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Speaker 1: Technology with tex Stuff from com be there and welcome

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Speaker 1: to tex Stuff. I'm Johns in Strickland and joining me

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Speaker 1: once again car Stuff Host extraordinaire. Scott, welcome back, Thank

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Speaker 1: you very much, thank for having me. I promised this

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Speaker 1: time I'm not going to break your heart. Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's right with the cars will be illegal someday. And

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Speaker 1: I didn't say cars will be illegal. I said it

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Speaker 1: will be illegal to drive a car. Cars would still

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Speaker 1: be legal, you just couldn't. You just wouldn't be allowed

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Speaker 1: to operate. That's like one of those crazy firework rules,

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Speaker 1: like where you can buy them, but you're not allowed

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Speaker 1: to light them. Right Well, you could still right around

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Speaker 1: in them, you just wouldn't be the one behind the wheel.

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Speaker 1: What a horrible future we're talking about. And you know,

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Speaker 1: I thought, since since that discussion went so well, let's

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Speaker 1: talk about with cars and robots a little bit more.

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Speaker 1: But for once, we're not talking about autonomous cars. Yeah, finally,

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Speaker 1: so let me paint you a word picture Scott. On

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Speaker 1: July two thousand fourteen, Hitchhiker began a historic journey from Halifax,

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Speaker 1: Nova Scotia, to get to Victoria, British Columbia. On the

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Speaker 1: other side of Canada. We're talking crossing the entire width

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Speaker 1: of Canada. And if you were to do that on

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Speaker 1: the most efficient route possible, if you got to choose

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Speaker 1: the route, that would be at minimum around three thousand,

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Speaker 1: six hundred forty four miles or five thousand, eight hundred

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Speaker 1: sixty four kilometers. However, hitchhikers rarely have the ability to

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Speaker 1: call exactly what route needs to be taken. They are

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Speaker 1: at the mercy of the drivers that pick them up. Sure,

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Speaker 1: I'm just I'm headed west exactly, take me as far

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Speaker 1: as you're going. And not that I condone hitchhiking or

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Speaker 1: anything like that. That's kind of dangerous. It can and

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Speaker 1: we will definitely get into some danger territory. Part of

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Speaker 1: this conversation, well, the full trip took closer to ten

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Speaker 1: thousand kilometers or about sixty two hundred miles. Uh. And

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Speaker 1: here's the weird part. The hitchhiker was a robot. Ah,

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Speaker 1: that is weird. Yeah, not a person. I've never picked

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Speaker 1: up a hitchhiker. In fact, for a long time, I

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Speaker 1: had never even seen one. Uh saw a lot in Hawaii.

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Speaker 1: Surfer culture is still going strong. Yeah, there's certain parts

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Speaker 1: of the United States that you can expect to see

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Speaker 1: more hitchhikers than than other parts. And uh in Hawaii,

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Speaker 1: I guess would be one of those places. I've been

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Speaker 1: there too, and I know exactly what we're talking about.

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Speaker 1: I think I've seen more hitchhikers in Hawaii standing at

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Speaker 1: bus stops attempting to hit your ride, just hoping to

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Speaker 1: catch a ride before that bus shows up. You know,

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Speaker 1: it's like one or the other. Eventually that bust will come.

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Speaker 1: But if in the meantime, if I can just get

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Speaker 1: a free ride down the road, That's what I'll do.

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Speaker 1: I've just seen lots and lots of surfers trying to

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Speaker 1: trying to get to the beach, trying to catch that

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Speaker 1: next wave. That's right, man, you can't the waves wait

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Speaker 1: for no one. And so we're talking about Hitchbot, which

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Speaker 1: a lot of you have probably heard about. Hitchbot made

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Speaker 1: the news first made the news in two thousand and

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Speaker 1: fourteen during this historic attempt to get a robot to

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Speaker 1: hitchhike across all of Canada successful. It was successful, so

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Speaker 1: spoiler alert there, and then went on to do this

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Speaker 1: again in Germany. It went all over Germany and it

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Speaker 1: also took a little vacation in the Netherlands, and then

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Speaker 1: finally there was an attempt for this robot to hitchhike

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Speaker 1: it's way across the United States, which was cut short.

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Speaker 1: Just like the robot. This all sounds so nice. What

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Speaker 1: could possibly go wrong? So you might be wondering, I've

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Speaker 1: heard about this, what actually is going on? The first

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Speaker 1: thing I want to say is, while we're talking about

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Speaker 1: a hitchhiking robot, honestly, if I were to describe this,

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Speaker 1: I would not have used the word robot. Yeah, it's

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Speaker 1: they're using the term very loosely. I think here. I

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Speaker 1: think it's because the form factor makes it looks sort

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Speaker 1: of like a robot. Uh. And it definitely had the

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Speaker 1: benefit of having like a light display that that made

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Speaker 1: a very simple smiley face, so you had kind of

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Speaker 1: a you know, a head that you could identify. But really,

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Speaker 1: we're really talking about a hitchhiking computer. It's just a

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Speaker 1: hitchhiking computer that was in a more or less static

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Speaker 1: robot body. It's simple, but they found a way to

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Speaker 1: anthropomorphosize this thing to the point where people look at

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Speaker 1: it and said, oh, that's kind of cute. Yeah, because

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Speaker 1: it has a torso. It's got arms and legs, and

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Speaker 1: arms and legs don't move the torso static torsos a

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Speaker 1: bucket um literally and literally a bucket. It does have

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Speaker 1: a cellar panels that are arranged on the outside of

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Speaker 1: the bucket, so that's one of the ways that the

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Speaker 1: robot gets electricity. The other is that it will ask

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Speaker 1: people to plug it into the a lighter socket on

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Speaker 1: a in a car. Yeah, it's only about three ft tall,

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Speaker 1: so it's very small. Waterproof, which is a kind of surprise.

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Speaker 1: It's waterproof, but it is well and also, I mean

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Speaker 1: it wears waterproof boots. Every single article, every article without fail,

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Speaker 1: talks about the fact that it wears Wellies. Wellington's the

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Speaker 1: brand name boot. Yeah, okay, like a like a rubber boot.

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Speaker 1: It's a named after the Duke of Wellington. Well It's

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Speaker 1: arms are what pool noodles, So you know, it's not

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Speaker 1: it's not like they went to two great lengths to

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Speaker 1: try to make this thing look human or anything like that.

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Speaker 1: But it does have arms and legs. It does have

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Speaker 1: a face as you mentioned, has um a almost looks

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Speaker 1: like a tupperware container on the top looks like a hat.

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Speaker 1: A beret or something like that. UM that's designed to

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Speaker 1: to actually protect the the electronics, the tablet computer that

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Speaker 1: is running the software that the robot so used likely

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Speaker 1: part of the waterproofing overall, I guess, and UM it's

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Speaker 1: GPS equipped. The thing weighs about twenty five pounds total,

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Speaker 1: so it's not that heavy. Really has its own built

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Speaker 1: in seat that it's like a car seat almost that well,

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Speaker 1: it is a car seat from a kid's car seat

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Speaker 1: that you can then put in your car and buckle

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Speaker 1: in so that secure when it's in there, it's not

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Speaker 1: gonna fly around the vehicle loose, you know, it's something

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Speaker 1: were to happen, right And and it's legs are not powered,

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Speaker 1: they are statics. So the way that you would set

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Speaker 1: this up when you are done carrying it as far

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Speaker 1: as you want to carry it is the seat also

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Speaker 1: has essentially a lever that can fold down into a

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Speaker 1: tripod like position, so the two legs act as two

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Speaker 1: of the legs of the tripod. This lever access the

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Speaker 1: third and if you were to pick it up, you

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Speaker 1: could fold that arm back up against the seat, so

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Speaker 1: that would allow you to put it into your vehicle

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Speaker 1: and secure the car seat, and as if you were

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Speaker 1: in an area that you wanted to set it up

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Speaker 1: on the side of the road that was you know,

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Speaker 1: like a field or something where there's nowhere for it

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Speaker 1: to sit, like on a bench or maybe on a

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Speaker 1: wall or something right the right and uh, you know,

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Speaker 1: like I said, it was running on essentially a tablet

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Speaker 1: PC that if you looked at all the equipment according

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Speaker 1: to the website, Uh, it cost about a thousand dollars,

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Speaker 1: maybe a little less. And that was a calculated decision.

