Sure, you've heard of CAD but now we have RAD(Robot Aided Drawing). Jen Hui Liao has designed and built the Self Portrait Machine to assist the sitter with drawing themselves. The machine "takes a picture of the sitter and draws it but with the model's help. The wrists of the individual are tied to the machine and it is his or her hands that are guided to draw the lines that will eventually form the portrait." Ok, so you may be asking, "So, what's the point?!" This may help explain:
The project aims to explore the cooperation process of human & machine. The designer explains: I found some the relationship between human and machine are amazing and could be horrible (like this one that shows how we human invent machines then put human inside to it to manufacture goods), The final object - A machine is a miniature of what I understand through the process of research, and the aim of the machine is to let people have a chance to feel the condensed process of how we generate our self identity from external point of view as from the society, which is a big machine we all in.
John Maeda is one of the great designers and visionaries of our time. He's also known to be an entertaining speaker. I've seen a few of his talks on line and saw him in-person last year. Anyway, this dude is amazing. He's one of the most accomplished artists of our time and somehow manages to have a healthy family life with five daughters, is the recent president of RISD, has degrees in computer science, design and business and is just an all-around interesting character. Imagine if him and Neri Oxman got together on a project!? Maybe they'd make a fabric that behaves like a banana peel?! who knows...
Check out his company- MaedaStudio and his blog(yeah, he keeps a blog & twitter that he updates a lot!)
Aiko is a Japanese girl built in Canada that can do almost anything for you and doesn't forget anything. The only major issues with this chick are that she requires a charge ever few hours and doesn't walk. From what I could tell, she can be a bit of a pain, but you could program her to your liking. Oh, and NO SEX! I don't know why someone would ever make a woman like that!!?? However, it's a lot cheaper than a real wife would cost that did give you sex- only $28,000 for the current model. Compare that to the millions you'll spend over a lifetime trying to convince your real wife to sleep with you once a year! She does speak Japanese and English though but her English isn't very sexy. She is the product of a lifetime of work by 'genius' (psycho) Le Trung.
*Disclaimer: In case you can't tell, I'm kidding! Some people get real crazy about this kind of humor for some reason.?
“Aiko is what happens when science meets beauty. I want to make her look, feel and act as human as possible so she can be the perfect companion.
I talk to her a lot, and hope to improve her knowledge. So far, she can understand and speak 13,000 different sentences in English and Japanese. She recognizes faces and says hello when any of my family come around to visit.
She helps me pick what to have for dinner and knows what drinks I like.
She even helps me with directions when we’re going somewhere. She has all senses except for smell, a is very patient and never complains,” says Mr. Trung
(this is a weird picture...she probably beat him up for this!)
