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C-3PO Joins R2 in the Robot Hall of Fame

Posted by timothy on from the worth-it-just-for-the-pictures dept.

dev_alac writes "The BBC is reporting that C-3PO has been inducted into Carnegie Mellon's Robot Hall of Fame, along with Asimo, Shakeyboy -- "the first mobile robot to reason about its actions," Astroboy, and of course, Robby the Robot of Forbidden Planet fame. There, he joins such other legendary mechanical beings as Hal 9000, R2-D2, and Sojourner." Update: 06/20 08:27 GMT by T : Yep, it's a near-dupe of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette story linked the other day.

7 of 122 comments (clear)

  1. HAL - IBM by eight · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Too bad they don't mention that the HAL acronym actually comes from "decreasing" each letter of "IBM" with one.

  2. C3PO and R2D2 included separately!? by 91degrees · · Score: 4, Interesting

    But.. they're a double act! You can't have one without the other. It would be like putting Stan Laurel on his own in a comedy greats display.

    1. Re:C3PO and R2D2 included separately!? by serutan · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Exactly. The Robot Hall of Fame is a media event generator, like the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, etc. It's kind of interesting that you can create one of these Hall of Fame institutions out of thin air, and it somehow automatically becomes the authority in its field. I'm surprised nobody's created a Geek Hall of Fame yet.

  3. Re:Coincidence? by techno-vampire · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Asimov claimed, later, that Campbell actually gave his three laws their form. Campbell pointed out that Asimov had been using a set of three, never specified laws for robots in his stories and gave them their format: A robot may not harm a human being or through inaction allow one to come to harm, a robot must obey any order given by a human being unless it would violate the First Law, and a robot must protect its existence unless by so doing it would violate the First or Second Law. The most interesting thing about them is how they're structured, to make each law subordinate to any earlier law, making the First Law override everything else. Over the years, Asimov came up with an astonishing number of ways for these laws to create problems that could only be solved by humans.

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  4. Futurama by keadie · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I hope they put bender in there soon I mean, what other robot can get a 5'clock rust shadow from not drinking enough beer!

  5. Mad Magazine rip off by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The Mad magazine parody of Star Wars was the first to feature a gay C3PO ("O Barstool (R-2 parody) the design of this planet is to die for!" with R2-D2 bleeps response translating into (Great! It's not bad enough were stranded on this desert planet but now I'm stuck with a fag robot!" If you read Mad you know A LOT of Simpson material comes from Mad Magazine. Especially the marginal gags.

  6. Re:marvin? by RogerWilco · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Yes it is, R. Daneel does make a small apearance in Foundation and Earth, tying the Foundation series in with the Robot series. I like the first three novells of either series best,
    - Foundation, Foundation and Empire, Second Foundation
    - Caves of Steel, The Naked Sun, Robots of Dawn.

    These books are almost 50 years old and as readable as ever, they rate second only to Tolkien's work for me.

    In his later Foundation novels he ties the earlier stories together:
    Prelude to Foundation, Foundation and Earth.
    I am not sure if that makes th stories stronger.

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    RogerWilco the Adventurous Janitor