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Speaker 1: They wanted that. They, being the team behind this, and

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Speaker 1: I'll talk about them in a second, wanted the robot

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Speaker 1: to be inexpensive enough where it would not be an

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Speaker 1: obvious target for someone to just steal the components out

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Speaker 1: of it. They wanted it to be uh, accessible, They

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Speaker 1: wanted it to be cute. They wanted it to be

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Speaker 1: something that people would want to interact with and to

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Speaker 1: have enough of an ability to have interactions, including holding

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Speaker 1: a conversation sort of ye kind of yeah, we're being

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Speaker 1: real generous with the term conversation. That's one thing that

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Speaker 1: you and I talked about off air is that every

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Speaker 1: conversation we've ever seen with this, you know that between

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Speaker 1: a human and hitchpot. It was awkward to say the least.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it was it kind of it kind of

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Speaker 1: picked up on what what the even was saying, but

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Speaker 1: not entirely didn't quite get the gist of the conversation,

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Speaker 1: and it would respond in an awkward way. Yeah, it had.

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Speaker 1: It had a microphone so it could pick up on

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Speaker 1: what people were saying, and a speaker so it could

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Speaker 1: then return and communicate back. And a big problem with

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Speaker 1: that was probably the the vast array of dialects that

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Speaker 1: was dealing with, right, and just the fact that our

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Speaker 1: spoken language is incredibly plastic and adaptive and there are

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Speaker 1: so many different ways to say the same thing that

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Speaker 1: it can be difficult for you know, It's like a

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Speaker 1: non native speaker of any language, you might be taught

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Speaker 1: how to say or ask for something a very specific way,

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Speaker 1: and that specific way is still correct, it's not incorrect,

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Speaker 1: but it's just one way to say that, to express

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Speaker 1: that thought. And in most languages there are lots of

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Speaker 1: different ways to express the same thought, and you're familiar

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Speaker 1: with one of them, so if anyone comes up to

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Speaker 1: you and uses a different one, you could be completely confused.

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Speaker 1: Even though you know, one way of saying it that

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Speaker 1: you understand all these other ways don't. Same thing with computers.

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Speaker 1: If you train a computer using machine learning on what

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Speaker 1: and phrases mean, that's great, the computer might be able

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Speaker 1: to identify that. But if someone were to ask for

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Speaker 1: the same sort of thing but word it slightly differently,

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Speaker 1: that could be enough to throw a computer off, because

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Speaker 1: these are subtle things that we humans can intuitively grasp,

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Speaker 1: but computers lack intuition. And there's not only the word problem.

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Speaker 1: There's also the way that it's said. So the you know,

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Speaker 1: the the regions, zones, like you know, here in the South,

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Speaker 1: people talk different than they do in the Pacific, or

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Speaker 1: the Pacific Northwest, or the or the Northeast or you know,

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Speaker 1: the the Northeast talk faster than I can hear. So

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Speaker 1: it's different. It's different, not only um, you know, just

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Speaker 1: the different languages, like of course this thing had to

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Speaker 1: learn German, had to learn, uh, you know, Dutch. I

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Speaker 1: guess I had no French to get through all of Canada. Sure, yeah,

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Speaker 1: exactly right, and of course English, and you know, and

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Speaker 1: not only that, but the different dialects along the way.

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Speaker 1: Sure yeah, so lots of challenges here. But the whole

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Speaker 1: goal was not The goal really, I don't think was

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Speaker 1: to have a robot hitchhike from one end of Canada

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Speaker 1: to another. That was sort of the the face of

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Speaker 1: this project. The actual goal was more of an artistic

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Speaker 1: expression as well as an experiment in robot human interactions,

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Speaker 1: because the thing could have been picked up right at

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Speaker 1: the right at the start, right the very first day,

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Speaker 1: and driven all the way across by one person, you know,

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Speaker 1: on a long haul truck or something, and what would

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Speaker 1: be the adventure and that what would be the fun.

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Speaker 1: The idea was that this relies on human interaction and

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Speaker 1: human kindness to get this thing from one place to

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Speaker 1: the next, kind of to take care of this thing

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Speaker 1: and along the way have kind of a checklist of

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Speaker 1: things that they wanted to do. Now I don't know

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Speaker 1: if the Canadian trip had a checklist. I don't think

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Speaker 1: it did. Uh. The USA trip did have a checklist,

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Speaker 1: which was was started um. But the Canadian trip um,

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Speaker 1: you know, just for instance, you know, in twenty six

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Speaker 1: days to get across um, you know, the entire nation there.

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Speaker 1: But it did things like a tend to wedding, um,

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Speaker 1: it was dancing in Saskatchewan. It it met some of

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Speaker 1: the Canadians First Nations people, uh, some of the Aboriginal

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Speaker 1: people um that were um, you know, native to Canada.

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Speaker 1: And it did all kinds of things. I mean, it

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Speaker 1: went to you know, parks, it went to scenic locations,

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Speaker 1: and all the time it was snapping photographs because this

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Speaker 1: programmed to take a photo every twenty minutes, right, and

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Speaker 1: it could tweet out that information. So it's interactions were

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Speaker 1: uh doubled, and that it could interact in person to

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Speaker 1: people who are around it and actually attempt to have

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Speaker 1: a conversation and interject. In fact, I read one report

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Speaker 1: of people who had picked up the robot and they said, yeah,

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Speaker 1: it was weird. There were three of us in the

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Speaker 1: car plus the robot, and we would the three of

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Speaker 1: us be talking, and the robot would interject and interrupt

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Speaker 1: us and often say something that is completely not connected

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Speaker 1: to any of the rest of the conversation. And I thought,

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Speaker 1: I've written in cars with people like that, you know,

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Speaker 1: just just someone just pipes up with a total non

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Speaker 1: sequitor and you think, are are we in the car

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Speaker 1: with a crazy person? What's that have to do with

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Speaker 1: the price of eggs? In China. Yeah, something along those lines,

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Speaker 1: and so, uh, you know that that was definitely part

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Speaker 1: of it. I think there was certainly an an element

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Speaker 1: of let's see how humans treat robots and also let's

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Speaker 1: see how we can design a robot that from the

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Speaker 1: get go is meant to interact with humans. Because one

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Speaker 1: of the things we're starting to see increasingly in technology

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Speaker 1: is the robotic sphere and the human sphere colliding like

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Speaker 1: there and and by design, we want robots in our lives.

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Speaker 1: People have named their room bas for example, they have

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Speaker 1: given their room bas uh. You know, they've they've imprinted

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Speaker 1: upon them this idea of a personality. Something happens to

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Speaker 1: that room, but you know how sad you're going to be, Well,

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Speaker 1: I'd be sad to be out you know two bucks.

