May 22, 2009

IRML Develops Robot on Facebook

The United Arab Emirates University has been working on a project that involves Sarah, a mobile wheel-based robot with stereo cam, who has her own Facebook page. While FaceBots is only being used for testing at this point, the IRML (Interactive Robots and Media Lab) plan to open it up to the public next January. From what we understand, Sarah meets someone, researches personal information and uses it as a starting point of interaction. Those interactions become the events on the robot's page and future communication will use memories from past encounters. The project hopes that its circle of friends will include other robots. Sarah, meet Wakamaru NYT.

(Thanks, Nicholas)

Via IRML