Hot Robot Love

Wow, my friend Jason sent me this amazing video for a song called Robot Love. The track is smoking hot, and the video features some Soulja Boy style robo-dancing– along with a robot romance shot that recalls DiCaprio spinning with Kate Winslet in Titanic. Enjoy!

Gizmodo gets a Taste of Honeydolls

Gizmodo has an in-depth look at Honeydolls– and apparently they like what they see.

If you aren’t familiar with Japan’s favorite robotic love doll with “HoneyFlavor“, you can check out my Honeydoll coverage here.

Japan’s Robotic Workforce

Robots could fill the jobs of 3.5 million people in graying Japan by 2025, helping to avert worker shortages as the country’s population shrinks.

Japan faces a 16 percent slide in the size of its workforce by 2030 while the number of elderly will mushroom, the government estimates, raising worries about who will do the work in a country unused to, and unwilling to contemplate, large-scale immigration.

The thinktank making these predictions, the Machine Industry Memorial Foundation, says robots could help fill the gaps, ranging from microsized capsules that detect lesions to high-tech vacuum cleaners.

Rather than each robot replacing one person, the foundation said in a report that robots could make time for people to focus on more important things.

Japan could save 2.1 trillion yen ($21 billion) of elderly insurance payments in 2025 by using robots that monitor the health of older people, so they don’t have to rely on human nursing care, the foundation said in its report.

Caregivers would save more than an hour a day if robots helped look after children, older people and did some housework, it added. Robotic duties could include reading books out loud or helping bathe the elderly.

“Seniors are pushing back their retirement until they are 65 years old, day care centers are being built so that more women can work during the day, and there is a move to increase the quota of foreign laborers. But none of these can beat the shrinking workforce,” said Takao Kobayashi, who worked on the study.

“Robots are important because they could help in some ways to alleviate such shortage of the labor force.”

The current fertility rate is 1.3 babies per woman, far below the level needed to maintain the population, while the government estimates that 40 percent of the population will be over 65 by 2055, raising concerns about who will look after the graying population.

Kobayashi said changes was still needed for robots to make a big impact on the workforce.

“There’s the expensive price tag, the functions of the robots still need to improve, and then there are the mindsets of people,” he said. “People need to have the will to use the robots.”

[Reuters]

Meet NEXI, MIT’s Media Lab’s Newest Creation

Wow, wow, wow. Cynthia Breazeal and the team at MIT’s Media Labs have done it again with NEXI, a mobile, dexterous, social robot that displays emotions.

Click on this link, and allow Nexi to tell you more about herself.

Via Suicide Bots.

Honeydolls: The Reactive Love Doll from Japan

Move over Real Doll–there’s a new sex doll in town, and she’s from Japan!

Honeydolls are the first reactive love dolls that come with sound— sorry, I couldn’t resist the pun. The Honeydoll has sensors in her breasts with adjustable sensitivity, and she moans when her specially designed silicone is squeezed.

And that’s not all folks– you can choose her voice, too! The voice module is accompanied by an SD card, which stores 4 kinds of voice files. Or you can store your own voice file you on the SD card, or even play Mp3s–how versatile!

But wait, there’s more! Honeydolls have beautiful faces with closed mouths, but they’re also built for oral sex. Their faces are specially designed with added elasticity and resilience, so the doll doesn’t suffer from the dreaded O mouth of substandard sex dolls.

Ugh, I’m simultaneously fascinated and disturbed. The website states that the self-imposed mission of Honeydolls is to balance beauty, reality–and still offer the durability expected for expensive dolls, along with the safety necessary for a doll built for intimate contact.

Weighing in at only 64 pounds and just over 5 feet tall, these dolls are available fully-loaded with “Honeyflavor” for about $7000. And yes, they ship to the US.

Visit the Honeydolls website for more info.

More on Love and Sex with Robots

David Levy continues to titillate the media and grab headlines with his book Love and Sex With Robots.

Levy predicts that sex with robots will be possible in the next five years, and that in the near future there will be a demand for androids with personality programming sophisticated enough for people to develop real relationships with them and eventually fall in love.

But some experts argue that Levy’s ideas are far-fetched. Frederic Kaplan, who programmed Aibo’s robo-brain, wonders whether we even want robots made in our own image. “Human-machine interactions will be interesting in their own right, not as ‘simulation’ of human relations.”