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Speaker 1: That's another thing that there's that side. But you know,

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Speaker 1: if something happens to Fred, yeah, don't name your room bot, right. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: But that's true, is a lot of people do name

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Speaker 1: these these robots. People get emotionally invested in these machines.

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Speaker 1: And so there is this growing field of research of

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Speaker 1: human robotic interactions. How can we one capitalize on this

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Speaker 1: need for humans to have an emotional attachment to these

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Speaker 1: these otherwise emotionless beings, these beings that lack of consciousness,

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Speaker 1: lack emotions. How can we capitalize on that so that

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Speaker 1: the interactions are are useful and meaningful in some way,

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Speaker 1: even if it's only meaningful for the human. If it's

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Speaker 1: impossible for it to be meaningful for the robot, that's okay,

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Speaker 1: if it's still meaningful for the human. Or how do

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Speaker 1: we design robots that are specifically meant to not evoke

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Speaker 1: that reaction, because it would be just you know, another

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Speaker 1: distraction from whatever the robot is supposed to do. Sure,

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Speaker 1: or it maybe that whatever the robot is supposed to

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Speaker 1: do is inherently dangerous and should not you know, you

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Speaker 1: don't want to encourage human interaction if if a robot

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Speaker 1: is meant to do something like dig into rubble, you

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Speaker 1: don't want people to, you know, worry about the robot.

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Speaker 1: The whole reason the robots digging into rubble in the

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Speaker 1: first place is likely to look for survivors in the

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Speaker 1: in the fall out of a building collapse or something,

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Speaker 1: or well just to prevent having to have a human

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Speaker 1: do the same thing. Yeah, exactly, Yeah, yeah, and that's

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Speaker 1: really I mean, the way that a lot of robotics

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Speaker 1: experts see robots really taking off, at least in the

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Speaker 1: near future, is they will be used to do jobs

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Speaker 1: that are either too dirty, dull, or dangerous for humans.

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Speaker 1: So jobs that are incredibly repetitive and don't require much thought,

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Speaker 1: robots are perfect for that. Also, robots don't sustain like

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Speaker 1: repetitive injuries. You know, you do have to continuously main

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Speaker 1: tame them. You can't just expect them to work forever.

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Speaker 1: But they don't get carbal tunnel syndrome for unless right,

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Speaker 1: and we we will get to that point eventually. And

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Speaker 1: dangerous obviously, you don't want, you know, you would want

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Speaker 1: to be able to use a robot in a dangerous

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Speaker 1: situation so that you're not putting human life at risk,

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Speaker 1: but with the goal of being able to use it

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Speaker 1: again and again and again. Right. So, but those robots

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Speaker 1: probably don't need to have a lot of human interactivity.

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Speaker 1: They're designed to do something that they're replacing a human,

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Speaker 1: not interacting with a human. But at the same time,

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Speaker 1: we are seeing this growing industry of robots that are

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Speaker 1: designed to be around us in our daily lives, either

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Speaker 1: as a telepresence style robot where the robot is standing

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Speaker 1: in as a surrogate for an actual person, and you

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Speaker 1: might have like an iPad or something like that as

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Speaker 1: a head where someone can skype in. And this is

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Speaker 1: always creepy whenever I see it done anywhere, but I

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Speaker 1: keep being told it's the way of the future. I

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Speaker 1: have never actually interacted directly with one in an official capacity,

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Speaker 1: but I've seen them at CS. Now I'm gonna I'm

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Speaker 1: gonna make a reference to something that I have nothing

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Speaker 1: I have no personal interaction with. I believe my wife

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Speaker 1: was telling me about a movie recently called Her and

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Speaker 1: it was a man who fell in love with the

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Speaker 1: operating system and uh and the voice that that that

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Speaker 1: that operating system had. Now I can see something like that.

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Speaker 1: Let's say you get a refrigerator, and refrigerators have screens

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Speaker 1: on them. Now ours does hear it how stuff works,

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Speaker 1: And it's got a screen but doesn't talk to us,

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Speaker 1: But it does have a screen. You can interact, and

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Speaker 1: there's a lot of different things you can do with

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Speaker 1: that screen, including putting a wacky background image on it,

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Speaker 1: as someone did when they put in the UM, the

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Speaker 1: symbol for the evil organization from loss Um. I could

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Speaker 1: see if if it was talking to you every day

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Speaker 1: and had a likable voice, something that you felt comfortable

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Speaker 1: interacting with. Um that you know, I could see somebody

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Speaker 1: saying why I'd be sad to get rid of that

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Speaker 1: refrigerator in in five years? Well, especially if you would

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Speaker 1: come home after a long day and the refrigerator says, Hi,

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Speaker 1: would you like a frosty adult beverage? I mean, you

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Speaker 1: know you're gonna have a bond with that machine immediately. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: So but there there's this whole discipline that's coming up,

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Speaker 1: like how do we how do we define these interactions?

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Speaker 1: How do we shape them? Uh? And a lot of

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Speaker 1: it means you have to do study on both sides.

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Speaker 1: You have to do a study on the robot side

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Speaker 1: like what works and what doesn't, and you actually have

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Speaker 1: to study human psychology how do humans respond to robots

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Speaker 1: and at what point do humans end up treating robots

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Speaker 1: as if they are alive, as if they're living creatures.

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Speaker 1: And for a while people were thinking, um, well, the

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Speaker 1: robot's gonna need to look like something biological already, Like

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Speaker 1: it's gonna have to be like a robot dog or

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Speaker 1: a robot you know, android type person almost like like

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Speaker 1: a crash test dummy where it looks like a human

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Speaker 1: but you can tell it's not a real human. And

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Speaker 1: it turns out that's not necessarily true, because as we've

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Speaker 1: already said, people have been naming the room bus. People

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Speaker 1: get emotionally invested. It turns out that we are if

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Speaker 1: it looks animate, if it appears to behave based upon

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Speaker 1: its own decisions, whether it's true or not. If it

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Speaker 1: if it looks like it's doing that, we start to

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Speaker 1: kind of in our minds give it these qualities. So

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Speaker 1: a lot of this really was studying that, like this

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Speaker 1: idea of the way people and machines are interacting and

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Speaker 1: how that is becoming defined over time and what we

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Speaker 1: might need to think about in that respect, and also

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Speaker 1: just kind of a you know, is a happy story

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Speaker 1: about how people find joy in uh, a silly I mean,

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Speaker 1: really you get down to it, it's a silly robot,

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Speaker 1: not a bad robot. It's a silly robot. And and

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Speaker 1: the the experience of discovery and sharing that with other people.

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Speaker 1: That was a big part of this project too, and

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Speaker 1: it was really successful for three out of the four

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Speaker 1: big things that it did. The one that wasn't so

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Speaker 1: successful and was the unit at States. So um really quickly,

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Speaker 1: before we get into the US stuff, I was going

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Speaker 1: to talk about some of the folks who designed and

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Speaker 1: came up with this idea. Uh. The two leads who

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Speaker 1: first came up with the concept for Hitchbot, we're David

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Speaker 1: Harris Smith and Franca Zeller. And I probably a mispronouncing

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Speaker 1: Mrs Ellery heard Fraca Zella. It's a name that I am.

