Cyberbees Score MIT Prize 157
DeAshcroft writes "The Boston Globe has a nice story on the winner of this year's Lemelson-MIT Student Prize. 125 infrared-communicating 4.5-inch swarming bee-like robots. Businessweek even covered this one here.
Next year's prize may go to the creator of 4.5-inch long swarming cockroaches."
Why wait.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Why wait.... (Score:1)
Re:Why wait.... (Score:4, Funny)
Sounds like we need an infrared interface for the honeypot project now...
Re:Why wait.... (Score:1, Funny)
Coming soon... (Score:1)
You know it's gonna happen.
I just hope (Score:4, Funny)
Re:I just hope (Score:1)
If you had a fleet of robots, would you use them for good or for awesome?
Re:I just hope (Score:1)
Resistance is useless! (Score:2, Funny)
Umm, their excellent work in the field, and, umm, the work on swarming worms and zombie DDOS attacks wouldn't have been the same without them.
You! (Score:1, Funny)
Swarming cochroaches.. (Score:2)
2 words you don't normally hear together (Score:5, Funny)
Re:2 words you don't normally hear together (Score:5, Funny)
"MIT" and "unemployed"
Re:2 words you don't normally hear together (Score:1, Funny)
Re:2 words you don't normally hear together (Score:2)
metrobots (Score:5, Interesting)
They are planning to enter the RoboCup American Open [cmu.edu] at CMU in Spring of 2003 and hoping to participate in RoboCup 2003 [robocup2003.org] in Padua Italy.
Suhit
Great...Bees with Wheels (Score:5, Funny)
You need a MIT Doctor to figure out the Lego Mindstorm kit?
Re:Great...Bees with Wheels (Score:1)
I am the walrus (Score:5, Funny)
Sandra Lawson, McLurkin's mother, figured out she had a gifted child at age 2 when her boy stuck a french fry up each nostril during lunch and said, ''Look mom, I'm a walrus.'' Though unimpressed by his nasal hygiene, she was astounded her child knew what a walrus was.
He then smeared the rest of his food all over his face and listed three more Beatles songs.
Sandra wept and thought : 'My boy is truly a genius'.
Re:I am the walrus (Score:1)
Were will he end up? Slashdot editor?
Re:I am the walrus (Score:1, Funny)
Re:I am the walrus (Score:2, Funny)
Re:I am the walrus (Score:2)
Re:I am the walrus (Score:1)
Re:I am the walrus (Score:2)
And leave your anti-americanism at home, thanks.
Re:I am the walrus (Score:1)
Re:I am the walrus (Score:2)
Wow, he's gifted! (Score:5, Funny)
That's weird. When I see a kid with something stuck up his nose, 'gifted' isn't exactly the word that comes to mind. It's more like 'doofus'. The only sign of genius would be that he didn't eat the fries afterward.
Re:Wow, he's gifted! (Score:3, Funny)
Damn news sites! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Damn news sites! (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.ai.mit.edu/projects/ants/
I found this a while ago while doing something similar in distributed computing.
Re:Damn news sites! (Score:2)
Re:Damn news sites! (Score:1)
Great minds think alike (Score:5, Funny)
I remember when, for some unknown reason, I stuck a little wheel from a Matchbox car up my nose and said "Look mom, I'm a Pep Boys." I didn't really say that. If I was a genius I might have said something like that.
I do remember that 4 people had to hold me down at the hospital. I screamed at the top of my lungs as the doctor came at me with what seemed like a meter long pair of tweezers. I think I know what people that have gone through an alien abduction might have felt, but from the other end.
Community college, here I come!
Re:Great minds think alike (Score:1)
I'm sorry, you said you stuck a Matchbox car up your what? :^P
But will i need a license for... (Score:5, Funny)
Half a robot bee, philosophically,
But can a robot bee be said to be
La dee dee, one two three,
Is this wretched demi-robot bee,
Fiddle de dum, Fiddle de dee,
I love this hive, employee-ee,
He loves him carnally,
Re:But will i need a license for... (Score:2)
No....Semi-Carnally!?
Oh.
C
Re:But will i need a license for... (Score:2)
The end.