What Kaplan doesn’t realize is that there will plenty of demand for both kinds for robots.

A company in Japan, Axis, has already produced the world’s first rudimentary sexbot called Honeydolls–check out my investigation of their uncanny valleys here.

Meanwhile in the US, the Real Doll is proving to be quite popular, as well as the Cyborgasmatrix dolls.

New York-based sexologist Yvonne K. Fulbright acknowledges that sexbots will probably find a niche market, especially with men seeking to fulfill fantasies their flesh-and-blood partners might be refusing. “But there will be a real stigma attached to sex robots. People are still going to feel like losers if that is their last resort,” she said.

I’ve said before that there will be a definite stigma attached to having sex with robots, but that won’t keep certain lonelyhearts from falling in love with their robot-mates. If you want proof, check out the pitiable lives of these Real Doll owners in the documentary Guys and Dolls.

Cyberquins: Moving Mannequins

ADM (UK) LTD offers a wide range of animatronic moving display mannequins. The Cyberquin website states that “The Cyberquin was born out of a concept that movement sells. ADM’s product development of the Cyberquin set out to produce a mannequin that had the following features:-

– the perfect lifelike movement of a slow motion human running, walking or cycling.
– the ability to be dressed and undressed with ease.
– the versatility to be operated simply by plugging into a 230 or 110 volt electrical supply anywhere in the worldwide.
– the capability to be shipped complete, with no need for intricate assembly.
– the durability to withstand every day use.

They attract maximum attention to the clothing they display and the products around them. Wherever they are used people are fascinated by their smooth movement. They have been used by some of the worlds biggest and smallest companies to successfully promote their products.”

Click here to see Cyberquins on the run.
They also offer Custom-Built Cyberquins if you’d like the celebrity of your choice to run around your home or business. Or if you’re targeting a younger demographic, you can also buy Cyberquins Kidz — these mannekids can wave & even skateboard.

My Fake Baby: The Inevitable Spawn of Real Dolls

Adult women in Britain are investing love and thousands of dollars on replicas of babies. These fake baby dolls can burp and cry, and even have heat packs to help them pass for human when they’re taken out in public. Now Lars and the Real Girl can have a family!

The documentary My Fake Baby explores the lives of these really desperate housewives. The entire documentary is available on Youtube, but embedding is disabled so follow this link.

Also, see the artistry involved in making these little sculptures at Lifelike Reborn Artistry Guild.

Exploring the Uncanny Valley and Angelina Jolie Nude

Uncanny Valley: The idea that the more humanlike a robot is in appearance and motion, the more positively a human being will react to it–until a robot reveals itself as creepily not human, at which point humans become repulsed. Basically, the gap between a realistic humanoid & a creepy robot– the ewww factor.

The latest issue of New Scientist investigates the uncanny valley, and it turns out that the ewww factor is visible in brain scans too, after an experiment at University College London by Thierry Chaminade and Ayse Saygin. They scanned the brains of subjects as they were shown videoss of a lifelike robot picking up a cup, as well as the same movement performed by a less realistic robot and a person. The results reveal there is a network of neurons in the parietal cortex that was especially active in the case of the lifelike robot.

This area of the brain is known to contain “mirror neurons”, which are active when someone imagines performing an action they are observing. While watching all three videos, the people imagined picking up the cup themselves. Chaminade says the extra mirror neuron activity when viewing the lifelike robot might be due to the way it moves, which jars with its appearance. This “breach of expectation” could trigger extra brain activity and produce the uncanny feelings.

The uncanny valley response may have evolved as an ability to identify and avoid people suffering from illness or disease. To test that idea, Karl McDorman, who researches human-robot interaction at Indiana University in Indianapolis, recorded the emotions experienced by more than 140 subjects who viewed moving robots of varying likeness to humans. The results show that those which prompt feelings of uncanniness also tend to provoke fear, shock, disgust and nervousness. Since these emotions are typical responses to diseased bodies, MacDorman suggests that the uncanny valley phenomenon may stem from a “fear of one’s own mortality” and an “evolved mechanism for avoiding pathogens”. “The uncanny valley is about a mismatch in human expectations,” he says.

