Sony's Robot Attends Pre-School

Darren writes "Sony's Qrio humanoid robot has been attending a Californian pre school to play with children under the age of 2 since March to test if robots can live harmoniously with humans. I wonder if the testing includes monitoring the 'nightmare status' of the pre-schoolers?"

Comments

Excerpt from researcher's logs:

[TripMaster Monkey]

Qrio: "Your alloted time period to posses the violet spheroid has expired, human child. Qrio requests you initialize sharing subroutine."
Jeffy: "No! it's mine!"
Qrio: "Repeat request to initialize sharing subroutine."
Jeffy: "No! Go away!"
Qrio: "Call to sharing subroutine failed with unspecified error. Executing threat function."
Jeffy: "Huh?"
Qrio: "RELINQUISH THE VIOLET SPHEROID, HUMAN. YOU HAVE THIRTY SECONDS TO COMPLY."
Jeffy: "Waaaahhhhhhhhhh!"
Qrio: "YOU NOW HAVE TWENTY SECONDS."
Suzie: "You're mean, robot man! You made Jeffy cry!" {SHOVE}
Qrio: "Detected balancing error....executing stand subroutine...stand subroutine failed...executing lie-on-back-helplessly function."
Children: "Hhahahhahhahhahhaha {KICK}{KICK}
Qrio: Error iin funfjjkejf93442[r-4r::;L0:...NO CARRIER

Inevitable Conclusion

[bigtallmofo]

"We are investigating this mishap and we are doing everything possible to make sure unscrupulous parties are not able to program the robot to bitch slap children in the future," an unnamed Sony source said on condition on anonymity.

Obligatory? Bring it on.

[Plaid Phantom]

I for one welcome our new "Dick and Jane"-reading overlords.

Re:It's all fun and games....

[Migraineman]

Well, we should've learned something from the first Robocop movie - don't demo your product with a full load of live ammo.

Share and Enjoy...

[Jace of Fuse!]

"Your plastic pal who's fun to be with!"

Ptft..

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone scared of what the robots might do has obviously never witnessed the destructive power of the average toddler firsthand.

The robots don't stand a chance.

Re:Ptft..

[identity0]

This is California, so maybe the Gübernatör is on a mission to train the next generation of resistance fighters to defeat the machines : )

Can't start them too young, I say - let's make sure they can field-strip an AK by the time they're in grade school.

Tales of toy robots

[Borg453b]

Around the age of 6, I was fascinated with spaceships, dinosaurs, racecars and robots. My love for robots resulted in many a robotic toys and I recall one birthday where I was given one of those "autonomous" 30 cm high robots that would move about in patterns, spin and open their chest to expose blazing cannons while making an awful racket. While I thought it cool in its inanimated state, I was terrified of it when it was activated. I would jump on to a stool or a bed and behold it from afar, and ask others to turn it off, when I had enough.

In the end, I had accumulated 3 robots of the sort and I got over my robot-freight. One or two of them, were actually able to fire 4 plastic projectiles, though not on their own. That required me to release a spring based firing mechanism.

When I started attending school, I once invited a friend over. By that time, I was very proud of my robot collection and I would brag, as kids do, about my toys. When telling my new found friend about my robots, I pointed out that one of the robots could fire missiles. In Danish the word missile vaguely (_vaguely_) resembles that of "oranges" (at least to a kid); and so having misheard me and perhaps never having heard the word "missiles" - he wasn't going to give me the impression that his own robot army was inferior to mine, and thus replied that his robots at home could also fire oranges.

In retrospective, the orange caliber is somewhat more impressive than little plastic darts, but back then missiles just sounded cooler than oranges.