CHRONICLING THE ROBOT INDUSTRY
SINCE 2011 © ROBOT RABBI
The shock ripped through the industry, on almost every social media platform techies were bemoaning the loss of Anki. As a former robo-toy maker, I read the epitaph months earlier in the title of Lara Sorokanich’s Medium post, “Anki’s AI Robot Is a Delightful (and Expensive) Desk Toy.” When asked … Read More
My throat is sore from touting New York’s tech prowess, which I realize has been for naught. Almost as quickly as the balloons from the Mayor’s celebration lost their air did Amazon announce it was leaving the Big Apple. The blow to our local venture community is like a sucker … Read More
Walking into XPONENTIAL 2018, I was dumbfounded by the keynote speech by Professor Zeynep Tufekci of the University of North Carolina. To paraphrase, ‘In the future, we will no longer need two pilots, planes will have just one captain and a dog. The dog will be there to bite the … Read More
“You Hacked, ALL Data Encrypted” blazed every screen last Friday night at San Francisco’s Muni Rail System. The cyber criminals held the city at ransom for over 48 hours, demanding 100 Bitcoins to turn back on the train’s automated ticketing system. Rather than paying, Muni responded with free rides all weekend long … Read More
Election 2016, or as it is better known, “humans are dangerous” it is time to elect a robot is approaching! While we are at least a century away from handing over the White House to a humanoid, our car keys are ready to go. Last spring, Wanis Kabbaj, a transportation thought leader … Read More
This past Monday, I accompanied my 18-year-old daughter to her road test. While there, I began reflecting on the amount of emphasis we put on developing good judgement. It struck me that, as we transition into an autonomous driving future, we need to question what we are doing to prepare our machines, and ourselves, … Read More
One of my favorite TV shows as a kid was Get Smart. Who can forget The Cone of Silence, the Shoe Phone, and, of course, Agent 99. Max, Agent 86, was funniest when he failed, using the same excuse: When thinking about autonomy, missing the target by even “that much” is not good enough, especially when people’s … Read More
Earlier this week I went to the Mets playoff game at Citified. Driving home at 12:30 am, I was exhausted, which led me to accidentally turn the wrong way on Amsterdam Avenue. Clearly, my car (via GPS) knew that I had made a mistake, but why wasn’t there some early warning signal like … Read More