Yay! (Score:5, Funny)
Which covers what, about 1 semester at MIT?
Re:Yay! (Score:1)
Re:Yay! (Score:1)
MIT doesn't want you. Go someplace where you're appreciated, and make a difference.
Re:Yay! (Score:1)
Lemelson (Score:5, Informative)
Settlements and verdicts in the more than 135 so-called Lemelson lawsuits led to millions for Lemelson and his allies.
This could be taken out of context but the sounds suspiciously like this guy was a patent squatter (although I assume these were legitimate as opposed to the ones ignoring prior art we keep hearing about).
Another old idea... (Score:3, Interesting)
My favorite was a Java-based applet called "Ants" where each entity only 3 rules...
1. where home was
2. what it "liked" (food)
3. communicate food locations to peers when contact was made
Within 20 seconds, the entire "colony" had been notified of the food location and the ants were swarming in a straight line between the colony location and the "food."
I hate it when something that is neither novel nor compelling wins a prize like this...
Hell, my father-in-law thought of this idea for a lawnmower grid, even...
Re:Another old idea... (Score:1)
if it makes you feel any better, I think you should have won.
Re:Another old idea... (Score:2)
Re:Another old idea... (Score:1)
Re:Another old idea... (Score:4, Insightful)
Aye, but it's one thing to have the idea, another to actually knuckle down and make it work.
> The idea of complex adaptive systems composed of a swarm of simple nodes with very simple rules is neither new or interesting in and of itself.
There is a lot of new and interesting stuff going on in that area, tho'
last week's "Nature" (vol 421, p 780) had a news feature on how systems of multiple units achieve synchrony ;
check out Steve Strogatz [cornell.edu] work ;
read Arthur Winfree's book "The Geometry of Biological Time" (Springer-Verlag 1980) [OK, not so new ...]
This stuff isn't so obvious. Christiaan Huygens, the Dutch physicist, couldn't get the Royal Society to pay attention to his observation that two pendulum clocks hanging on the same wooden beam eventually adopted the same rhythm. That was in 1665. Next stop : the 1960s, when Winfree started looking at coupled oscillators as an explanation for fireflies synchronizing their flashes. Still plenty of stuff to find out here.
I for one don't begrudge a student winning a prize for this.
Re:Another old idea... (Score:2)
Well, it means that you idea is sound enough that it might work. But there's no guarantee that it will actually work in hardware.
Kind of like hardware development in simulation and actual hardware. You can get anything working in the simulation.
And the stuff that generally trip you up with real hardware is stuff like the light sensors don't work 100% all the time, the engines don't work acurately, you internal maps get corrupted etc.
Or like Minsky pointed out: Robot AI people treasure their videos
Re:Another old idea... (Score:2)
There's a difference? That explains why my girlfriend left me after I sat across from her and said "I am unbuttoning your blouse, my hand slipping up your thigh."
Hey wait. (Score:1)
military apps (Score:5, Informative)
Re:military apps (Score:2)
Also, Prey, the new Michael Crichton book, which is about nano-technology run amock.
Justin Dubs
Lifetime achievement award goes to ... (Score:5, Funny)
You know it's the Golden Age of awards shows when even God makes an appearance at some b-list event like this.
The Lemelson-MIT Student Prize (Score:3, Informative)
This guy made his money from bar-code scanners' patents (and lawsuits). Still his is "one of the larger student grants in the country"
Re:The Lemelson-MIT Student Prize (Score:2)
And while I normally jump all over overly-litigous corporations and individuals, I must say that I find his particular abuses of the patent and judicial systems quite appealing. Seems he took somewhat of a Robin Hood approach, with a sue the rich, give grants to the poor (students) philosophy. Is this one instance where the ends truly do justify the means? Or are the means, themselves, wholey justified by the participants and their intentions?
Re:The Lemelson-MIT Student Prize (Score:1)
1000 robot apiarists (Score:2)
Robot parents report they were testy whenever any of their robot friends asked how the meet went.
GIfted (Score:1)
You Insensitive Whippersnapper! (Score:1)
As for the "next Einstein", let's just see if you're Y21-safe yet.
