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The ROBOlympic Games
Roland Piquepaille writes "The first International Robot Games, or ROBOlympics, organized by the Robotics Society of America, will take place on March 20th and 21st, 2004 in San Francisco, California. There will be competition for combat and non-combat robots, a World Cup Soccer game, and even a robo-triathlon. More than 400 robots are registered for this robotics competition. And the winners will receive hard cash. Nature tells us the story in 'Robolympics contestants shoot for gold.' More details and references are available in this overview which also includes a very nice photo of two robots, the larger one either fixing or rocking the smaller one. And for your information, ROBOlympics is not sold out. So if you are near San Francisco, it's still time to buy tickets. They cost $15 to $25. Entrance is free for children under 7."
There will be competition for combat and non-combat robots
Does it disturb anyone how much effort is put into building robots designed for distruction? I mean I understand building robots that solve puzzles, and robots that overcome obstacles, but the idea of designing robots primarily for violence kind of bothers me.
Maybe this is a little off topic, but it's an interesting thing to think about.
One event called Ribbon Climber, in which robots race up a carbon-fibre ribbon, was designed to inspire 'space elevator' technology that might one day lift satellites into orbit.
It's nice to see they added this event in to draw a little more attention to the space elevator. I personally would rather build a robot to compete in that competition than the fighting ones. It may be a little easier, plus, you're helping towards a cause that would benifit us all, not building a robot purely to smash other things (which is still pretty cool).