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Speaker 1: I was not familiar with, totally new for me. And

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Speaker 1: they're out of port Credit, Ontario. Yes, and uh. Smith

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Speaker 1: is assistant professor at McMaster University in the Department of

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Speaker 1: Communication Studies. Zeller is an assistant professor in the School

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Speaker 1: of Professional Communication at Ryerson University Communications professors. Now, this

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Speaker 1: makes perfect sense because they're they're fishing for the way

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Speaker 1: people interact with this. They want to find out exactly

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Speaker 1: how people respond to this, how how in response to them. Uh,

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Speaker 1: this interaction is really really interesting for these people in particular,

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Speaker 1: I'm sure right. And Zella she got her PhD. Her

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Speaker 1: thesis was on human robot interaction. Then, yeah, and they

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Speaker 1: were joined by a lot of other people. I've just

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Speaker 1: got a couple of names I'll mention, but the team

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Speaker 1: itself is quite large. You can actually read up on

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Speaker 1: all of them on the website. It's funny because the

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Speaker 1: way the website is written, it's written from Hitchbot's perspective.

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Speaker 1: So hitch it's Hitchbot saying, oh, this is the person

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Speaker 1: who helped me learn how to talk and it's very cute.

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Speaker 1: This is the person that takes care of my electronics. Yes,

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Speaker 1: on a daily basis. I think they're about fourteen or

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Speaker 1: fifteen people on that team. It's big. It's a big team.

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Speaker 1: Is a large team, not just the two two leads here, right,

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Speaker 1: So you've got people like a colin or a gadget

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Speaker 1: who has a develop ro hitchbot, and he's also a

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Speaker 1: McMaster University student. He helped design and test hitchbot to

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Speaker 1: make sure it would be able to withstand the various

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Speaker 1: environments that it would encounter. Keep in mind, this was

385
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Speaker 1: summer in Canada, so it wasn't going to have to

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Speaker 1: deal with a Canadian winter. Beautiful Canadian summer. Yeah, it's

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Speaker 1: a little bit different from the Atlanta summers. Slightly slightly

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Speaker 1: less warm and humid, about sixty degrees cooler fahrenheit that

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Speaker 1: is um not Celsius. That would be pretty incredible. Uh.

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Speaker 1: So then you had Davin Bigelow, who was an undergraduate

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Speaker 1: student at McMaster who worked on the conversational skills of

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Speaker 1: this robot. Karen Reveal birth Fish, who was another person

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Speaker 1: who worked on Hitchbot's language skills. Dominic kal Kinn whose

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Speaker 1: undergraduate student at McMaster whose job was to monitor Hitchbot's

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Speaker 1: status and make sure the robot was okay. So again,

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Speaker 1: the robot was fitted with GPS and three G capability

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Speaker 1: to essentially report back home saying here's where I'm at,

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Speaker 1: being given time in every twenty minutes, he's getting a

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Speaker 1: photograph sent from this robot to him to kind of

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00:21:48,920 --> 00:21:51,720
Speaker 1: update status where he is right now. Yeah, and then

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Speaker 1: uh there was the big brother robot to Hitchbot, culture

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Speaker 1: Bot k U L t U R. But this was

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Speaker 1: this was a robot that preceded Hitchbot. This was a

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00:22:04,160 --> 00:22:09,439
Speaker 1: different human robot interaction experiment. Culture bots job was to

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Speaker 1: attend artistic exhibitions, take images of what was going on,

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00:22:15,520 --> 00:22:19,199
Speaker 1: tweet them, and critique them. It was a robotic art

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Speaker 1: critic interesting anyway, so it would actually do the critique

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Speaker 1: on the fly They're like right there at the event.

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Speaker 1: That's how it was described. But I didn't read enough

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Speaker 1: into it to find out how this actually worked. Like,

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Speaker 1: I don't know if it was capable of stringing together

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Speaker 1: any words just based upon what it was seeing. I

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Speaker 1: don't know if it had human intervention where the human

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Speaker 1: was the one actually providing the caption. I don't know

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Speaker 1: the answer to that, but I do know that that

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Speaker 1: was essentially another project that was taken Uh. That was

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Speaker 1: that was being performed by much of the same team,

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Speaker 1: and kind of the hitch Bot was kind of the

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Speaker 1: next step, not directly connected. It was just one of

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Speaker 1: those idea is that that Smith and Zelleri came up

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Speaker 1: with that they thought was a really interesting concept. So

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00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:12,240
Speaker 1: after going through Canada, they went to Germany. It had

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00:23:12,320 --> 00:23:14,359
Speaker 1: a lot of adventures in Germany, went to castles, went

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00:23:14,359 --> 00:23:17,840
Speaker 1: to another wedding. There's a great picture of a bride

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Speaker 1: giving Hitchpot a little kiss. Yeah and um and uh.

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00:23:24,400 --> 00:23:27,479
Speaker 1: Lots of stories of people. All of Hitchbot's journeys, by

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00:23:27,480 --> 00:23:30,240
Speaker 1: the way, are chronicled on the website. There are blog

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Speaker 1: posts that tell what happened on each day. Some of

429
00:23:32,840 --> 00:23:36,720
Speaker 1: them also have embedded videos of the stuff that went

430
00:23:36,800 --> 00:23:41,960
Speaker 1: on and also photographs. It's very cute. Then after Germany,

431
00:23:42,000 --> 00:23:44,919
Speaker 1: they went to the Netherlands for a brief while in

432
00:23:44,960 --> 00:23:48,879
Speaker 1: the summer, early summer, for a bunch of activities and

433
00:23:48,960 --> 00:23:52,200
Speaker 1: events that I cannot pronounce. Yes, I'm not even going

434
00:23:52,240 --> 00:23:56,240
Speaker 1: to attempt a series of festivals with unpronounceable names. And

435
00:23:56,280 --> 00:23:59,000
Speaker 1: then at least for the American tongue, and then uh,

436
00:23:59,000 --> 00:24:01,240
Speaker 1: and then it moved over to the good old us

437
00:24:01,320 --> 00:24:03,560
Speaker 1: of A. Yeah, started in Boston, right, it was gonna

438
00:24:03,560 --> 00:24:06,520
Speaker 1: go from We're gonna go from Boston to San Francisco.

439
00:24:06,600 --> 00:24:08,359
Speaker 1: That was the goal. That was the goal. And it

440
00:24:08,400 --> 00:24:11,399
Speaker 1: also had a bucket list, which is appropriate since it

441
00:24:11,480 --> 00:24:13,560
Speaker 1: was a bucket. I have the bucket list in front

442
00:24:13,600 --> 00:24:16,920
Speaker 1: of me now. Uh, well, the bucket list has a

443
00:24:16,960 --> 00:24:18,920
Speaker 1: couple of check marks on it. Now. One check mark

444
00:24:19,080 --> 00:24:21,719
Speaker 1: was um, uh, to do the wave of a sports

445
00:24:21,720 --> 00:24:24,520
Speaker 1: game anywhere, it didn't matter where it was to do that. Uh.

446
00:24:24,560 --> 00:24:26,280
Speaker 1: The other one was to see the lights in Times

447
00:24:26,280 --> 00:24:28,920
Speaker 1: Square of course in New York City. And there were

448
00:24:28,960 --> 00:24:30,920
Speaker 1: other there's other stuff along the way, and I'll just

449
00:24:30,960 --> 00:24:33,639
Speaker 1: mention a few of these because there's probably again fifty

450
00:24:33,720 --> 00:24:35,760
Speaker 1: different things in Grand Canyon has to be on there.

