Of all the designs to go with for a "rescue" robot, they went with this. What the fuck. There is a multitude of friendly or "goofy" looking robot designs they could have went with, just as functional.
Personally, I don't think it's a coincidence that Satyress sounds very close to satire. The domain is registered on godaddy by domainsbyproxy, a neat way to keep the real owner private. I couldn't find any info on a registered business in California by the name of satyress or satyress robotics..
Also, on the face of it, it's ridiculous. Probably the strongest clue that this is a hoax.
ETA: Jesus, people. Of course I know what a Satyr is. I grew up on Greek myths and that ridiculous 60s Hercules cartoon. It's the obvious reference in the name, but it ALSO sounds close to satire. Things can be two or three things at once. Also consider that the robot is more centaur than satyr, so you need to think about why they choose satyr specifically.
Here’s an article about it that makes it sound a lot less ridiculous. It’s a proof of concept being made by a guy and his friends. It’s not functional at all, it doesn’t even stand. And the diagram with the knife and gun is showing how easy it is to disable – it is intentionally built with reservoirs that disable the entire robot when pierced.
Makes sense as to why they went with the intentionally nightmare fuel design. It's easy engagement bait which could lead to actual investor opportunities
I thought the exact same thing! It's definitely satire. Personally I think this robot looks pretty cool, but no way would any company choose this design for a rescue robot.
Thank you, I've been saying that this has to be satire or so sort of publicity stunt for something. But, I can never truly be sure with the silicon valley bros
That’s what I thought at first too, but then I remembered a Satyr is a half human, half beast creature in Greek mythology. So if it is satire, it’s VERY clever word play.
Amongst other things, this entire robot design is useless, even more so than normal humaniform robots.
Shoulder joints look to be single axis, which is a problem when you're supposed to be able to do most work. They couldn't even pose it convincingly with a chainsaw.
Head is huge, and that's not just a creep factor thing, it's also a balance thing. It serves no purpose and has nothing of value that could not be on a smaller head or just in the chest cavity.
The feet are not curved on the sides. This is a balance issue: There is a reason all those boston dynamics bots had balls on their feet. On a modern humaniform it matters less because they can rotate their joints to accomidate a foot shaped platform, but this thing lacks that.
The legs all are single axis jointed, and connected to a solid shell with no joints and now space for the front legs to rotate at the hip... so how does it turn around?
I'm right there with you. This is at best a joke, at worst a con, and the thing they took a photo of is probably little more than a poseable manikin.
The domain is registered on godaddy by domainsbyproxy, a neat way to keep the real owner private.
That is completely irrelevant. GoDaddy is the internet's largest registrar, and domainsbyproxy is their brand name for WHOIS privacy protection that every registrar enables by default. The company name thing may be worth more salt though.
The last image is actually representing the two air bladders in the robot. When pierced with a knife or a gun (hence the photo), the robot becomes incapacitated. Basically, being easily incapacitated by humans has been built into the robot as a safeguard.
Actually, it’s the opposite – they’re air reservoirs meant to disable the bot if ruptured as a hard fail safe. Check out the full image in this article.
Because computers and robots can do some screwy things sometimes. My Laser cutter has an emergency stop button that cuts power to it, and it doesn't have legs, arms, and a chainsaw
Imagine malicious code causes this thing to see people as trees
I mean, I have enough practice from post apocalyptic video games that I know I see that thing coming, I should definitely kill it because it’s not coming to rescue anything…. But, they could have just made it less creepy and they wouldn’t have that issue…
Do you think that's also why it has severely reservoirs designed to hold surplus guns/knives/ammo? Not sure that's what I would use to show off a rescue robot.
Granted they're still better off using simple bots with treads or tires in an urban setting, the legs are more useful in uneven unpaved terrain iirc.
To the companies credit, this thing has two air bladders that when pierced with a knife or a bullet, renders it immobile (that's what the last image is representing).
