small mirror. It moves in several axes,
has a video screen in the seemingly
blank face, has dual video cameras,
and speaker holes in the lower part of
the dome. To be honest, Jibo really
does have a personality.
Cynthia and her team have been
refining Jibo for years, drawing on her
university experiences and those of
her team to produce what she calls a
“new member of your family.”
She quickly rose past her
Indiegogo financing goal of
$100K to many millions,
mainly because of her
amazing record in the field of
robotics. Prices started at
$499 for a basic Jibo and
$599 for a developer’s version
and soon went to over
$1,000+ as the word spread.
It would take this whole
article to do the diminutive
11” tall robot justice, so I
would ask you to go to the
Internet for the many videos
and articles on it, if you have
not been among the lucky
few who received their first
robots this past December.
This article would not be
complete if I did not include
the Amazon Echo, developed
at Amazon’s Lab126 — an
advanced product division of
the company that produced
the Kindle, Kindle Fire, and
Amazon Fire TV. The Echo
(shown in Figure 9) is
certainly not a robot as it has
no movement, cameras, or facial
recognition, but does have certain
features that would be appreciated by
a home-bound senior. For $180, I am
amazed at the device’s capabilities.
Always listening, the Echo is
‘awakened’ by the word, ‘Alexa,’ or if
you prefer, ‘Amazon.’ The cartoon in
Figure 10 shows Aladdin’s lamp on
the bookcase in reference to the
seemingly magical operation of the
device. You can always opt for using
the handheld remote to call the device
by just speaking into the remote’s
microphone from another room. It has
one of the best voice recognition
systems available with its seven-microphone array. Though the built-in
speakers are not audiophile quality, it
sounds remarkably good for a 9-1/4”
tall device. It is not anything like a
Jibo, nor is intended to be, but I see
tremendous robotics possibilities with
this Wi-Fi connected device. Has it
been hacked? Oh, yes. As with any
new technical device that hits the
market, you can be sure several
people have torn it completely apart
and reverse-engineered it. (Though I’m
certainly not going to peel mine open
as there are many photos available of
its insides.)
I know that experimenters will
find some very unique and useful
ways in which to use the Echo. It
appears to work fine in a 12 volt DC
power supply. I intend to use it over a
period of a few months and will do an
extensive review of it for robotics uses
in a future column.
More Robots
Available to Offer
Seniors Assistance
I have envisioned a wheeled robot
utilizing a SCARA arm configuration
to allow greater lifting ability without
using multiple power-hungry motors.
Besides Engelberger’s design shown in
In my numerous
conversations with him on the
progress of his assistive robot
design, he is looking seriously
SERVO 01.2016 65
Figure 8B. The socially-interactive
Kismet robot head.
Figure 8A. Cynthia
Breazeal with her doctoral
thesis project, Kismet.
Figure 9. The Amazon Echo.
Figure 10. Amazon Echo in a typical application.