451
00:24:36,359 --> 00:24:40,159
Speaker 1: Let's see Grand Canyon. Um uh, you know, I'll have

452
00:24:40,200 --> 00:24:42,879
Speaker 1: to check out. Yes, it does. See the jaw dropping

453
00:24:42,960 --> 00:24:44,679
Speaker 1: views of the Grand Canyon. That is one. Yes in

454
00:24:44,720 --> 00:24:47,800
Speaker 1: Arizona um posed with the Lincoln statue in d C.

455
00:24:48,040 --> 00:24:50,960
Speaker 1: Was another one. Tan at Myrtle Beach Um experienced the

456
00:24:50,960 --> 00:24:53,399
Speaker 1: magic of Walt Disney World in Florida. So it was

457
00:24:53,480 --> 00:24:57,119
Speaker 1: going to need to actually go south along the Eastern Seaboard.

458
00:24:57,160 --> 00:24:59,119
Speaker 1: I mean for people who are not from the United

459
00:24:59,119 --> 00:25:01,280
Speaker 1: States and aren't famili or with our geography, if you

460
00:25:01,320 --> 00:25:04,119
Speaker 1: were going Boston to San Francisco, you would essentially be

461
00:25:04,160 --> 00:25:07,840
Speaker 1: setting your sites west. Yeah, just do west, Just go yeah,

462
00:25:07,960 --> 00:25:11,960
Speaker 1: just go west, and just keep on adjusting your your

463
00:25:12,160 --> 00:25:15,840
Speaker 1: your journey in orders for you to get to California exactly.

464
00:25:15,920 --> 00:25:18,399
Speaker 1: But with this list, it means that you would have

465
00:25:18,440 --> 00:25:21,119
Speaker 1: need you first would need to go south, because you

466
00:25:21,119 --> 00:25:23,520
Speaker 1: would have to go south from Boston to well to

467
00:25:23,520 --> 00:25:25,240
Speaker 1: get to New York City, but also to d C

468
00:25:25,760 --> 00:25:28,800
Speaker 1: and to Florida. And then this goes all over the place,

469
00:25:28,800 --> 00:25:30,440
Speaker 1: I mean all over the Midwest. So there are things

470
00:25:30,480 --> 00:25:33,879
Speaker 1: to do in Illinois like explore the cloud gate and

471
00:25:33,960 --> 00:25:37,440
Speaker 1: Millennium Park, um stand under the Gateway arch in Missouri.

472
00:25:38,040 --> 00:25:40,000
Speaker 1: Just all kinds of things like this, And again it's

473
00:25:40,040 --> 00:25:42,680
Speaker 1: a it's a relatively long list and with many different states,

474
00:25:42,720 --> 00:25:48,400
Speaker 1: many different activities, and checked off two items on that list. Yeah,

475
00:25:48,560 --> 00:25:51,399
Speaker 1: And the reason that only two items were checked off

476
00:25:51,520 --> 00:25:56,800
Speaker 1: is that Hitchbot met and untimely demise at the hands

477
00:25:56,800 --> 00:26:00,640
Speaker 1: of a vandal maliciously murdered. Yes, decapitate it. Yeah, can

478
00:26:00,640 --> 00:26:02,439
Speaker 1: we just can you say murdered when it's a robot?

479
00:26:02,480 --> 00:26:06,160
Speaker 1: I mean it was disassembled. Yeah, that's what Johnny five

480
00:26:06,240 --> 00:26:10,040
Speaker 1: was scared about. No disassembled Johnny five. Um. Yeah, So

481
00:26:10,040 --> 00:26:12,480
Speaker 1: I'm guessing disassembled is probably the best way of putting it.

482
00:26:12,640 --> 00:26:15,640
Speaker 1: At some point, you figure there's gonna be another robot

483
00:26:16,440 --> 00:26:19,159
Speaker 1: getting a delivery with a cardboard box and it'll just

484
00:26:19,200 --> 00:26:23,240
Speaker 1: be what's in the box, uh, and they'll have the

485
00:26:23,320 --> 00:26:26,959
Speaker 1: binary uh code for seven as the title of that.

486
00:26:27,520 --> 00:26:30,240
Speaker 1: Very clever, clever. All right, So this is a weird,

487
00:26:30,440 --> 00:26:33,600
Speaker 1: weird ending. So um it is the night prior to this,

488
00:26:33,640 --> 00:26:35,680
Speaker 1: so it's it's what the end of July, right, because

489
00:26:35,720 --> 00:26:37,840
Speaker 1: I think this all went down on August one, as

490
00:26:37,840 --> 00:26:40,919
Speaker 1: when we heard exactly so July thirty one, Um, I

491
00:26:40,920 --> 00:26:44,320
Speaker 1: think it was a Saturday night and Hitchbot was in

492
00:26:44,640 --> 00:26:49,399
Speaker 1: Philadelphia and hang hanging out with a vlogger by the

493
00:26:49,480 --> 00:26:52,760
Speaker 1: name of Jesse Wellens. And it is well documented what

494
00:26:52,800 --> 00:26:54,800
Speaker 1: they did in their evening, during their evening because you know,

495
00:26:54,840 --> 00:26:58,600
Speaker 1: Wellen's being a YouTube YouTube personality. Um, it took him

496
00:26:58,680 --> 00:26:59,960
Speaker 1: on the town. You kind of did a lot of

497
00:27:00,000 --> 00:27:01,920
Speaker 1: different things with him. There were other people involved. There's

498
00:27:01,920 --> 00:27:06,080
Speaker 1: another guy um there with them. His name was Ed Bassmaster,

499
00:27:06,400 --> 00:27:09,800
Speaker 1: who was another YouTube personality, and they had kind of

500
00:27:09,840 --> 00:27:12,080
Speaker 1: a fun evening. Yeah. The whole the whole idea was

501
00:27:12,119 --> 00:27:14,359
Speaker 1: that this is a I mean it was. It was

502
00:27:14,600 --> 00:27:18,399
Speaker 1: elevating Hitchbot's profile and elevating the YouTuber's profile. This is

503
00:27:19,640 --> 00:27:22,960
Speaker 1: this is a dream come true for a YouTube personality

504
00:27:23,000 --> 00:27:26,280
Speaker 1: because it gives you the chance to interact with a

505
00:27:26,400 --> 00:27:31,600
Speaker 1: meme while it's at while it's happening, you're not capitalizing

506
00:27:31,600 --> 00:27:33,680
Speaker 1: it on afterwards. This is this is like a once

507
00:27:33,680 --> 00:27:36,240
Speaker 1: in a lifetime type deal. It can It can garner

508
00:27:36,320 --> 00:27:41,119
Speaker 1: you international attention immediately. It really would, because people were

509
00:27:41,160 --> 00:27:43,800
Speaker 1: tracking this thing. People were watching exactly where this is

510
00:27:43,840 --> 00:27:45,960
Speaker 1: and they knew, you know, when it was when it

511
00:27:46,000 --> 00:27:47,439
Speaker 1: was in their city, they knew where it was, they

512
00:27:47,440 --> 00:27:50,280
Speaker 1: could walk. I mean, if it said it's been sitting

513
00:27:50,320 --> 00:27:52,800
Speaker 1: here at this corner of you know, Maine and Elm

514
00:27:52,840 --> 00:27:55,240
Speaker 1: Street for the last twenty minutes, you could go down

515
00:27:55,240 --> 00:27:56,719
Speaker 1: to Maine and Elm Street and look at this thing,

516
00:27:56,800 --> 00:27:58,200
Speaker 1: or pick it up and give it a ride yourself

517
00:27:58,200 --> 00:28:00,760
Speaker 1: if you wanted to. In fact, the early part of

518
00:28:00,760 --> 00:28:02,760
Speaker 1: the trip we didn't talk about this, but it took

519
00:28:02,800 --> 00:28:04,960
Speaker 1: a long time for it to leave the Boston area.

