Tweenbots

April 10, 2009 11:51 AM

"Tweenbots are robots that navigate the city by the help of the people they meet."

A little motorized cardboard robot, equipped with a flag saying, "I'm lost, help me find my way to Waverly and University", is set loose several blocks away at the other end of Washington Square Park. Does the robot make it to the other side? Is it mugged or robotnapped? Does the department of Homeland Security blow it up?

The work of Kacie Kinzer.

posted by dirtdirt (41 comments total)

Do they recognize Miley Cyrus as their lord and master?
posted by tommasz at 11:53 AM on April 10, 2009 [4 favorites]

This is pretty neat, but those things are no more robots than these were.
posted by dersins at 12:00 PM on April 10, 2009

Oh god, oh please don't model the robots after small children, oh god no.
posted by The Whelk at 12:02 PM on April 10, 2009

I wonder how much help it would get if it didn't have a friendly smile on its face?
posted by cimbrog at 12:08 PM on April 10, 2009 [2 favorites]

Beanbots are robots that navigate the a plate of beans by the help of the people they meet. The project came about by an interest and an idea: the interest was in the way that we move through a plate of beans -- what do we think about, how do we create circular arguments and meaning based on our impressions and encounters as we go from one Mefi Post to another? And, the idea was that I could facilitate narrative related to this complexity by creating a bean-eating robot that traverses Mefi along with us.

Eating at a constant speed, from a plate, beanbots have a FPP displayed on the BLUE, and are at the mercy of Mefites they encounter to read this FPP and to aim them in the right direction to reach their goal. The journey the bots take each time they are released in the Internets becomes a story of people's willingness to engage with a strange-- and some would say potentially suspicious-- character.

As each encounter with a helpful Mefite takes the robot one step closer to attaining it's destination, the significance of our random discoveries and individual actions accumulates into a story about a vast space made small by an even smaller robot.
posted by Muddler at 12:13 PM on April 10, 2009 [1 favorite]

After seeing how the Boston has responded to bomb threats, lightbrite Aquateen Hunger Force symbols, anthrax scares, threatening letters delivered to banks, and so forth, its a good thing they didn't do this here... we'd have closed down half the city in an effort to keep the public safe.
posted by Nanukthedog at 12:14 PM on April 10, 2009 [2 favorites]

i find myself charmed by this hapless little non-creature. if i found one, i might just carry it all the way to where it wants to go.
posted by millipede at 12:15 PM on April 10, 2009 [17 favorites]

It appears to be Kacie, rather than Katie, too. Just sayin'.
posted by Brockles at 12:38 PM on April 10, 2009

I was just thinking the same thing, millipede. I suppose I have less of a border between living and non living when it comes to feeling compassion for them - a hazard of growing up with electronic toys probably. Some of the other work on those pages is quite nice too. I like the "there chair" idea.
posted by strixus at 12:42 PM on April 10, 2009

Based only on the first line of text, I was worried this was some strange TV show about promiscuous and/or naive pre-teens dropped into big cities and left to their own devices to get somewhere.

While I wanted to say that this wasn't a robot but a cute experiment based around a small motorized, wheeled vehicle, the wiki page on robots presents an interesting arguement that this could be considered a robot:

There is no consensus on which machines qualify as robots, but there is general agreement among experts and the public that robots tend to do some or all of the following: move around, operate a mechanical limb, sense and manipulate their environment, and exhibit intelligent behavior, especially behavior which mimics humans or other animals.

Does a cardboard box with a smiley face and powered wheels do enough to be a robot? Would sensor-based responses make it more of a robot? Or has the notion or robot changed from anything robotic to a pseudo/semi-intelligent metal creation in humanoid form?

I wonder how much help it would get if it didn't have a friendly smile on its face?

I'd like to try an experiment and see which "robot" gets to the other side first. The design range would include plush toys, cute robots, angry looking robots, and nondescript boxes.

i find myself charmed by this hapless little non-creature. if i found one, i might just carry it all the way to where it wants to go.

