waziwazi.com - robotics today

waziwazi Status

dsk — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 16:37:08 -0600

Well, MZK and I were excited about starting waziwazi with the hopes of turning it into a free-for-all online magazine dedicated to robotics. Unfortunately, given our day-time engineering jobs, it became difficult to find the 2-3 hours a day required to write the stories, prepare for events and expand the site.

Wazi means 'open' in Kiswahili. I've been thinking about restarting waziwazi by opening up the site to the robotics community. If you have any ideas or want to get involved, drop me a line via the 'Submit a story!' link above or by email at dskhatri{shift-2}waziwazi{dot}com

i-SOBOT Fight Club (Video)

dsk — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 03:39:48 -0500

Robert Oschler's i-SOBOT has donned some boxing gloves and started a robot Fight Club. :)

Thanks Robert for an entertaining video!

William "Red" Whittaker Gunning for Lunar 2.0

dsk — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 03:31:12 -0500

Click To Play

Robotics powerhouse Carnegie Mellon University, led by William "Red" Whittaker (famous for leading the Red Team in the Grand Challenge), is one of the first to throw down the gauntlet in the race for the $25 million Google Lunar X-Prize. Whittaker (pictured above) will certainly be one of the top contenders having worked on a host of robots as director of the Field Robotics Center. Scarab is one of Whittaker's robots designed specifically for lunar exploration. The robot (video and right-most photo) is also designed with a drilling apparatus for lunar mining. Scarab can raise and lower its chassis; the raised-chassis pose allows it greater mobility in navigating around rocky terrain while and the lowered-chassis pose will allow it to drill into the lunar surface. Nomad is another robot designed to traverse uneven terrain. The winterized version of Nomad has been designed to navigate the Antarctic ice sheets. Watching Nova's behind-the-scenes coverage of the Grand Challenge, one gets the impression that Whittaker is quite the competitive professor and one who can pull together vast resources (funding and an army of students) to achieve his mission. With someone like Whittaker gunning for the Lunar 2.0 prize, the playing field doesn't look as level as it was when the announcement was made, does it?

HeartLander: Carnegie Mellon's Heart Walker

dsk — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 02:11:01 -0500

Click To Play

Engineers from Carnegie Mellon's Robotics Institute have created a tiny medical robot that can crawl across the surface of the heart to deliver therapy in a procedure that is much less invasive than current methods. HeartLander is inserted via two small incisions in the skin and the pericardium (sac that encloses the heart). Once inserted, the 0.8" (2cm) long robot attaches itself onto the heart surface and is then driven around using a joystick, its position tracked on a graphical interface using a tiny embedded tracking sensor called microBIRD. The robot can also navigate to a specified target automatically. The robot is made of two tethered segments with vacuum lines and wires running through the tether. The vacuum lines allow the robot to adhere to the heart surface using suction. The wires are driven using external linear

i-SOBOT Available Now!

dsk — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 16:44:13 -0500

Apparently, Neiman Marcus has the i-SOBOT available NOW for $325 (+ shipping), $25 more than the pre-order price!

If you hadn't seen it, we wrote a comprehensive review of the little robot several days ago.

Aging Japanese Bored with Complicated Robots

dsk — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 02:58:33 -0500

Japan is one of those countries with an unusual population pyramid. The high life expectancy and low birth rate trends have created a situation where there may not be enough of a working class to support the large ageing population. This problem has spurred huge investment in the development of robots like Toyota's Partner Robots to help care for the elderly.

A recent news story by Reuters may require Japanese robot developers to rethink their approach to elderly care. Ifbot, a $4300 robot (above left) developed to provide companionship for elderly Japanese, has instead found himself living a lonely life in Japan's nursing homes. The elderly folks lost interest in the robot after only a month and stopped interacting with it after that. Despite packing some useful sensors like a thermometer and glucometer, Sanyo also canned its medical robot named Hopis (above right) due to its lackluster reception with the Japanese.