520
00:28:05,040 --> 00:28:09,119
Speaker 1: People in Boston, we're taking it to different parks and

521
00:28:09,200 --> 00:28:11,520
Speaker 1: different you know, they're kicking out on boats and things

522
00:28:11,520 --> 00:28:13,960
Speaker 1: and taking you know, selfies with it, and um, it

523
00:28:14,040 --> 00:28:16,159
Speaker 1: took I think it was more than seven days for

524
00:28:16,240 --> 00:28:18,359
Speaker 1: it to get out of the Boston area, which I

525
00:28:18,400 --> 00:28:22,639
Speaker 1: think the team would have found wonderful because it was

526
00:28:23,160 --> 00:28:26,920
Speaker 1: what was happening was the robot was gathering a series

527
00:28:27,119 --> 00:28:31,440
Speaker 1: of rich experiences, and the people were gathering the experience

528
00:28:31,440 --> 00:28:34,000
Speaker 1: of interacting with the robot, which was the purpose for

529
00:28:34,040 --> 00:28:37,359
Speaker 1: this thing in the first place. So having it take

530
00:28:37,440 --> 00:28:40,320
Speaker 1: a really long time to get off any area would

531
00:28:40,320 --> 00:28:44,920
Speaker 1: not be considered a a an impediment on the behalf

532
00:28:44,920 --> 00:28:48,280
Speaker 1: of the people running the project. They I'm sure loved it.

533
00:28:48,360 --> 00:28:50,240
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, in no way is that a failure. That's

534
00:28:50,240 --> 00:28:53,040
Speaker 1: a that's a wind as fact. So you know, here

535
00:28:53,040 --> 00:28:55,080
Speaker 1: it is after this fun evening on the thirty feet

536
00:28:55,280 --> 00:28:58,400
Speaker 1: and they placed it on the bench middle of the night.

537
00:28:58,440 --> 00:29:00,560
Speaker 1: You know, it's late at night of course dark. They

538
00:29:00,560 --> 00:29:02,280
Speaker 1: placed it on a park bench, or not a park bench,

539
00:29:02,320 --> 00:29:05,280
Speaker 1: but a bench on the city street there. And that's it.

540
00:29:05,320 --> 00:29:08,240
Speaker 1: I mean, you see a cab driver arrived, think uh.

541
00:29:08,280 --> 00:29:10,200
Speaker 1: And and that's it. I mean at the end of

542
00:29:10,200 --> 00:29:15,160
Speaker 1: the video interaction with with Hitchbot at that point. And

543
00:29:15,240 --> 00:29:17,520
Speaker 1: the next day we wake up to the news that

544
00:29:17,760 --> 00:29:22,040
Speaker 1: Hitchbot has been murdered. Yes, its head had been removed

545
00:29:22,080 --> 00:29:24,320
Speaker 1: from its torso and its arms ripped off. And I

546
00:29:24,400 --> 00:29:27,760
Speaker 1: gotta ask you this, when you saw the photograph of Hitchbot,

547
00:29:27,840 --> 00:29:30,080
Speaker 1: because now this is a dramatic photograph, I mean it

548
00:29:30,320 --> 00:29:33,400
Speaker 1: did it did look a lot like a true crime

549
00:29:33,440 --> 00:29:36,600
Speaker 1: scene photo in that uh and that horrific as this maybe,

550
00:29:36,720 --> 00:29:39,880
Speaker 1: I mean Hitchbot's arms were pulled off and placed above

551
00:29:39,920 --> 00:29:41,840
Speaker 1: its head and um, he was laying in a pile

552
00:29:41,880 --> 00:29:44,760
Speaker 1: of leaves. It's headless at this point. I mean they're

553
00:29:44,800 --> 00:29:47,200
Speaker 1: they're real crime scene photos like that. Now understand that

554
00:29:47,280 --> 00:29:49,720
Speaker 1: this was starting, it was starting to feel like this

555
00:29:49,800 --> 00:29:52,720
Speaker 1: is this is the robot equivalent of a serial killer

556
00:29:52,720 --> 00:29:54,760
Speaker 1: a crime scene. So it was laid out in this

557
00:29:54,880 --> 00:29:58,800
Speaker 1: light like the staged manner, and uh and very very showy,

558
00:29:58,880 --> 00:30:02,320
Speaker 1: I guess. And and there were actually websites or you know,

559
00:30:02,320 --> 00:30:05,160
Speaker 1: blogs that would say, I don't really feel comfortable showing

560
00:30:05,160 --> 00:30:07,640
Speaker 1: you this image, which is weird because here it's just

561
00:30:07,680 --> 00:30:10,240
Speaker 1: a bucket with a couple of noodle arms and some

562
00:30:10,240 --> 00:30:13,120
Speaker 1: some rubber boots. Right, if you saw this same collection

563
00:30:13,160 --> 00:30:16,560
Speaker 1: of stuff and a hardware store, you would just think, oh,

564
00:30:16,680 --> 00:30:20,600
Speaker 1: somebody just left their random shopping right here. That's pretty funny.

565
00:30:20,600 --> 00:30:23,000
Speaker 1: I never thought of it that way. Yeah, it's like, yeah,

566
00:30:23,080 --> 00:30:25,440
Speaker 1: you could gather the stuff up at Walmart and put

567
00:30:25,480 --> 00:30:27,720
Speaker 1: it on the floor and not think twice about it.

568
00:30:27,760 --> 00:30:29,880
Speaker 1: But now that we know that this is this uh,

569
00:30:30,040 --> 00:30:33,320
Speaker 1: this this thing that they've created that has a name, uh,

570
00:30:33,440 --> 00:30:35,520
Speaker 1: now it takes on a different twist, doesn't it take.

571
00:30:35,560 --> 00:30:39,960
Speaker 1: It takes a different different feel, which, again you might say,

572
00:30:39,960 --> 00:30:43,520
Speaker 1: while while it brings the the that particular part of

573
00:30:43,520 --> 00:30:47,760
Speaker 1: the experiment to an end, it also says a lot, right.

574
00:30:47,880 --> 00:30:50,920
Speaker 1: It also tells you a lot about robot human interactions

575
00:30:50,920 --> 00:30:52,840
Speaker 1: and where they can go. It sure does, and you're

576
00:30:53,040 --> 00:30:54,640
Speaker 1: and you know right away you would think, well, of

577
00:30:54,680 --> 00:30:57,760
Speaker 1: course Wellens and bath Master have done this. That's that's

578
00:30:57,800 --> 00:30:59,760
Speaker 1: the two people, the two characters that were involved at

579
00:30:59,800 --> 00:31:03,560
Speaker 1: this last and then well and Behold three or day later,

580
00:31:03,680 --> 00:31:06,719
Speaker 1: two days later, whatever, there comes to this uh secret

581
00:31:06,800 --> 00:31:09,200
Speaker 1: surveillance video that was taken it in from a nearby

582
00:31:09,240 --> 00:31:11,840
Speaker 1: store that shows what happened. And someone wanders up in

583
00:31:11,880 --> 00:31:15,960
Speaker 1: a football jersey and just kick the living heck out

584
00:31:15,960 --> 00:31:19,200
Speaker 1: of this thing and destroys it. But it's it's shown

585
00:31:19,280 --> 00:31:22,400
Speaker 1: just on screen. We don't actually see the person kicking

586
00:31:22,400 --> 00:31:24,920
Speaker 1: and destroying this thing. We see him kicking in this

587
00:31:25,200 --> 00:31:28,760
Speaker 1: destroying the area of the bench that that that hitchbot

588
00:31:28,840 --> 00:31:33,040
Speaker 1: was known to be last, right, And then later everyone

589
00:31:33,120 --> 00:31:37,120
Speaker 1: was reporting that this video was essentially itself was staged. Yeah,

590
00:31:37,120 --> 00:31:38,760
Speaker 1: it's a fake video because you can go to that

591
00:31:38,800 --> 00:31:41,040
Speaker 1: scene and look exactly where it was taken from the

592
00:31:41,080 --> 00:31:44,360
Speaker 1: same perspective. There's no camera there. Yeah, so it's a fake.

