Designer Alexia Léchot of Ecole cantonale d’art de Lausanne (ECAL) presents Deltu, a strange and useless little robot that wants to play with you.
First of all, I love the completely non-humanoid body for this robot. It’s not human, so why should it try to look human? And it is flat out fascinating to watch how it operates, elegant and simple.
But…even if he (this appears to be the preferred pronoun) doesn’t look human, he exhibits a very definite personality and intelligence, apparently desiring attention from humans, and wanting to best us at his games. so cool!
I admit that I was astonished by the way the robot can manipulate the touch screens. Apparently his artificial finger is close enough to human to work. I wonder how that is made.
It is also kind of cool that the robot takes selfies—very useful for documenting the project. (He can probably make phone calls and purchases, too. And boast of his victories on Twitter. Why not?) I guess this would be “humanoid” but not “intelligent” behavior, no?
What a lovely project! Very nice work. I look for great things in the future from Sensei Léchot.
By the way, I rule that this robot definitely is not an inappropriate use of a touchscreen!
Robot Wednesday
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