No, it’s not about cybernetic Hannah Montana fans:
It’s part of a project by Kacie Kinzer about social interaction and cooperation and helpfulness and what altruism we upright simians might extend to tiny adorable slightly anthropomorphic cardboard robots. I damn near cried reading about the project at Tweenbots.
(Thanks to my semicousin Gail for pointing this out to me.)
i don’t know by what glitch, mishap or techno-miracle i was able to view this at work today, but it gave me a real lift! like you, when reading the project webpage, i felt a tear come to my eye. hopefully, when the aliens finally arrive they’ll find the same sort of sympthetic encounters. as long as they look cute, friendly and helpless, i guess. heaven help them if they’re slimey, or ugly.
I’m sure this is WAY before your time, MaryAnn, but there used to be little plastic containers, red with eyes painted on them, call Oobi. There was a slot in them, and you’d slip a note into Oobi, then write the receiver’s address on the outside. No fair dropping these in the mailbox; the intent was to put Oobi somewhere public and have folks move it toward its destination.
I have an Oobi around somewhere; it was too cute to send off into almost-certain oblivion.
Of course, there’s more information on the Internet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oobi_(toy)
Awww…gotta love the little one with the note: “Call my Family”. Too cute. :)
There might be hope for our species…
It’s interesting how cute she made them — especially the newer versions (http://tweenbots.com/newBots.html). Proportionally large heads, wide-set eyes — those are baby features we’re instinctively driven to go “awwww” and care for. I wonder if the results would be different if they were less cute/helpless looking.
Not to take away from the sweetness — it’s very sweet!
I think the artist/experimenter’s next step should be to send an ugly robot out on its own, and see how many people help it. Not as many, I bet.
Yes — I’ve been trying to think of what an ugly robot would look like, for purposes of this hypothetical experiment. Is the opposite of “cute robot” a mean-looking robot or a non-humanoid robot?