Socibot Robot Can Wear Your Friends' Faces

MarlaDesat

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Aug 22, 2013
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Socibot Robot Can Wear Your Friends' Faces


It can gauge your mood, guess your age, and give you nightmares.

Don't say we didn't warn you. This robot head treads dangerously in uncanny valley territory [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/criticalintel/10367-Realistic-Graphics-Are-Broken], and I'm expecting nightmares for weeks.

The Socibot-Mini, just shy of 2 feet tall, is a robot built by Will Jackson and his colleague at Loebner prize winner Rosette [http://www.robothespian.co.uk/'], allows the Socibot to hold simple conversations.

The robot can be used to add a face to colleagues on teleconference calls or to employees who telework. "It's as spooky as all hell," says Jackson. "We've tried it with a couple of our telecommuting colleagues in meetings and when it suddenly turns and joins in the conversation as our colleague Dan, and with his face, it is quite amazing. But you get used to it quickly." An upcoming Kickstarter campaign will slim down the Socibot-Mini for home use. "It'll become a butler who knows you inside out," says Jackson.

The robot was on display at the Human-Robot Interaction conference in Germany held in March. A similar robot, Furhat, was also on display. Samer Al Moubayed developed Furhat at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden. Furhat uses a 3D-printed face, based on an infrared scan of a person's face. The 3D-printed face can be swapped out for the appropriate face before a teleconference. 2014 Interspeech conference [http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn25307-robot-can-wear-your-friends-face-and-guess-your-mood.html#.Uz2HdvmICm4].


Source: Geekologie [http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn25307-robot-can-wear-your-friends-face-and-guess-your-mood.html#.Uz2HdvmICm4]


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Headsprouter

Monster Befriender
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Nov 19, 2010
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Ooooh. The instant face change reminds me of the Securitrons. That's a scary thought. Imagine a classy butler-face for the coat-taking role and a stern, intimidating face for the bouncer role. In that case, likely a more robotic one.
 

Genocidicles

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Sep 13, 2012
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That the badly drawn skeleton face is the least scary face on display, just says it all really.
 

Scorpid

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Jul 24, 2011
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BURN IT WITH FIRE! That is the creepiest thing I've seen outside horror movies!
 

RealRT

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Feb 28, 2014
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Man, this thing is so fucking creepy. It's creepy as in "Honey, bring the kerosene, I think our child is possessed by Satan".
 

EHKOS

Madness to my Methods
Feb 28, 2010
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Now I can have my own Lucy Liu!

Seriously though that thing is creepy. The only interesting thing of any value is the software that allows it to hold conversations.
 

Micalas

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Mar 5, 2011
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"It can wear your friend's faces."

Yeah, when it malfunctions and turns into a killbot it will.
 

RicoADF

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Jun 2, 2009
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The first one was quite cool actually, basically a holographic image using glass to project onto. Not sure how useful it is though other than to use as either a phone replacement or an advisor/receptionist.
 

uchytjes

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Mar 19, 2011
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RicoADF said:
The first one was quite cool actually, basically a holographic image using glass to project onto. Not sure how useful it is though other than to use as either a phone replacement or an advisor/receptionist.
Now THAT would be a hell of an interesting trip to the office.
 

RicoADF

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Jun 2, 2009
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uchytjes said:
Now THAT would be a hell of an interesting trip to the office.
Hopefully there'd be no more trips to the office, working from home (atleast here) is becoming a thing, if it takes off then there'd be no need for some silly 30 story building wasting space and resources when you can work from home, saves time and traffic and public transport congestion. I'd like to think it'd improve performance too however that would depend on the individual I suppose, some people are better at remote working than others.
 

NotThePANTSU

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Apr 4, 2014
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MarlaDesat said:
"It'll become a butler who knows you inside out," says Jackson.
Sounds like a Horror reimagining of Bicentennial Man that takes a lot of inspiration from iRobot