Pleo Sighted in Sacramento (Video)

dsk — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 01:35:00 -0500

Pleo made an appearance at SAAG 2007 (Sacramento Area Aibo Gathering). The video by SAAG member Elly shows Pleo in the beginning of the hatchling mode where it is sluggish and slow. We must say it doesn't look very exciting but if the FAQ on Ugobe's website are anything to go by, there should be much more to Pleo than this video shows. We hope Pleo will be able to move around with a more animated, dinosaur-like gait. We also look forward to the release of the Pleo PC Utility and Pleo Developers Kit that will enable customizations and hacks.

Finally, see a photo of the box Pleo will ship in here.

Thanks Robert Oschler!

WowWee Acquired by Optimal Group for $65 million

dsk — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 03:09:51 -0500

WowWee has been acquired by a Canadian comany called Optimal Group. It is a surprising purchase given that Optimal Group's primary business is to provide solutions for online credit and debit transactions. The press release (PDF) says that WowWee's revenues amounted to $117 million in 2006 and $131 million in 2005. Wow! The US made up 65% of WowWee's market.

The good news is that we can expect many more robot products from WowWee. Optimal says it intends to broaden WowWee's product portfolio and increase development of products that "combine computer connectivity, utility and entertainment". Furthermore, it seems that they want to continue working on branded and licensed products such as Elvis Alive and the Barry B. Benson Bee.

Should we call this a new species? Mowgli, the jumping robot!

mzk — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 22:42:40 -0500

Researchers at University of Tokyo have shown us a two-legged jumping robot—Mowgli, a Tarzan character originally came from Rudyard Kipling's short story "In the Rukh".

The Laboratory for Intelligent Systems and Informatics researchers chose a good name to gift their child with amazing abilities to jump. In the video, you will see the robot leap up 50cm in the air and land on an office chair. Mowgli is 1.2m tall and is capable of hopping up and down any platform in its range. Now that bipedals are not much of a challenge anymore (really?), the Japanese researchers are rushing into their next new concept? And yes, Mowgli also knows how to kick a soccer ball. Mowgli will be combined with some other dexterous mechanisms and will be programmed to help humans, to mess in the office for example.

i-SOBOT Hands-On Review

dsk — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 01:47:32 -0500

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Updates:

150,000 i-SOBOTs now destined for the US!
i-SOBOT available NOW at Neiman-Marcus Online
Eneloop batteries will require a pre-charge in this product
We clarified our pros and cons
waziwazi IE bug hopefully fixed (Thanks Bill!)

Introduction:

Bah! I don't wish to read all this. Just give me the pros and cons!

Pros:

Awesome fun
Small: 6.5" height!
17 degrees of freedom
Easy to operate
2 bands/frequencies
Gyro sensor
Neat Robo-One style bipedal design
Smooth human-like motion
Voice command mode
Huge number of possible actions
Hilarious actions
$299

Cons:

Infra-red (line-of-sight) Communication
Not autonomous
Cannot program/control individual servos

Hobby robotics enthusiasts have only recently been able to purchase and tinker with advanced bipedal robots such as Kondo's KHR and Hitec's Robonova. These awesomely cool robots, now a staple of the Robo-One competition, have never been popular with everyday gadget-loving consumers because of their steep cost (~$1000), complicated assembly and difficult programming requirements. A new breed of less expensive, pre-assembled and easy-to-operate robots are catching the eye of the everyday consumer. Robosapien, made by Hong Kong outfit WowWee, was one. The robot, now in its third generation as Robosapien RS, comes with a slew of entertaining features but lacks the human-like motion seen in the $1000 bipedal robots.

Video: i-SOBOT Self Introduction

Click To Play

Enter i-SOBOT, a new $299 bipedal capable of smoother, more human-like actions thanks to the 17 'joints' it is created with. i-SOBOT has been 3 years in the making in the labs of Tomy Takara, a Japanese toy company. It comes with an entertaining array of abilities: the cute little robot can walk, kick, punch, somersault, utter some 200 words and even act out