Numerous tech companies are endeavoring to develop robots that, in the style of fictional automatons like R2-D2 and C-P3O, can be helpful and friendly towards humans. One company that, at least to our knowledge, is not busy with robot-building is Apple – but, should Tim Cook one day take the company in this direction, what could the resulting robot be like?
Apple could take inspiration from ASIMO, the charming humanoid robot manufactured and regularly enhanced by the Japanese company Honda. This robot has an array of functions that, in future, could be refined further to enable numerous ASIMO robots to fulfill many routine responsibilities in restaurants, shops and hotels. Apple might not yet have developed robotic hardware to rival Honda’s – but, for putting together its own intelligent humanoid robot, it has an excellent basis in the form of software…
We are thinking particularly of Siri, the virtual personal assistant that comes as standard on iOS devices. Siri is already capable of answering a huge number of questions on many different subjects, speaking in a male or female voice and even being humorous. Siri could therefore make an ideal “brain” for a fully-fledged humanoid robot. You can read more about the modern world of robotics, and so where Apple could find even further inspiration, in a lengthy feature article in the latest issue of AppleMagazine.