From the MIT News Office... (Score:2, Informative)
A Cyber-Bee? (Score:2)
culture comentary (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't know how to respond from this observation in the article. On one hand being a "geek" in middle/high school really sucks. On the other hand, is it "black culture" that doesn't like geeks, or "white" culture that has traditionally railroaded blacks into those two categories? I definitely don't want to play the race card here. I just thought the observation in the article was interesting.
Re:culture comentary (Score:2)
Whites played a big part in how that black culture developed. But it is, nevertheless, still black culture. It is blacks who are calling each other oreos for studying too hard. As John McWhorter, (a black) UC Berkeley linguists prof, said in his recent interview in Salon, the fact is that Asian culture in the US puts a high value on academics, while black and Hispanic culture do not.
Again, whites played a big part in the development of black culture. And black culture can change - culture is not static. But that doesn't change the fact that today, black culture - the culture of black people who live in the US - does not respect intellectual achievement.
Re:culture comentary (Score:3, Insightful)
And the upshot of this is that someone who can throw a ball gets paid millions (litterally), someone who can steal and abuse an idea gets billions, someone who can sell himself gets to fleece a nation and someone who is smart (in everything but maybe marketing and/or finances) gets a comparable pittance for finding out how the universe works and translating that to something usefull (like artificial hearts, computer chips or stronger materials).
Strange, isn't it.
Re:culture comentary (Score:2)
I think this was the reporter's attempt to subtly inform us that McLurkin is black. It adds some interest to the story - probably not many black engineers have won in the past - but he feels awkward coming right out and saying it. The reporter is trying to be cool about it, like, "oh, he's black? I didn't even notice, that's how color-blind I am." But he has to let us know. This lets him do it without admitting that he's doing it.
It's sad to see that this kind of pussy-footing is still necessary for some people.
Re:culture comentary (Score:1)
Re:culture comentary (Score:2)
Now go take your race baiting and shove it up your ass!
Re:culture comentary (Score:1)
Adolescent culture is only what they inherit and learn from their environment. They do not create the culture themselves, they are taught it by their community.
I believe that brash, consumer culture teaches adolescents this shallow "idol worship". Not the kind of thoughtful, in-depth role-models which might be a rewarding experience for children. Capitalists, bent on creating the most fluid and influenceable market possible, bombard this group (children/young adults) with twisted images of reality (commercials) whose 'heros' or 'stars' are these simple people (athletes). Life itself is cloaked in a weird Brand Lifestyle shimmer, the products themselves are secondary, but necessary props in a life you can purchase at the mall. Or so they're told.
Incapable of understanding more complex ideas or views of the world, the Capitalists quickly interfere and make impotent their development. These people don't grow out of this influence, they remain mired in this sphere of simplicity - all their thinking done for them - and delivered through their Televisions.
In the End, you have millions of ill adjusted 'adults' shouting about sports teams and watching the 6 PM news. These broken adults become the cheering section for anything presented to them: Sports, OldNewDiet CokePepsi, bad literature, bad television, Orwellian Wars on Iraq, The Swifter, irrational fears of all stripes, etc etc etc.
So, whats my point? Adolescents idolize whatever you present to them. Modern marketing has one goal: create/reinforce/encourage Consumerism; a wholly unrewarding(unsustainable) existence.
Why would anyone be surprised when they see a gaggle of nike-clad mall punks smoking and acting like idiots? Look at the shallow, self-serving nature of the world that is presented to them. Further, why are we surprised when some "Geek" is ostracized because he doesn't follow the herd? Everything around him is guaranteed to make exactly that happen.
ewww, i feel dirty - like ive just channelled john Katz. eek.
where are they called bees specifically? (Score:3, Insightful)
Prior Art! (Score:1)
Like that doesn't exist already? (And for a long long time.) On the bright side, maybe the patent office will still patent their idea? *sigh* It still won't work, of course: Trying to get a lawyer to serve cockroaches, hell, most of them already serve cockroaches.
The original project.. (Score:1)
Take a look at:
http://www.ai.mit.edu/projects/ants/
It's really quite interesting how they're designed, even if the tech is from a few years back.
Too bad there aren't any websites showing the new ones? Or are there?