I was thinking of that, too. I wish there were more videos, or some indication if this is would be a series of runs. At some point, people might know about these ahead of time, and that would alter the interest and fun of the thing.
posted by filthy light thief at 12:42 PM on April 10, 2009 [2 favorites]

the wiki page on robots presents an interesting arguement that this could be considered a robot:

Except that there's no sense of agency. It's just a go-forward machine. If I put a brick on my gas pedal and get out of my car does that make it a robot?
posted by dersins at 12:47 PM on April 10, 2009

That's my question, too. I cited that line because there's no set definition of robot, just a gray swath between vehicle (or machine) and robot.
posted by filthy light thief at 1:05 PM on April 10, 2009

I would so totally help that robot.

What really strikes me, though, is that this wouldn't have been possible in 2002-vintage NYC. But a park ranger -- an armed park ranger -- even bent down to help.

It's good to see that we've unclenched a little.
posted by mudpuppie at 1:09 PM on April 10, 2009 [1 favorite]

I don't see the grey swathe as much as you do:

There is no consensus on which machines qualify as robots, but there is general agreement among experts and the public that robots tend to do some or all of the following: move around, operate a mechanical limb, sense and manipulate their environment, and exhibit intelligent behavior, especially behavior which mimics humans or other animals.

This only does one of the things that makes a robot a robot, although a mechanism doesn't need to do all of the things, it seems clear enough to me that just doing one isn't enough, as the phrase 'some or all' is fundamental to my interpretation of it.
posted by Brockles at 1:16 PM on April 10, 2009

The greatest minds in robotics continue to debate "what is a robot." One of the guys who started iRobot loves telling everyone how "Really, if you think about it, a vending machine is a robot." One of the other cofounders disagrees. I'm going to a robotics conference next week where they specifically exclude manufacturing and industrial automation because those aren't real robots (instead, they include consumer, medical, military, academic, etc in their "robots" category).

The point is, there is much debate. This "robot" is a "robot" for some definitions of "robot". But it is still an awesome project.
posted by olinerd at 1:25 PM on April 10, 2009

The first thing I thought of, too, was the Boston Aqua Teen Hunger Force LED scare. And then when I saw the park ranger walk up, I thought the gig was up; I totally expected her to pull out her walky-talky and make a perimiter. But I actually LOL'd when she bent over and gingerly pushed him on his marry way.
posted by nitsuj at 1:30 PM on April 10, 2009

More specifically, it is still an awesome project because the point was not to create a robot; it was to study how people react to an unknown situation (of which a "robot" was one element). So I'm okay with calling it whatever the researcher feels is appropriate -- to the people interacting with it who didn't know any better, it was indeed a robot.
posted by olinerd at 1:34 PM on April 10, 2009 [1 favorite]

More play is good.
posted by hellboundforcheddar at 1:57 PM on April 10, 2009

Yah, to most people, face + movement - blood and guts = robot.

I love this. I smiled a lot.
posted by nosila at 1:59 PM on April 10, 2009 [1 favorite]

Metafilter: the power of a simple technological object to create a complex network powered by human intelligence and asynchronous interactions.
posted by specialagentwebb at 2:15 PM on April 10, 2009

They have square heads with faces and they move. Of course they're robots.
posted by longsleeves at 2:43 PM on April 10, 2009 [5 favorites]

It probably doesn't hurt that the robot has a relatively large head for its body, giving it an aspect of human childlikeness that many people will respond to instinctively.
posted by localroger at 2:44 PM on April 10, 2009

Very nice, and it put a smile on my face, so thanks for posting it.
posted by languagehat at 2:54 PM on April 10, 2009

I enjoyed this a lot too. Such an interesting look at how people interact with their environment. I wish there had been audio too, though. I would have loved to hear some of the discussions about it from people walking by.
posted by gemmy at 3:06 PM on April 10, 2009

If I encountered a tweenbot I would have no choice to to fall back on my training and kill it with fire. Not as you might think, because I expect robots to eventually take over the world, but because it's the only appropriate way to react when confronted with a "tween" anything.

Those little tween fuckers do plan on taking over the world and to do so, they are going to have to pry it from my cold dead hands.
posted by quin at 3:10 PM on April 10, 2009

What I found fascinating was that, at least in the instances captured on the video, everyone wanted to give the robot as little help as possible. Some of them were moving it a tiny bit, seeing that it was still stuck, nudging it a little bit more, and only moving it fully past the obstacle when it was clear that it just wasn't going to make it without help.

