
Honda’s Dancing Humanoid Robot - luu
http://www.wired.com/2014/04/honda-asimo/
======
yukichan
Hacker News is turning out to be the RSS feed for Wired's stupid articles and
their link bait titles. I've even seen mods change the titles they're so
"Upworthy" like. There hasn't been a day there haven't been one or two Wired
articles on the front page and I think if they're not gaming it, something I
wouldn't put past someone writing obnoxious titles like this, well then maybe
we just need a weight against these "Astounding!" Wired articles.

Please just go to [http://www.wired.com/](http://www.wired.com/) and see one
gross and manipulative title after another:

"The Coolest Spaceships Ever Built, Compared by Size" Well I'll only read it
if they're the coolest EVER!

"Americans Aren't Ready for the Future Google and Amazon Want to Build" I'm
sure they used a scientific poll.

"Why the Console Wars Won't Be Anything Like You Expect" Right, you knew just
what I was expecting.

"The Craziest, Coolest Mustangs That Never Were" So crazy, so cool, who would
have known?

"Free iPhone 5s Deal Proves Apple Isn't So Special" See there you go, proof
Apple isn't special.

Seriously, Wired is shit content. It's a cesspool. Yet every day it's on the
HN home page. One obnoxious article after another. Usually HN is a bellwether
for what will end up on techmeme or the general tech press the next day, but
you think you're going to see these shit articles from Wired on techmeme or
the tech page of the New York Times? How often is tptacek leaving amazing
comments on these stupid Wired posts. Like never.

~~~
dang
Yes, this was a stupid title (I just edited it), and yes, a lot of Wired posts
are fluff and inappropriate for HN. We sometimes penalize sites (without
banning them) when they're responsible for too much fluff. But doing so
increases the risk of missing any substantial articles.

The last three from wired.com that got significant attention on HN were:

    
    
      https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7590644
      https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7610452
      https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7599422
    

Not the most substantial ever, but not bad.

If anyone wants to throw out some things we might try to address this
problem—specifically, the problem of tech press websites that put out
substantive pieces but also a stream of dreck—we're interested in addressing
this. It's a significant impediment to the quality of HN.

~~~
yukichan
That's a tough problem. Outside of human moderation I don't have any idea. I'm
glad you're aware of the problem though and are working on it. You guys work
hard and we pay you nothing!

~~~
dang
Thanks. I may write some code to show moderators a view like /newest but only
from sites marked lightweight. Then we can rescue any solid articles from the
penalty. If we can save most of the solid articles, it would free us to mark
more borderline sites as lightweight. An experiment worth trying, anyway.

------
nebulus
It was such a strange mistake for Toyota to abandon their little QRIO robots.
Even at their small size, they always seemed to be head and shoulders above
ASIMO, and frankly, they still do:
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGtxPmcsXfg](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGtxPmcsXfg)

(This is an old video. They cancelled their robotics line in 2006.)

~~~
tluyben2
They were Sony robots weren't they?

~~~
nebulus
Oops! You're most definitely right about that. Toyota is still making robots.
Sony isn't.

------
increment_i
Whenever I watch advanced robotics stuff, particularly humanoid stuff, I'm
always struck by feelings that are equal parts awe and mild anxiety.

~~~
eksith
This is normal. If you think about it, at no point in the history of our
species has another bipedal, humanoid creature shared our space (excluding
perhaps early humans and Neanderthals). We're used to seeing that we're the
only things that look like us.

------
Theodores
Honda should think about using some 'deploy then code' philosophy with ASIMO.
I know ASIMO works hard in theme parks and in the lab, however, ASIMO really
needs to be in a movie to reach a large appreciative audience. The things
ASIMO can't quite do now could be CGI'd in or there could be some (stunted)
stunt doubles dressed in a suit.

From what I understand the target audience is elderly care. I have done a fair
bit of this myself on a neighbourly basis and I have witnessed how
professional care workers can work - they can fill in lots of forms and
somehow avoid any actual care. Imagine how dystopian things could get if
elderly people had ASIMO and instead of care workers visiting them they just
had an engineer to care for the ASIMO. Then imagine the Alzheimer's disease
kicking in. ASIMO could be sent off doing the same thing three thousand times
a day, with a feedback loop formed, making matters worse.

Clearly the distant relatives would interface with ASIMO rather than their
grandma/grandpa. The senile yet devious grandma/pa would do things to outwit
ASIMO like regurgitate their pills or eat the bag of sugar instead of their
microwave meal. So situations could develop without relatives knowing what was
going on. Obviously at things like family weddings the elderly person would
not actually go, instead ASIMO would do the duties including standing in the
pictures, front-row due to height reasons. You would also have the problem
that we have with cars - most houses have lots of them. So some people could
end up with more ASIMO than occupants.

So, I look forward to 'ASIMO the movie', where the basic premise is basic care
work - as intentioned - and how it works out in practice, ideas fully worked
through on the assumption that the code can be written, e.g. to do things like
change bandages. Using this 'deploy then code' we could determine if this
'looking after old folk' scenario is realistic.

~~~
tempeaster
This movie already exists, and its great - I've watched it twice. The robot in
the movie even looks like the Honda robot.

Movie: Robot & Frank
[http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/robot_and_frank/](http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/robot_and_frank/)

~~~
mwg986
Was thinking the exact same thing and expecting this movie to show up in the
comments. I really liked the movie from a couple different perspectives.

------
soup10
No applause haha, tough crowd! I've certainly seen worse dancing. Very
impressive demo.

~~~
codeonfire
This is the same stuff from 2011 so they've probably seen the drink pouring,
hopping on one foot.

------
chmike
The critical factor is the speed and precision of the actuators. And the
energy of course. If we could increase the speed the robots could behave much
more naturally and do much more.

------
bananas
Past the Wired junk, there is some good dexterity progress here. They'll get
there one day with the amount of dedication that has gone into the project.
I'd kill to work on a project like that.

However I wish they'd put some work into getting rid of the gait that looks
(as a human) as if ASIMO has pooped itself.

------
blueintegral
The thing about the ASIMO project is that they do a bunch of research and then
publish nothing.

~~~
bananas
It's a technology demonstrator for a proprietary internal research project.
They don't have to publish anything if they're going to use it themselves.

------
Someone
Very nice demo, but still very far from a useful aid.

\- it cannot, I guess, screw on that lid (if it could, they would have demoed
it)

\- does it work on slightly uneven flooring?

\- battery live? Anybody's guess, but older ones
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASIMO#Specifications](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASIMO#Specifications))
managed an hour or so. This one will not likely not beat two hours.

Also, it still stands and walks like an ape, with bent knees, I guess because
the software that keeps the robot upright always needs to be able to bend the
knees both ways.

~~~
51Cards
Regarding some of what you mentioned:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zul8ACjZI18](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zul8ACjZI18)

~~~
Someone
Thanks! That's a far better way of showing what it can and cannot do. Looks
less scripted, and more as a scientific demo. For example, it does not appear
to be able to pick up and put down that tray as smoothly as the bottle (did
they spend ages to get him pick up and put down that bottle, or are we talking
different hardware/software?)

What would top it of for me is a technical description of what Asimo can do,
what design choices they made, and what improved between 'versions', if they
call them that way. For example, at first sight, it doesn't look like the
hardware of the legs changed in years, but that may not be true. Maybe, the
thing is half the weight now, the logic for stance control was moved into the
knees, a degree of freedom was added, etc.