593
00:31:44,760 --> 00:31:47,120
Speaker 1: And so what's going on here? Because they never have

594
00:31:47,240 --> 00:31:50,120
Speaker 1: found the head of hitchpot. I mean they never found

595
00:31:50,120 --> 00:31:53,360
Speaker 1: the I guess the CPU, the the thing that would

596
00:31:53,400 --> 00:31:56,560
Speaker 1: tell them PC. Yeah, that would tell them what is

597
00:31:56,760 --> 00:31:59,600
Speaker 1: what is happening? Like, what what happened to it? So

598
00:32:00,200 --> 00:32:04,280
Speaker 1: the best guess is just that somebody scavenged it. But

599
00:32:04,360 --> 00:32:06,400
Speaker 1: you know, in fact that the people behind the scenes,

600
00:32:06,440 --> 00:32:09,920
Speaker 1: the people behind the project, have said, we don't we

601
00:32:09,960 --> 00:32:12,440
Speaker 1: don't care to identify the person who did it or

602
00:32:12,480 --> 00:32:15,040
Speaker 1: why they did it. That's not important to what we

603
00:32:15,040 --> 00:32:17,880
Speaker 1: were trying to do with it taking photographs every twenty minutes.

604
00:32:17,920 --> 00:32:20,280
Speaker 1: I wonder if it captured something and send it without

605
00:32:20,360 --> 00:32:23,880
Speaker 1: the the the person you know, the purp knowing what

606
00:32:24,040 --> 00:32:27,080
Speaker 1: had happened, or if or if it just happened to

607
00:32:27,080 --> 00:32:29,760
Speaker 1: befall within that time frame between when the photos are

608
00:32:29,760 --> 00:32:33,040
Speaker 1: taken and didn't capture anything, and it's just like everybody else,

609
00:32:33,080 --> 00:32:36,080
Speaker 1: they don't know anything. It's possible either way, uh the

610
00:32:36,760 --> 00:32:38,960
Speaker 1: you know, of course, there was a huge reaction to

611
00:32:39,040 --> 00:32:42,720
Speaker 1: this both ways. Yeah. Yeah, there were people who were saying,

612
00:32:43,040 --> 00:32:45,920
Speaker 1: this is awful, this is the worst. You know, it

613
00:32:45,960 --> 00:32:50,160
Speaker 1: really reflects poorly on the United States that a robot

614
00:32:50,440 --> 00:32:53,840
Speaker 1: that was capable of safely traveling from one coast of

615
00:32:53,880 --> 00:32:56,560
Speaker 1: Canada to the other, and also in Germany and also

616
00:32:56,600 --> 00:33:00,440
Speaker 1: in the Netherlands, gets barely into its arny here in

617
00:33:00,440 --> 00:33:04,320
Speaker 1: the United States before it's destroyed seven days. Yeah, that

618
00:33:04,320 --> 00:33:11,760
Speaker 1: that was a telling um condemnation, if you will, of

619
00:33:11,800 --> 00:33:15,000
Speaker 1: the United States in general and Philadelphia in particular. You

620
00:33:15,040 --> 00:33:17,520
Speaker 1: can think of all the different comments that were immediately

621
00:33:17,600 --> 00:33:19,320
Speaker 1: happening afterwards. A lot of people would say like, well,

622
00:33:19,360 --> 00:33:22,400
Speaker 1: this happens to real hitchhikers as well, it happens to

623
00:33:22,480 --> 00:33:24,640
Speaker 1: people well, and then there were a ton of comments

624
00:33:24,640 --> 00:33:27,480
Speaker 1: that said, well, of course this happened in Philadelphia. Yeah,

625
00:33:27,480 --> 00:33:29,200
Speaker 1: there's that. And then there's another group of people that

626
00:33:29,240 --> 00:33:31,760
Speaker 1: would just respond with something like a big deal. It

627
00:33:31,800 --> 00:33:35,840
Speaker 1: was a bucket of bolts. Anyways, it was a machine. Yeah,

628
00:33:35,880 --> 00:33:40,120
Speaker 1: and I mean it's it's again. This ties right back

629
00:33:40,120 --> 00:33:43,960
Speaker 1: into that robotic human interactions. You might think the experiments

630
00:33:44,000 --> 00:33:46,720
Speaker 1: over I would argue that the team probably says, no,

631
00:33:46,920 --> 00:33:49,960
Speaker 1: it's still going. It doesn't matter if the robot is gone.

632
00:33:50,600 --> 00:33:55,840
Speaker 1: The continuing conversation around this is still informing us and

633
00:33:55,960 --> 00:34:00,800
Speaker 1: still giving us a lot more data about how humans

634
00:34:00,920 --> 00:34:06,120
Speaker 1: view robots, how we can identify with them, we can

635
00:34:06,160 --> 00:34:09,239
Speaker 1: imprint an emotional response to them, and in fact, they

636
00:34:09,239 --> 00:34:11,360
Speaker 1: have tweeted out, you know, continuing to tweet out with

637
00:34:11,360 --> 00:34:14,240
Speaker 1: the robots, saying the robots still loves people, still loved

638
00:34:14,239 --> 00:34:17,799
Speaker 1: its adventures, which I think needles it even more right.

639
00:34:17,840 --> 00:34:20,200
Speaker 1: You made the robot this innocent creature. It reminds me

640
00:34:20,239 --> 00:34:24,279
Speaker 1: a lot of when um the various Mars rovers when

641
00:34:24,280 --> 00:34:28,040
Speaker 1: they were like the Phoenix Lander, specifically, when it was

642
00:34:28,200 --> 00:34:30,360
Speaker 1: nearing the end of its mission, like it had gone

643
00:34:30,400 --> 00:34:34,080
Speaker 1: well beyond what the mission parameters were and it was

644
00:34:34,280 --> 00:34:36,680
Speaker 1: to a point where it was no longer going to

645
00:34:36,719 --> 00:34:40,080
Speaker 1: get enough sunlight to recharge its batteries, and it's essentially

646
00:34:40,080 --> 00:34:43,360
Speaker 1: the social media team at NASA sent out a final

647
00:34:43,440 --> 00:34:46,759
Speaker 1: tweet from the robot, keeping in mind the robot was

648
00:34:46,920 --> 00:34:49,680
Speaker 1: never tweeting directly. It was always a human being taking

649
00:34:49,760 --> 00:34:53,600
Speaker 1: data from the robot and then messaging it out. But

650
00:34:53,680 --> 00:34:56,960
Speaker 1: people identified with that robot, and when that last tweet

651
00:34:57,000 --> 00:35:01,440
Speaker 1: came out, people cried the watching this thing and they're thinking,

652
00:35:02,400 --> 00:35:04,359
Speaker 1: they're almost making it into like like it's like you're

653
00:35:04,400 --> 00:35:07,160
Speaker 1: watching a dog or something like that. That's that's dying.