-m_xiphias
not impressed (Score:2, Interesting)
i downloaded a few of the videos and was not that impressed. i am sure there is a lot of time and effort put into this, but i worked a summer camp where we taught kids a half of the things they were show casing... this [parallax.com] company sells little robots and we can even buy little ifrared recievers [parallax.com] imiters [parallax.com], light sensors, etc. we program it with BASIC to follow the light/dark, take commands from a remote control, pick things up. all this for just a 200bucks.
now, many of the "crown control" things were odviously a bit more complicated. but is it THAT special? sending signals that push away or get closer to other bots.. not that new.
one thing that i must say is that programming for these premanunfactured bots is easy, but if you ever try to linux-fy, and tweak, or play with the goodies inside, goodluck. Me and friend tried to make a linux compiler for it, and got no support from the company, no techdoc, nothing. (we were not surprised)
Tweaking? (Score:2)
Are you talking about the Parallax robots powered by BASIC Stamps? Those are standard PIC microcontrollers. If StampBASIC isn't good enough for you you should be able to directly replace the PIC with the StampBASIC microcode interpreter with a plain one and program it in machine language. I believe there is even a C compiler for the PIC.
As for compiling to StampBASIC p-code there isn't much point; you'd still have a very limited instruction store and you'd still be limited to the functions supported by the p-code interpreter, which are quite primitive.
Re:Tweaking? (Score:1)
we were bored. we weren't trying that hard.
Bee-Like? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bee-Like? (Score:1)
Hmm... (Score:1)
So what? (Score:1, Funny)
I'd like to see these pissy bee-bots bringing a hyperdrive to 800% efficiency. Or evolving into cellular units that are invincible even to our projectile weapons.
Pah.
Wait a minute... (Score:4, Funny)
it has to be said... (Score:3, Funny)
The real step three. (Score:2)
Re:it has to be said... (Score:1)
I don't get it (Score:1)
I don't see what all the buzz is about...
*bah* *dum* *cha!*
thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week
issues (Score:2, Funny)
At least he isn't bitter...
Infrared? Hmmmmm (Score:1)
Infrared = no progress for most applications, e.g. exploring earthquake ruins.
Re: Infrared? Hmmmmm (Score:1)
Imagine.. (Score:1)
Ooooh.
What a waste (Score:2, Funny)
30 years old, still in school, and won 30k for building a hobby type robot and then duplicating it 124 times. Ya, on a different course alright, the rest of his peers have been working in the real world for 26 years, and have made 40x his prize money in real income. Plus most are married and like to be social.
His mommy sure can be proud of the french fry walrus now.
And im sure your much better off... (Score:3, Insightful)
Im not sure where you came up with 26 years for how long his peers have been working in "the real world", but Ill go with it. So, 30k * 40 = 1.2mil...spread that out over 26 years, and thats only a little over 46k a year.
Meanwhile, by the time this man has 26 years of "real world" work experience, he will be pulling in well over 46k a year with his masters, let alone a doctorate. As the article indicates, he has already taught civil engineering at MIT, is the lead scientist at iRobot, and winning this award will only give the company better recognition.
As for it being a hobby type robot, that would only make it all the better. Noone would turn down 30k for something they put together as a hobby, let alone thier doctoral thesis.
You also indicate he does not like to be social, and is not married, neither of which are addressed in either article.
At least you got one thing right, his mommy sure can be proud.
Re:What a waste (Score:1, Funny)
start working at 4? your peers must all be Nike employees I take it...
So I guess (Score:2)
Reminds me of the retina-scanning robotic spiders (Score:1)
Also check out this guy's company at iRobot which offers real life robotic product like the "Roomba [roombavac.com]" - a robotic vacuum cleaner.
I guess we may be only half a century away from commericialized robot similar to Honda's Asimo Humaniod [honda.com].
I saw a demonstration of these (Score:2)
Re:I saw a demonstration of these (Score:1)
Computer Bugs (Score:2)
Brooks, ants, and all that (Score:2)
There's a lot happening in mobile robotics, but the action is with the smarter machines. DoD is pushing hard on this. Look up "Demo III" and "XUV".
Little Swarming Robots (Score:2)
Zim said it best (Score:1)
Re:Big deal. (Score:1)