Things to Do for Robots - Robots Unlimited: Life in a Virtual Age - page 287

Figure 57. RoboSapien (Courtesy of The Gadget Shop, Ltd.)
Honda is not the only Japanese giant to enter the field of humanoids.
In December 2003 Sony followed on the PR success of its Aibo dog ro-
bots by demonstrating Qrio, 21 a humanoid with a bubble-shaped head,
which can perform a few dance movements and can jog, making it the
first robot to simulate smoothly the running movements of humans.
Qrio can also pitch a baseball, and in March 2004 it conducted the
Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, waving its baton in a performance of
Beethoven's fifth symphony.
Not to be outdone, in March 2004 Toyota unveiled its own hu-
manoid robot, which can play the trumpet. It walked onto the stage
carrying a brass trumpet in one hand and then, when it reached centre
stage, it turned towards the audience, raised the trumpet to its artificial
lips that can move with the same finesse as human lips, and gave a virtu-
oso performance of Louis Armstrong's version of “When You Wish Upon
a Star”.
By the Christmas season of 2004 the concept of humanoid robots
had so caught the public's imagination that an inexpensive humanoid
called RoboSapien (see Figure 57 ) became the hit toy of the year, selling
for around $80 in the U.S.A. It was designed by Mark Tilden, who has
worked at the U.S. National Laboratories at Los Alamos and has con-
sulted for NASA, and it is manufactured in China by Wow Wee Toys.
RoboSapien can perform various “gymnastic” functions with its arms
and body, moving forwards, backwards and turning around, some of
these actions being accompanied by a limited number of sound effects.
21 Meaning Quest for Curiosity.