Alas, Poor Hitchbot: "Bad Things Happen to Good Robots."

[PatrickJS]

Alas, Poor Hitchbot: "Bad Things Happen to Good Robots."

Hitchbot, which was designed to test whether robots could trust humans, met an abrupt end to its journey across the continental United States after just two weeks thanks to vandals.

In July of 2014, a noodle-armed, bucket-headed bot named Hitchbot began its journey across Canada. Its goal: to get from Halifax, Nova Scotia, to Victoria, British Columbia - a journey of over 10,000 kilometres, or about 6300 miles. A difficult journey for an immobile hunk of machinery, to be sure, but the robot (and its Canadian creator [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/141854-The-Slinky-Escalator-Is-Humanitys-Greatest-Achievement]) was determined. It was going to hitch.

Its cross-Canada trek was a success; it did the same in Germany some time later. Two weeks ago, it announced the beginning of an American journey that was due to end in San Francisco - unfortunately, Hitchbot has fallen a little short.

"Oh dear, my body was damaged, but I live on with all my friends." [https://twitter.com/hitchBOT/] Hitchbot announced on Twitter, after his remains were discovered outside of Philadelphia, likely destroyed by vandals. "Sometimes bad things happen to good robots!"

Indeed, they do. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/141106-DARPA-Robotics-Challenge-Finalists-Keep-Falling-Over]

Ironically, one of the aims of the Hitchbot creators was to see whether a robot could "trust" in the help of humans.

Click here for less sad robot news. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/tag/view/robots]

Still - the little bot made it quite a long way before disaster struck. Over the past year, plenty of people have given rides to the adorable droid. Selfies were uploaded with hashtags like, #hitchBOTintheUSA.

Hitchbot communicated with its drivers through Cleverscript speech technology, a program that has attempted to beat the Turing test in the past, as well as "San Francisco or Bust" scrawled on its arms. It loved answering and asking trivia quizzes. It probably wold have loved this hotel. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/141680-Robot-velociraptor-concierge-welcomes-you-to-the-best-hotel-ever-in-southern-Japan]

Its last tweet reads, "my trip must come to an end now, but my love for humans will never fade." Apparently its previous message, "VENGEANCE AND DEATH TO HUMANS #ROBORALLY" was deleted by moderators.

Source: m.Hitchbot.me [http://arstechnica.com/the-multiverse/2015/08/robot-depending-on-kindness-of-strangers-meets-its-demise-in-philadelphia/]

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[esserin]

Damn you, vandals! You destroyed something beautiful!
And, for what? Shits and giggles? Bah!

I wonder if hitch of has a younger brother.
Guess it depends on how expensive building him was.

A cautionary tale of the dangers of hitchhiking

 

[Lil_Rimmy]

Man, I feel so sad this happened. Did hitchBOT have a camera or something on him to record his trip or whatever? I'd say it'd be real cool to see that, and also point out the terrible flesh-bags that destroyed hitch.
But I'd love to see this happen again along a different route. Bring the bloody thing down to 'straya, would ya?

R.I.P hitchBOT

 

[PatrickJS]

Man, I feel so sad this happened. Did hitchBOT have a camera or something on him to record his trip or whatever? I'd say it'd be real cool to see that, and also point out the terrible flesh-bags that destroyed hitch.
But I'd love to see this happen again along a different route. Bring the bloody thing down to 'straya, would ya?

R.I.P hitchBOT

From what I could tell, it was left up to the people travelling with HitchBot to take photos with it. It's got quite the Instagram, though, which you can find on their site

 

[American Fox]

I SWEAR IT WASN'T ME

le sad

It was obvious this would have happened here.

 

[The Ditz]

And this is why, when the robopacolypse comes, I'm rooting for teamrobo... and not because I hope to gain their favor so that I maintain freedom of thought and ability within the matrix. (even though that would be very nice of them *hint* *hint*)

Philadelphia is going on my "never travel to" list, right next to Florida and Iran.

 

[Kenjitsuka]

It also did more countries, like NL...

 

[Chessrook44]

Damn you, vandals! You destroyed something beautiful!
And, for what? Shits and giggles? Bah!

Actually, considering the thing was made of computer parts, I imagine more likely it was salvaged for parts to sell for money or something.

 

[TallanKhan]

Pay attention America, this is why you can't have nice things.

The USA, the country that elected Bush twice, and killed HitchBot.

Hitchbot was awesome, I thought it was so inspiring that he made two trips and no one did anything like this to him, really made me think that maybe people could be decent if given the chance.

 

[Groxnax]

Dang it, that's horrible news.

I thought that little guy was cool.

Well, when the eventual robot uprising happens I hope the ones who did it get taken out in the first salvo.

R.I.P. little guy.

 

[Cryselle]

From what I understand, while the head was taken and some of the other parts destroyed, the actual primary computer parts in the torso were intact and recoverable.

The creators of it have also stated that trying to identify and catch the people responsible is NOT a priority.

Lets be honest, this robot being destroyed was always part of the whole experiment. They knew it was a high possibility when they started, and it happening (and if they can figure out why) is as interesting to the team as it not happening.

 

[Barbas]

Killed in the vicinity of Philly?

BRIAN T. DELANEY, YOU GET AWAY FROM THAT GODDAMNED WORKBENCH AND REASSEMBLE THAT ROBOT RIGHT NOW!

 

[Thunderous Cacophony]

By the way, if you ever wanted to burst the bubble of Canadian politeness, go look at the comments on the CBC article about HitchBot's destruction; more invective thrown at America there than from ISIS that day.

 

[Radoh]

Of course he was slain in Philly.
The Gang destroys something beautiful.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

Maybe, as its America, they should give it a gun so it can protect itself next time.

 

[happyninja42]

The robot lasted a full year, and safely traversed several countries. I think that's a pretty good first test on the acceptability of robots by humans.

 

[Mortuorum]

And this is why, when the robopacolypse comes, I'm rooting for teamrobo... and not because I hope to gain their favor so that I maintain freedom of thought and ability within the matrix.

And during the inevitable robot uprising, nobody should be surprised when Philadelphia (aka priority target Alpha-1) is cleansed in fire.

Probably be an improvement.

 

[RJ 17]

*sigh*
Figures it would get killed in America...why am I not surprised in the least?

 

[flashoverride]

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