I speculate that I would do the same thing, and I'm not sure why. One reason, I think, is a conflict between the desire not to get involved (or to be seen getting involved) and the desire to help. I think the stronger reason, though, is just that I'd want to see the little guy make it on his own.
posted by darksasami at 3:13 PM on April 10, 2009 [3 favorites]

Those little tween fuckers do plan on taking over the world and to do so, they are going to have to pry it from my cold dead hands.

What if it had a flag that said "I'm lost, help me find my way to taking over the world by prying it from your cold dead hands"?
posted by davejay at 3:29 PM on April 10, 2009 [3 favorites]

The thing obviously IS a robot. The key is that its computer brain isn't stored on-board, but instead atop the shoulders of everyone who helped it on its way.
posted by JHarris at 4:10 PM on April 10, 2009 [7 favorites]

Kill it with FIRE. Kill it before it becomes a teen!
posted by WalterMitty at 4:10 PM on April 10, 2009

i find myself charmed by this hapless little non-creature. if i found one, i might just carry it all the way to where it wants to go.

Robots needs self-actualization, too.
posted by stavrogin at 4:17 PM on April 10, 2009 [1 favorite]

quin, is that why you have a restraining order for any and all middle schools? They're just kids, they'll grow out of their tween years. You should stop trying to baptize them all in fire.
posted by filthy light thief at 5:01 PM on April 10, 2009

Cute! I live a block from Washington Square, wish I'd seen one of these... The map doesn't show however that the middle of the Square is all fenced off as they move the fountain, so the robot's path is really the only one you can take through the Square at the moment...
posted by nicwolff at 5:45 PM on April 10, 2009

Awesome, but only for now. Once this gets highjacked by social networking viral marketeers, I'll just kick any cute robots right in their smiling faces.
posted by DU at 5:58 PM on April 10, 2009 [1 favorite]

I think JHarris has it right. This is a robot that exists partly in the social space of the real world. Sure, that's unusual, and you could even argue that by this definition, so it a postcard -- but ultimately the point isn't to demonstrate robotness but socialness.
posted by dhartung at 10:06 PM on April 10, 2009

Except that there's no sense of agency. It's just a go-forward machine. If I put a brick on my gas pedal and get out of my car does that make it a robot?

Only if you paint a cute face on it.
posted by polymath at 12:42 AM on April 11, 2009

This has reaffirmed my faith in humanity more than anything I've encountered in recent memory. I don't know how to feel about that.
posted by chrismear at 4:28 AM on April 11, 2009 [3 favorites]

I'm curious how the robot would have fared in a different part of NYC. Washington Square Park is near New York University, and in both the video and the pictures the majority of passersby look like students. So it's possible that many people, including the park ranger, regarded the robot as yet another NYU student project and chose to help it, or at the least, to not destroy or vandalize it.

But this is a fascinating project - there's an amazing number of theoretical implications from what appears, on the surface, to be a simple study with only a crude robot. Crowdsourcing, social navigation in a physical realm, interaction with technology, as well as how people react to a small, non-threatening object with some anthropomorphic qualities, such as the smile, that appears to push our buttons regarding how we respond to small children.
posted by needled at 7:37 AM on April 11, 2009 [1 favorite]

I'm curious how the robot would have faired in a different part of the USA. It'd make an interesting social experiment. Would it be well-received in Salt Lake City? New Orleans? Detroit? If it were dropped in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, dressed in a business suit, would it be treated differently than when it's dropped there wearing studs and leather?
posted by five fresh fish at 9:06 AM on April 11, 2009

This reminds me of a story I heard about one of the major yearly robotics competitions funded by the Department of Defense. Apparently one of the challenges was to build a robot that could navigate from the hotel to the convention center by itself. Most teams installed local maps, GPS, and so on. Carnegie Mellon made theirs cute, and programmed it to ask people for directions. And CMU's robot got there first.
posted by rifflesby at 8:44 PM on April 11, 2009 [1 favorite]

Hi!

:)

I'm trying to find John Connor.

:)

Can you lead me to John Connor?

:)
posted by dirigibleman at 10:23 PM on April 11, 2009 [4 favorites]

Terminator jokes aside, that raises an interesting idea (though one that would probably work better somewhere smaller, like maybe a small or medium-sized college campus), which would be to use this approach to find a person.
posted by !Jim at 11:49 PM on April 11, 2009