Robot hitchhiker sheds light on human-tech interaction

HitchBOT is off on a journey across Canada — from Halifax, Nova Scotia to an art gallery in Victoria, British Columbia, to be exact, according to a report on CBC News.

 

 

The brainchild of university professors David Smith (McMaster University) and Frauke Zeller (Ryerson University), hitchBOT began its journey on July 27. It plans to cover the distance from Point A to Point B—which in this case covers about 4,500km—through the good hearts of the people it is going to interact with.

 

As of August 6, the little bot has reached Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario.

Tweets by @hitchBOT

 

"HitchBOT is more of a collaborative art project and social experiment than a marvel of modern technology," the CBC News report said.

 

"The little traveller is about the size of a six-year-old child that was made using pool noodles, an old bucket, Wellington boots, rubber gloves, solar panels and a computerized "brain," it added.

 

However, hitchBOT can still somehow communicate with humans, a skill which it is "still practicing". http://www.hitchbot.me/help/

 

The bot said in its website: "Please be patient — speaking human is rather difficult for me, and I only recently learned it. So when it’s quite noisy around me, or too many people talking to me, my brain hurts and I have to shut up for a while to find my inner peace again."

 

"These dialogue models, like [Apple’s] Siri, they listen for key words and try to develop appropriate responses," Smith told CBC News.

 

HitchBOT signals car drivers by waving its pool noodle arm — the only part of its body it can move, the CBC report said. And like any other robot, it can run out of power. Humans would have to plug him in their cars' cigarette lighters or any power plug in their homes during stop overs. 

 

It also instagrams and tweets. Its GPS and 3G wireless connectivity allows it to post updates on its position, the CBC report said.

 

Smith recognizes the risk it would take sending a robot across Canada on its own, "It kind of depends upon empathy and social collaboration. That’s one of the risks we’re willing to take," he told The Star. 

 

"As we move into a world where we are going to be interacting with robots on a regular basis and we’re going to find ourselves in areas of our social life, assisting our [aging] parents, for instance. These robots, in their design, they need to be respectful of social customs, of cultural attitudes etcetera.," Smith told CBC News. — Kim Luces/TJD, GMA News