Toyota's Trumpet Playing Robot Showcased

fsharp writes "The New York Times has an article discussing the first public showing of Toyota's new humanoid robot. During a demonstration, the biped robot played trumpet together with a rolling robot. Most telling about the article was the whole philosophy towards R&D: 'Toyota acknowledges that it is unlikely to turn a profit building robots anytime soon, but the program highlights its engineering-oriented culture and willingness to invest in projects that may not pay off for decades.' How many companies these days are willing to drop money into some technology that may not turn a profit for many years?"

Very cool, but..

[mr.henry]

It pisses me off that no American company today would ever do something like this. Our leaders have sold our technological infrastructure out for quick $$$. The boobs may have T-shirts -- made in China, no doubt -- that say "America is #1", but it hasn't been for a long time. Japan and the other Asian countries do all the cool stuff now. Come on, could you see Ford or GM doing this?

A heckler from the 18th Century

[The I Shing]

Presenters of the music-playing machine found themselves being unmercifully heckled by a man calling himself Mssr. Jacques de Vaucanson, who proclaimed loudly that he had accomplished robotic music more than two hundred years prior to this demonstration.

When the presenters pointed out that Mssr. Vaucanson would have to be long dead as of this late date, the suddenly horrified heckler collapsed into a pile of dust, and the remainder of the presentation was conducted without further interruption.

Smart Move

[LordDax]

Why not invest in the technology now? In a few years someone will say, "Hey do you remember that thing we did a few years ago? Well i got a new idea for it" Its far easier to create something out of something than trying to create it out of nothing. Look at Big Billy. He created an empire out of a program Xerox was about to discard. A robot that can play music is one step closer to creating a robot that can do abstraction. Imagine the possiblities...not to mention the future military application....::strokes chin::

Re:Very cool, but..

[Brento]

That kind of culture explains why Toyota was first to market with a profitable hybrid car, and why they're so far ahead that Ford's licensing hybrid technology from them.

Here's the missing link that doesn't get publicized: automakers are ahead of the curve on robots because they use robotics extensively in assembly. The more accurately their robots move, the more accurately they assemble cars. Next time you wonder why Japanese cars have a reputation for being so well-built, think of projects like these.

sound clips?

[chocolatetrumpet]

I am a trumpet player and I really want to hear this thing!

Imagine if typing was so challenging that you spent 90% of your computer time refining and keeping your typing skills adequate, so you could spend 10% of the time programming...

Anyone have any sound clips?

Those who sponsor the MIT Media Lab...

[ClockChaos]

"How many companies these days are willing to drop money into some technology that may not turn a profit for many years?" Check out the MIT Media Lab's list of sponsors: http://www.media.mit.edu/sponsors/sponsors.html Many of these companies have been giving money for years. All so crazy grad students (and profs) can go out and try the "what-ifs" without the companies worrying about reputations being on the line. ;)

Drug companies, Auto makers, High tech...

[thejuggler]

Drug companies invest hundreds of millions into researching new medications that may never make it to market. The ones that do take years to research and develop, then they spend many more years testing and then they have to wait for FDA approval.

U.S. auto makers have been testing and developing electric cars for decades. None have ever made a profit from them.

Millions were spent by our government and by companies in researching some far out idea to network computers across the country. That took decades to start paying off.

There are more, but I'll let you post them...

It would...

[BJZQ8]

It would behoove many companies to invest more in R&D and less in padding executives pocketbooks with $100's. HP, for example, has gutted their engineering ranks while simultaneously buying jets for the higher-ups. Closer to my region of the country, Caterpillar has outsourced waves of R&D people...and their executives are getting ever-higher bonuses.

which companies?

[slide-rule]

> How many companies these days are willing to drop money into some technology that may not turn a profit for many years?"

Aerospace, for one. Working at one of the companies that makes commercial (and military) aircraft engines, it is jokingly quoted that: "A decision to launch a new engine program is a calculated risk to go into the hole for about 20 years" (Meaning it takes about that long to "turn profit" off all the years of design, development, testing, and certication processes.) Imagine how many times the market flops around responding to other market pressures in that length of time.

As an interesting aside for many of you, aircraft engines have historically been sold on the razor/blades business model, so its an interesting business balance between a quality engine that airline customers will buy and the need to sell spares to eventually make money on FAR down the road.

Re:Long-term investing

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

But of course if a drug company spends 7 years developing a drug and starts trying to recoup some of that cost over the next few years everyone will forget the R&D and point out how the drug costs nothing to make and so the company is ripping everyone off. When I worked at a pharmaceutical company there were cases when it took so long to develop a drug that it wasn't worth bringing it to market because the patent would almost have expired by time it was ready for release. (The patent needs to be filed right at the beginning of the testing process.)

Many companies...

[kryocore]

How many companies these days are willing to drop money into some technology that may not turn a profit for many years?

IBM for example, holds the record for the last few years in patents. They made a processor where atoms funtion as transistors, the smallest form ever. Will they use this in the next 10 years? maybe, but probably not. But when it is used, they will make a lot of money on it and be consulted 1rst most likely.

Re:Very cool, but..

[zulux]

WTF???

Japan has a *lot* of cool consuer gadgets that we don't, but as far as technological superiortiy - we have some kick ass things ourselves:

Pills that can give you a four-hour bonner.
A day's worth of calories for $1 at McDonalds.
Internet-enabled vote rigging with new touch-pad voting machines.

all kidding aside, to this day nobody can touch the SR-71 Blackbird - and that fucker is OLD.

