes "New York Times (open kimono before entering) is carrying an article on various robots that are being used in assisted living situations. In addition to mentioning the Wakamaru, the story has illustrations of a human washing machine and a description of robotic pants that help those with mobility problems. Apparently, the devices are considered the better choice in a country that is not inclined to grant working visas to foreigners. As Japan's population shrinks, will the robot population make up the difference?"

Comments

Work visas?

[sakusha]

Huh? What's this crap about Japan not issuing work visas? Do I sense some bitter frustration by some otaku who couldn't get a job?
I was offered a job and a work visa in '96 and turned it down, a friend of mine has been over there since '98 on a work visa.

Re:Work visas?

[gullevek]

getting a working visa IS hard. I had to wait 4 months to get one. They hate foreigners. 90% of the people working in the immigration office don't speak a single word of english. Funny for those foreigners who have to go there for applying a re-entry permission (yes even if you have a 1 year working visa and you leave without a re-entry permission, you actually have to re-entry the whole circle of getting a brand new working visa (a friend of mine working as a bar tender happend this thing). Furthermore, 3 months before your working visa is over (and you can extend it) you cannot get things like: mobile phones or any dial up device, can't sign up for credit cards (which is understandable), ... For all the visa thing you have to fill out 100.000 formulars. and if you enter japan with a tourist visa (normal entry visa) and you want to work and get a working visa, you have to leave (! YEAH L E A V E !) the country to get it ... THAT is sick ...

But damn, I love it here :) I hope my working visa extension goes well ...

greeings from japan.

Re:A country without children

[gl4ss]

..It's not like that.. not even nearly.

I'm suspecting the situation there is similar as here in Finland, that the baby boom generation that was born after ww2 is getting old enough to retire, which means that a lot of jobs is going to be freed and the number of elderly people is going to increase quite fast(coupled with increased life expectancy).

It's not that there isn't any children. It's that the population isn't expanding rapidly as it was after ww2. basically what it means that because of the baby boom 50 years ago there's going to be a boom of people retiring in the coming years.

besides, a personal helper is very expensive if the problem is that a person needs just some mobility enchantment(basically the realistic alternative for normal folk being sent to a retirement home and lie drugged out on a bed there till you die - does that sound very good?).
and old people feel better if they can get on by themselfs, in their own homes(granted that they still get to meet other people and generally have some activity in their lives.).

not that they're very protective either, I'd guess you'd need to know the language pretty well to be able to carry out house helper tasks(and be subject to local minimum wage & etc laws. unlike in some certain countries into which foreign manual labour workforce can be brought in very cheaply and then dumped back to where they came from..). getting work visas into japan is far from impossible, but hey, it's slashdot! dramatised shit for nerds!

Re:I hope they come with the three laws of robotic

[AndroidCat]

They're working on it. Japanese conference states robots' rules of order