Robots

The third-party Robo-One 12 coverage keeps rolling in. Robots Dreams has a video montage of this year's bipedal robot competition in Japan that showcases this year's special challenge: to have robots catch and throw a ball.

Results and throwing styles vary. From two-handed soccer throw-ins to one-armed frozen ropes, they're all here.

In keeping with the fun-lovin' 1980s theme inherent in video montages, the clip is accompanied by a Night Court theme song soundalike.

NEW YORK--Spykee, a communications robot from the toymaker Erector for $299, allows you to listen, see and record the surroundings of the robot from anywhere in the world through a Web-based software application.

Similar in function to iRobot's ConnectR robot, the Spykee offers a VOIP telephone that works with Skype 3.0 and a Webcam, as well as controlled movement around a room.

Spykee operates over a wireless network and is controlled through downloadable software that Erector refers to as its "machine man interface."

You can upload music to the device from a computer and it will … Read more

It's not quite Rosie yet, Mr. Brooks, but we'll concede that the company you founded is a step closer to The Jetsons world of communications.

iRobot is expected to unveil this ConnectR communications robot, aka a physical avatar, at DigitalLife 2007 on Thursday.

The ConnectR for $499 is a robot you control on your behalf from anywhere in the world using a Web-based application. With a VoIP speakerphone and one-way video, it allows you to carry on a conversation as if you are right in the room. You can also control where it goes.

The video camera mounted … Read more

NEW YORK--Gadget-freak homeowners may never have to face the gunk of fall fallout ever again.

iRobot's CEO Colin Angle is expected to unveil two new robots at the DigitalLife 2007 consumer electronics show in New York on Thursday.

The Looj, which was accidentally leaked in August by the Federal Communications Commission Web site, is a remote-control robot that cleans out the gutters on the outside of a home.

The $99 robot's mobile base was based on that of iRobot's military PackBot, only on a much smaller scale. The robot can be slid into a gutter and then … Read more

You've probably seen or heard of the industrial robots that build cars, and the various humanoid robots like Honda's Asimo. Most of these are made in Japan. But let's face it, there's only so much these can do. An industrial robot is bolted down, and only knows one or two simple tasks. Asimo is small and weak, and famously collapsed once while trying to climb stairs.

As we know from sci-fi movies, real robots are the size of a man and can do things--dangerous things. Real robots are suitable for building robot armies. For that, we … Read more

Carnegie Mellon University on Wednesday announced a $300 robot designed to easily enable people to create super-high-resolution panoramic pictures--and a Web site to let anyone in the world dive into them.

The GigaPan robot, built by Charmed Labs, can accommodate most compact cameras and is designed to be relatively inexpensive, said Illah Nourbakhsh, a Carnegie Mellon associate professor of robotics. Images then are uploaded to the new GigaPan Web site. They also can be viewed through the Google Earth software.

The researchers' project aspirations extend well beyond just flipping through snapshots of foreign lands. "What if you could do … Read more

If you've been following Robo-One 12 vicariously on the Internet, welcome to the motherlode.

Robot Watch recently posted a smorgasbord of videos showcasing the best demos and battles from the recent bipedal robot competition in Japan, and they're all available right here, about a third of the way down the page.

If you don't want to do all that clicking and deciphering, here are some of the best clips of the lot. Mind you, I can't read Japanese, so I've offered my own personal interpretations of what the hell is going on in each video, … Read more

CNET News.com reports on and posts photos of Caltech's entrant for the DARPA Urban Challenge. This Ford E-350 van, named Alice, is rigged with GPS, LIDAR, and other sensors, the data from which is processed by Caltech's custom programming. The goal for Alice is to negotiate an urban course designated by DARPA without a driver. This Urban Challenge is a new twist on DARPA 2005 Grand Challenge, which ran through the desert. In the Urban Challenge, cars will have to follow basic street rules, like staying in their lanes and obeying traffic signs and signals. The race … Read more

More video is rolling in from last week's Robo-One 12 competition, courtesy of Robots Dreams. One of the challenges of the recent bipedal robot competition in Japan was to have a robot play catch.

As this video shows, robot King Kizer took that challenge to another level altogether, also fisting an inside changeup to the opposite field, diving back to first base on a pickoff attempt, and stealing second with no throw. Let's watch.

This isn't the first time we've seen a robot with baseball skills, although King Kizer may have the most well-rounded game. This … Read more