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Koolio, the Beer Delivery Robot

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the rolling-rocks dept.

Ipingforpong writes "Recently a University of Florida engineering student named Brian Pietrodangelo built a mini fridge named Koolio that when you place an order through the website, will deliver a cold soda, beer, or various candy to you. Right now it's only available in one building at University of Florida but soon it could catch on in office buildings and other places."

9 of 325 comments (clear)

  1. Oh boy.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    that's gotta be one hot piece of hardware. I'd bet it'd be hard to keep thieves at bay.

    1. Re:Oh boy.. by LostCluster · · Score: 5, Insightful

      that's gotta be one hot piece of hardware. I'd bet it'd be hard to keep thieves at bay.

      This thing would never survive in a dorm environment. The payload will always be stolen, and it'd be constantly knocked over by people who just want to be jerks.

      However it might work just fine within a "friendly" office environment...

    2. Re:Oh boy.. by evilWurst · · Score: 2, Insightful

      "Make it shriek in a loud female voice if abused..."

      Most of my friends would feel compelled to abuse it at least once, then, just to hear it.

  2. So, how much did it really cost? by LostCluster · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You can tell these kids are going to make it in the business world...

    He provides no source nor price for such key components as Sonar, LCD, IR detectors, Motors, and Wheels. You can almost hear the future bean counter cutting them a check for $260 for this project and laughing.

  3. This is a convenience? by OmegaGeek · · Score: 5, Insightful

    From the description:

    "Imagine watching a movie with someone and you get thirsty. It is an inconvenience to everyone watching the movie to stop the movie, but at the same time you don't want to miss anything important. Koolio could solve your problem."

    Right. So instead of taking 30 seconds to get to the fridge and back, I'll pull out my laptop, login to the robot control server, place my order, then wait for the bot to get my drink to me; at best this takes 2 minutes

    Its a cool idea, I'll admit, but maybe not the most practical. Especially since when I launch my browser to login to the robot server, my home page is /. and it takes me 20 minutes to read and comment on new stories. Now, where was that work I actually meant to be doing right now...

    --
    Even heroes have the right to dream
  4. Re:You can laugh... by Phenris+Wolfe · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That happens because the geek approaches the situation from a scarcity mentality. A woman can't do that to you if you're willing/able to walk away if it gets to be too much crap.

    That being said, it took me a long time to figure that out, so I can understand the depression thing as well.

  5. Re:This is cool by swfranklin · · Score: 3, Insightful
    if it can climb the staris to my front door ...
    Would be kind of cool to build this on a Segway chassis... it wouldn't be able to handle stairs, but at least some decent inclines and uneven terrain.
  6. Re:You can laugh... by hachete · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I thought Alan Turing committed suicide as a result of being hounded by the security services and the general witch-hunts of that era.

    h

    --
    Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious
  7. Re:You can laugh... by Profane+MuthaFucka · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Another thing: the economic theory of pussy explains why in most places, the pussy cartel dislikes and even shuns pussy suppliers that provide pussy at discount rates, or even give out samples like it's Saturday morning at Sam's club. They resort to mean tactics like calling the alternate suppliers "sluts".

    --
    Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!