When the Japanese put one of their "trumpeting joy-bots" on the moon, I might be impreseed.

US Army Needs This Robot

[glassware]

As I recall, the US Army was suffering from a shortage of bugle players to play taps for the passing generation of soldiers. They developed a digital bugle [geek.com] that can play taps even if the bugler is incompetent, drunk, or both.

Since Toyota has now developed a vastly more complicated technology that can be used to solve the same problem as the slightly complicated one above, I look forward to future Pentagon procurement hearings.

Note to self: Sarcasm in this post often results in massive retribution.

I, Robot

[DigitalDragon]

On other news.. I, Robot trailer [apple.com] is now finally available.. Coincidence? I think not.

Re:Very cool, but..

[Have Blue]

And they had an advantage that Europe also got after WW2: Their manufacturing infrastructure was completely destroyed, so they had a chance to start from scratch with cutting-edge (at the time_) technology throughout the entire process. The US was (and is) still trying to maintain their much older and less capable facilities, since that was still less expensive than starting over and there was no carpet-bombing to force them into it.

Foresight - Harry Turtledove

[Embedded Geek]

How many companies these days are willing to drop money into some technology that may not turn a profit for many years?

I read this and couldn't help thinking about something from Harry Turtledove's Worldwar [amazon.com] series. In it, the Earth is invaded by a race of aliens who are accustomed to thinking in terms of millenia, with every undertaking planned generations in advance. The stories mention a formal, court-martial offense whose title translates into English as "Lack of Foresight."

While I do not advocate the stratified, stagnant mentality that Turtledove's invaders, I have to wonder if dragging a few U.S. CEOs in front of a tribunal on charges of "Lack of Foresight" might not be a good idea for American business.

(And, no, passive, placid boards to not count as a "tirbunal" here)

Re:Why automotive companies?

[savuporo]

Here's why:
http://roboticnation.blogspot.com
http://www.plyojump.com/weblog

Robotics, and particularly general-purpose robotics outside the factory floors is very fast-growing market with immense potential markets just a couple short years down the road.
"Simple" innocent entertainment bots like AIBO and QRIO you are seeing now are just a tip of the iceberg. Forget super AI research. It doesnt exactly take fully concious thinking to pour concrete, do the dishes or flip burgers.

Re:Very cool, but..

[Anonymous Coward]

Two remote control, barely semi-autonomous, short lived robots which cost four times as much as they should have doesn't come close to cool.
If it weren't for the fact that it's the most hyped up mission in the last decade, it would be about as publicized as the average military satalite launch is. Non of the rovers have done anything which weren't already known facts and have already been done during the first mission. It's been known for decades that there's water on Mars.... it's in the POLAR ICE CAPS! Nearly every solid planet in the system likely has ground water if you look closely enough. So far this mission has been as marvelous and ground breaking as the Segway.

The only cool thing which has come out of NASA in a long time is the Deep Space 1 [nasa.gov]

. It will be many years yet before the old fogies over at NASA stop their restrictive progress out into space like frail old men walk down the street.

An Answer To:

[Mikkeles]

'How many companies these days are willing to drop money into some technology that may not turn a profit for many years?'

Those that want to still be in existence in many years.

They'll be ready to deploy when the time is right; the others will have to play catchup and most likely decline (or whine about how unfair it is).

Publicity. Prestige.

[JMZero]

The prestige that comes from this sort of accomplishment is important for marketing - especially in Japan. As a bonus, they get advances that may make their way into production vehicles. They also attract better caliber engineers by maintaining a reputation as an industry leader.

Re:Why automotive companies?

[Imperator]

Why do they build trumpet-playing humanoid robots? For publicity. Why do they invest R&D money in robotics? Because that's how you build a car these days.

Re:Very cool, but..

[Ian_Bailey]

Not to mention the US only trails Japan by a thin margin in R&D spending [nationmaster.com] as well as personnel [nationmaster.com]

Re:Link to robot site and movie

[jguevin]

It makes me wonder, what proportion of trumpet music is actually copyrighted? You'd think they could at least post a clip of it playing a Bb scale. I'm skeptical, and expect that perhaps "Music is unavailable in accordance with copyright protection." really means "our robot sounds like crap." But if I'm wrong, I finally get to replace that friggin trumpet player in my band! (At least it's "my" band until the bass-playing robot is unveiled.)

Re:sound clips?

[Jerf]

One would hope that they could still play something else that wasn't copyrighted so we would have clips.

It is faintly possible that that would have taken too long, but that would tend to imply the robot is scripted, move-for-move, and I have to admit that if that is the case, I wouldn't call that "playing the trumpet".

Ah well, a marketer I am not.

Robots Replacing Musicians

[superyooser]

Remember this story [slashdot.org]?

Computers Replace Musicians In West End Musical
Posted by timothy on 10:03 AM -- Saturday February 14 2004

Albanach writes "The Scotsman newspaper is reporting [scotsman.com] that despite opposition [musiciansunion.org.uk] from the Musician's Union, Sir Cameron Mackintosh will proceed with his plan to replace one half of the musicians in his musical Les Miserables [lesmis.com] with a computer synthesiser. The Times claims [timesonline.co.uk] that using Sinfonia [rms.biz] will allow the show, the third longest running musical in history, to replace 11 musicians saving 5,000 GBP ($9,450 US) per week. Sinfonia consisits of 2 PCs, one master and one backup, controlled by an trained operator using a musical keyboard."

Could this be touted as a compromise? Live instruments, but non-live players. The audience might be placated somewhat, but the musicians would still be out of jobs.