Editorial Review

The robot revolution promised through science-fiction has materialized very differently than it was posited. For the better part of a century, literary visionaries have offered far-flung notions of anthropomorphic automatons possessing AI and a distressing degree of sentience. These autonomous bots could not only reason and calculate probability at alarming rates, but they could move about independent of external human controls. Possessing superhuman strength, these machines offer either desolation or salvation, and given the nature of fiction, oft times both.

The bots that most people interact with in the 21st century are answering phone calls or engineering human responses through the interweb. In the home, they might be scooting around, sucking up floor filth or even doing the windows. In the workplace, they have worked the factory floor for decades but now they have rolled into the managerial spaces in the form of telepresence. Telepresence is the robotic way to be in one place while existing biologically in another. As such, Remote Presence Devices represent actual people, not just some programmed entity bent on destruction. Yet most of the telepresence bots representing their bio-masters presently look anything but human. The Anybots QB is a monitor on a rolling extend-a-pole. The impossibly expensive money-saver, iRobot Ava 500, looks quite unlike its motion picture namesake.

And the Orbis Robotics Teleporter looks like an outdoor space heater that has had its heating element replaced with a monitor/camera thing. It rolls around all self-assured on its fairly cheesy casters but evokes no humanity. Like its brother, Orbis Robotics Carl, it resembles something someone put together in their garage, which is not far from the mark. The Teleporter is specified for factory environments with a 20-inch monitor and an ultra-high resolution camera able to pan, tilt and zoom for extremely close views of subjects of interest. With advanced obstacle avoidance utilizing infrared, sonar and 3D cameras, the Teleporter can run things without running into them. 2-way communication is enhanced by amplified speakers and noise cancelling microphones. Joystick controls make the Windows/Mac-compatible Teleporter easy to use, and the battery gives it 6 hours of operation.