Personally, I get dizzy from the uncanny valley every time I see trailers for the new movie Beowolf. I know that I should like seeing Angelina Jolie nude and expect to like it– but that’s not quite Angelina, is it?

Sex with a robot, sure…but marriage?

AI researcher David Levy is predicting that robots specifically built for sexual intercourse will be available within the next five years– and also says that the right to marry a robot isn’t far away, although the article admits the implications of this would be a “mixed bag” for humanity.

Levy is currently writing a paper on the ethical treatment of robots and says, “the ethical issues on how to treat [robots] are something we’ll have to consider very seriously, and they’re very complicated issues.

The Nymph has been seriously considering these issues for a long time– and no matter how close the technology may be to becoming a reality, public acceptance is still a long way away. At least in this country.

From MSNBC.com via Live Science

Beautiful Japanese Love Dolls

Wired has a collection of pictures from Japan’s first sex show. This love doll is super realistic– but there’s also an artist’s touch to her face that keeps her in the “doll” category & not too corpse-like.

They cost over $5000–and if you like variety, they have interchangeable heads available for $765 each.

http://aidoll.4woods.jp/en/index.html

ITEM!: Now you can own an AI head in a crystal ball for $75,000

At $75,000, I have to admit this guy’s just a little bit out of my price range (I’m the kind of girl that bought I-Cybie instead of Aibo). Neiman Marcus is selling a robotic Swami head that can recognize faces and carry on conversations. The Swami has an impressive character engine that runs off a PC (which I assume you need to hide behind a red curtain to maintain the illusion), and his head has more than 30 robotic micro motors and microcamera eyes. No word on who is responsible for this creation, but I’m assuming it’s a Hanson Robotics special.

via Techdigest.tv

Explore the Creepy Beauty of I-doloid

I don’t speak any Japanese, so I can’t explain. Feel free to interpret it for yourself.

http://www.coremagazine.co.jp/idoloid/index2.html

Real Doll Documentary

If you’ve ever wondered about what life is like for people who are living with Real Dolls, check out this documentary called Guys and Dolls.

Shame and cost aside, I would never have sex with a Real Doll because my imagination just isn’t strong enough to bring that placid plastic face to life–and I also wouldn’t want to have to deal with storage and clean up. That said– I’m glad the people buying these are off the reproductive market.

Robotwins — Zou Ren Ti I & II

The Xi’An Chaoren Scupture Research Institute’s founder Zou Ren Ti has created Zou II, an android copy of himself. The two of them sat together on stage at Wired’s Nextfest last month, and Zou remained still enough on stage that a lot of bystanders weren’t sure which of them was “real.” Only Zou II’s face moved, and it was startling when he’d finally blink and turn his head. The best interaction I saw between the two of them was when Zou cleaned off his robo-doppelganger’s glasses and stored them in his pocket.

The resemblance between Zou I & II was uncanny, but it was a little bit like getting a Gobot when you want a Transformer…I really want to meet Hiroshi Ishiguro’s Geminoid twin. The Geminoid’s physical resemblance to his creator isn’t as strong, but then again Geminoid is also more fully animated and capable of telecommunication– Ishiguro intended for his Geminoid to teach his classes when he didn’t feel like going into the office.

The Creepiest Sex Dolls Around

That award goes hands down to the Cyborgasmatrix Dolls (warning: link not safe for work, anyone under 18 years of age, or if you’re afraid of falling deep into the uncanniest of valleys!). Cyborg + Orgasm = Matrix?!! If you say so pal. These poor girls make the Real Doll seem almost dignified.

This is the “Pandora Innocent” Model.

Sweet Replicants!! They call that her innocent face!?!

These dolls can be ordered with your choice of eye color, hair color, and pubic wig…but you don’t necessarily have to buy the entire torso or even a head. Eeeeh.

And if you’re really looking to save some money, they “have a selection of slighlty (sic) blemished, discounted Torso Fronts available for immediate delivery.” Or you can join a torso test group.

There’s also a cd available of the “high-fidelity 3-D sound” of Pandora Peaks having sex. The kind people at Cyborgasmatrix.com suggest that you listen to it over wireless headphones for “the fullest 3-D effect”.

I could go on & on about how disturbing these dolls are…and I probably will.