Robots can be cute too you know, that is until they become self-aware and decide they’re better than us and take us out, but I wouldn’t put my money on that just yet. Alonso Martinez, a technical director at Pixar, has developed a simple robot called Mira that is capable of playing peek-a-boo, you only have to see the video to grasp just how cute this little robot is.
When Alonso hides his face Mira gets sad and changes colors but she immediately gets excited, bounces and chirps when Alonso shows his face again.
It’s endearing to see a robot respond that way, quite similar actually to how a real baby would respond when playing peek-a-boo, except that you don’t have to feed Mira or change it or start a college fund.
Mira uses face tracking to interact with users and relies on emotional intelligence, her abilities to interact with people will improve over time as she gets a better understanding of people’s emotions.
Alonso hasn’t said if and when he will start developing enough Mira units to sell publicly but he will continue working on this project to improve her emotional intelligence and enable more genuine interaction with humans.
Robots, they’re just like us.