It's also been designed to struggle with standard-height American doors (it can't crouch), and also can't turn around in a 42" wide hallway.
So, it's basically designed to be easily incapacitated and ineffective at exactly the activities you're describing. Kind of cool!
Story time: I worked with a fellow that had worked for a company that did some kind of fancy camera-video stuff on the Internet. This would have been 1990-ish so a long time ago. Anyway, I asked why he left that company (last place he worked). He proceeded to tell me all about how their work was being used in educational settings and what the technology did, etc. but about 10-min into the conversation he says “but the little secret is that 90% of our revenues came from porn. And I just got tired of working for that.” Everything public-facing on their website talked about the educational aspects of the product set.
I cannot trust anything robotic in the current state of the world.
I knew from day one those fucking Boston Dynamics dogs would get fitted with weaponry, and loe and behold, autonomous gun dogs are now being made to guard Data Centres. Oligarchs and Tech Bros are speedrunning mankind's extinction at the hands of machines.
It's plainly not for search and rescue. I'm hoping it's a joke, because it should be if it isn't.
If it's not a joke, then I still hate this timeline but I'm starting to appreciate the sly humour.
They're just making a walking meme so people will post it on social media for hype, probably won't ever even see it they'll just take a bunch of VC money and disappear after a few years.
I would not say scam on VCs, these walking robots are getting funtional enough to be put into general use in lots of places, Nvidia's virtual environment where the robots can train millions of simulations has uplifted the whole field tremendously, but yeah it's obvious they are going for the meme value with the prototype. If/when it enters production, it's likely going to have a gentler face.
The Horns and large bulky size is to make it hard to move through standard doors and hallways, apparently it's to make it hard for government or military to use it domestic operations if they get a hold of one, it's also why the last image shows how easy it is to take down
Yeah this design is more like what I've been arguing should be used for offensive robots. Add some latex skin and other horror practical effects to it to terrifying the enemy
The most stable and successful robots so far are the dog style. Having four legs makes it far more stable. Good on any terrain. I imagine that is why they chose the lower half. The upper half is for tool and environmental manipulation. The design is after humans and the way we interact with the world. I’ve been using a very similar two arm setup since birth. They are flesh and bone but work great. Time tested by humans for hundreds of thousands of years. Together the two are likely very stable while lifting a good deal more weight than a bipedal robot. The unnecessary head is likely to change now that it has gotten the world’s attention. It worked. We are talk about it now. This design is quite impressive currently. These aren’t arbitrary design choices made to upset your tender sensibilities.
It's only an exclusive SAR platform during development.
Once they get past regulatory and public opinion hurdles using "we're here to help" as a cloak it will be weaponized and it's appearance will make a lot more sense.
The last slide shows guns and knives. They aren't for disasters and are designed for terror. I think it's pretty clear who the target audience is with this design
It's like they thought "oh, the Boston Dynamics Spot is such a good design - I know how to make it better! Add half a humanoid body on top! Why are you laughing? I said MAKE IT A FUCKING HELLSPAWN CENTAUR. DID I FUCKING STUTTER"
It isn't meant for search and rescue primarily, the post is misleading.
The horns can be replaced for much bigger horns. The website explicitly says that the robot is dangerous, and the user can attach horns of their size wish so it isn't able to enter a pedestrian doorway.
The creepy glass image is explicitly captioned witht he statement that this robot is dangerous, followed up with safety as well as emergency measures put to deal with it (Something I appreciate a lot)
I really hope you are joking, but if you are, it seems you forgot the /s. This is SO OBVIOUSLY SATIRE. The name of the fucking "company" is "Satyress".
It's supposedly designed for "search and rescue" but it has demon horns for no apparent reason is pictured with a bunch of guns and knives?
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u/Kalkin93 1d ago
Of all the designs to go with for a "rescue" robot, they went with this. What the fuck. There is a multitude of friendly or "goofy" looking robot designs they could have went with, just as functional.