Another interesting thought that occurred to us was our son is going to grow up with robots in the house. People are making a big deal about gen Y having grown up with the web, mobiles and IM. Is this the start of gen Z - the generation who grow up with AI as part of their everyday life?

(Pete you should make it so posters get emails when replies are posted)

New Scientist did a feature on emotional attachment to robots a couple of weeks ago. Roombas featured heavily:

Sung believes that the notion of humans relating to their robots almost as if they were family members or friends is more than just a curiosity. “People want their Roomba to look unique because it has evolved into something that’s much more than a gadget,” she says. Understanding these responses could be the key to figuring out the sort of relationships people are willing to have with robots.

What sort of relationship are you willing to have with yours, Mark? The article is behind their subscriber paywall, but LMK and I’ll cut-and-paste it to you.

Who’s got the verse?
Who’s got the verse?
Who’s got the motherf****’n dopest verse?

It took a lot of emptying the first few times, but mostly because it goes under the couch, bed, cupboards, etc where there was a lot of dust built up. Now that all that is kinda clean - you just run it once or twice a week and it does a pretty good job. However if I dumped a pile of dirt on the floor I wouldn’t use the roomba to clean it up.

Nice mix though..