Are Consumer Robots Just Fancy Toys?
This week we observed robotic vacuums and floor scrubbers, but we have yet to discuss robotic lawn mowers and pool cleaners. Any of these robots could prove themselves useful, but none of them have achieved wide-spread adoption.
Looking at other robots like Robosapien or the Sony AIBO the questions arises, are these just expensive toys?
The Robosapien is certainly marketed as a toy. It is manufactured by the Wow Wee Toy company. It requires six D batteries and 7 AAA batteries (not included). As they say, if it walks like a toy and it talks like a toy - it’s a toy.
However, while the Robosapien takes small steps around the house, it has taken a giant step for robotkind. This was the first mass-produced bipedial robot made commercially available to the public and it captured market share from robot enthusiasts and children alike.
Recently, the Robosapien evolved to V2, so perhaps in the future this toy will become a tool. Additionally, there is a community of developers that hack the Robosapien in an effort to make it more functional. As soon as it can be programmed to get me a beer from the fridge, I’ll buy one.
The Sony AIBO is another robot that walks the fine line of being called a toy. It has built in motion sensors and speech recognition. Sony has provided a programmer’s kit for hobbyists that want to tinker under the hood. But ultimately, what can AIBO do? Not much, which is why it never caught on.
In January, 2006 Sony announced it was discontinuing AIBO.
“There just aren’t enough people out there who want to own a robot,” says Steve Rainwater, chairman of Network Cybernetics and co-founder of the robotics blog robots.net. “They want a vacuum cleaner or a lawn mower or a pool cleaner, something that does something for them. And it has to work.”
June 14th, 2007 at 7:09 am
At this point in the evolution of robotics, consumer robotics are in fact (somtetimes) expensive toys. But what’s happening is far more then mere entertainment.
The more of these “toys” consumers see in the marketplace, the more they become accustomed to the idea of robotics in the home, (which is not an altogether comfortable thing for many people.) However, when the level of comfort reaches a certain threshold for the “everyman” consumer, AND a “killer App” which includes robotics hits the market, I think we’ll see consumer robotics move into the mainstream, with increasing numbers of robotics uses being adopted and accepted into the American home.
There’s one thing that most robotics companies currently looking at the consumer market don’t seem to “get” yet: Widespread acceptance of consumer robotics will NOT hinge upon a “killer App” ROBOT, but will instead hinge upon fulfilling a widespread consumer need with an appliance or piece of equipment that INCORPORATES robotics. So it’s not about ROBOTICS, it’s about answering a need or want, and using robotics as merely part of that solution set. If the item is a “Robotic Widget”, then it will not sell as well as a “Widget” which just happens to do what its new owner needs done with a degree of autonomous-ness, robot-ness, etc.
iRobot is breaking a lot of consumer ground with the Roomba and related products, but this is primarily consumer “robot acceptance” ground. I don’t think we’ve seen the real “Killer App” that is going to open the floodgates of consumer robotics yet, and I don’t think we’ll see it in the short term with robotic lawnmowers, etc.
But it’s coming.
September 20th, 2007 at 7:14 pm
Hi, I am a proud owner of a Ambrogio L200 Evolution robotic mower, and i also have a Robosapien. And i would like to say that the Evolution is great because it does a job for me so that now i have more free time. whereas the Robosapien is just a toy, it doesn’t do anything usefull except use up my free time. i believe the future of robotics is in working robot industry, robots that make our lives easier. Because they have a usefullness and a purpose.