654
00:35:07,320 --> 00:35:09,160
Speaker 1: That thing right there is dying and I'm watching it

655
00:35:09,239 --> 00:35:12,920
Speaker 1: happen and they're not understanding that. It's like, um, now,

656
00:35:12,960 --> 00:35:15,960
Speaker 1: I know it's way more complexness, but it's not like, well,

657
00:35:16,000 --> 00:35:18,000
Speaker 1: it's time to get a new toaster. You know, it's

658
00:35:18,040 --> 00:35:20,600
Speaker 1: not like a machine that you don't really have any

659
00:35:20,680 --> 00:35:24,960
Speaker 1: kind of personal um attachment to attachment. Like if my

660
00:35:25,080 --> 00:35:29,040
Speaker 1: microwave were to malfunction, I think a lot of pain

661
00:35:29,080 --> 00:35:30,120
Speaker 1: in the butt. I have to go and get a

662
00:35:30,120 --> 00:35:33,000
Speaker 1: new one. You're not gonna cry. No. But and again

663
00:35:33,040 --> 00:35:36,680
Speaker 1: that that goes right back into that idea of how

664
00:35:36,719 --> 00:35:40,040
Speaker 1: do robots and humans interact? And and we do need

665
00:35:40,080 --> 00:35:43,319
Speaker 1: to think about this because if we enter into a

666
00:35:43,360 --> 00:35:46,960
Speaker 1: world where we start treating these relationships is really casual.

667
00:35:47,480 --> 00:35:53,720
Speaker 1: When stuff happens and people go through an actual grieving experience,

668
00:35:54,880 --> 00:35:56,600
Speaker 1: we won't be ready for it. But if we know

669
00:35:56,640 --> 00:35:58,799
Speaker 1: ahead of time, we can say, all right, you know what,

670
00:35:58,920 --> 00:36:01,360
Speaker 1: we we know this about ourselves. This is something that

671
00:36:01,480 --> 00:36:06,239
Speaker 1: is innately human, at least for many people. Yeah, and

672
00:36:06,280 --> 00:36:09,279
Speaker 1: then you then you think, all right, now I can

673
00:36:09,360 --> 00:36:13,319
Speaker 1: I can design a product and market a product and

674
00:36:13,320 --> 00:36:18,080
Speaker 1: and do it in a responsible way that doesn't say

675
00:36:18,120 --> 00:36:21,279
Speaker 1: this is a weird you know, aberration or anything. No,

676
00:36:21,400 --> 00:36:23,640
Speaker 1: this is a very human kind of trait that a

677
00:36:23,640 --> 00:36:27,240
Speaker 1: lot of people have. Sure, whatever elicits from the humans,

678
00:36:27,239 --> 00:36:29,560
Speaker 1: that's what you're looking for, yeah, and so or at

679
00:36:29,600 --> 00:36:32,040
Speaker 1: least that you account for it. Even if that's not

680
00:36:32,120 --> 00:36:34,799
Speaker 1: the purpose of whatever it is you're making, you at

681
00:36:34,840 --> 00:36:38,400
Speaker 1: least account for the fact that it exists. And what's

682
00:36:38,400 --> 00:36:41,520
Speaker 1: interesting is that in the fallout of all of this,

683
00:36:42,480 --> 00:36:46,520
Speaker 1: we've seen not just the condemnation of an act of

684
00:36:46,640 --> 00:36:51,120
Speaker 1: violence against what seemed to be an innocent creature that

685
00:36:51,239 --> 00:36:55,160
Speaker 1: loved adventure and meeting people, or as Smith had called it,

686
00:36:55,440 --> 00:36:59,560
Speaker 1: a story collecting and story generating machine, like that was

687
00:36:59,600 --> 00:37:05,280
Speaker 1: its per us. We've also seen people come together to say,

688
00:37:05,520 --> 00:37:07,840
Speaker 1: we can't let this be the end of the story.

689
00:37:08,400 --> 00:37:10,480
Speaker 1: Um we there are a couple of different groups in

690
00:37:10,480 --> 00:37:16,120
Speaker 1: Philadelphia that had said, let us build a robot two

691
00:37:16,880 --> 00:37:20,040
Speaker 1: continue on in the spirit of Hitchbot, because I can't

692
00:37:20,120 --> 00:37:22,920
Speaker 1: stand for hitch Bot story to have ended in the

693
00:37:23,000 --> 00:37:26,040
Speaker 1: city that I call home. Let's let's let's have a

694
00:37:26,120 --> 00:37:28,680
Speaker 1: chance to make this right. Yeah, and we're gonna do it. Yeah.

695
00:37:28,840 --> 00:37:33,320
Speaker 1: So there are the tech community in Philadelphia has responded

696
00:37:33,360 --> 00:37:38,480
Speaker 1: with this and actually received some more or less tentative

697
00:37:38,800 --> 00:37:41,439
Speaker 1: thumbs up from some of the members of the hitch

698
00:37:41,480 --> 00:37:45,520
Speaker 1: bot team to give this a go. And so there's

699
00:37:45,560 --> 00:37:51,440
Speaker 1: a group um at that gathered at the hactory. The Hactory, Yeah,

700
00:37:51,480 --> 00:37:55,359
Speaker 1: it's like a factory hactory in West Philadelphia. Um, this

701
00:37:55,440 --> 00:37:59,000
Speaker 1: was this is very recent when this happened. And they

702
00:37:59,040 --> 00:38:00,880
Speaker 1: have come up with an eye yea that they're calling

703
00:38:00,920 --> 00:38:05,960
Speaker 1: the Philly love Bot. I don't like the sound of that. Yeah,

704
00:38:06,560 --> 00:38:10,080
Speaker 1: an odd choice for a name. Wait, but in the

705
00:38:10,120 --> 00:38:12,480
Speaker 1: brotherly love Okay, I don't want to I don't wanna

706
00:38:12,480 --> 00:38:14,480
Speaker 1: take this in the wrong direction or anything. But we're

707
00:38:14,480 --> 00:38:16,719
Speaker 1: not talking about a sex spot. Okay, okay, sex But

708
00:38:16,800 --> 00:38:18,200
Speaker 1: I didn't want to just come right out and say it.

709
00:38:18,239 --> 00:38:20,080
Speaker 1: But it seems like I've heard of products like this.

710
00:38:20,200 --> 00:38:23,319
Speaker 1: Yeah no, not not that kind of love. But this

711
00:38:23,400 --> 00:38:26,759
Speaker 1: is more of a love for all mankind and robots

712
00:38:26,840 --> 00:38:28,880
Speaker 1: kind of what kind of bought podcast if I wandered

713
00:38:28,880 --> 00:38:30,759
Speaker 1: into Yeah, no, I'm not going to do another bait

714
00:38:30,840 --> 00:38:32,960
Speaker 1: and switch on this sky. I already promised you I

715
00:38:33,000 --> 00:38:37,680
Speaker 1: wasn't gonna do not doing it this time, honest. So

716
00:38:38,160 --> 00:38:41,799
Speaker 1: they said that, Um, the idea they have is they

717
00:38:41,840 --> 00:38:45,520
Speaker 1: would build a robot that was designed to be passed

718
00:38:45,600 --> 00:38:47,920
Speaker 1: from one person to another, so it's not designed to

719
00:38:48,120 --> 00:38:53,200
Speaker 1: hitchhike from one location to another location. There's no location requirement,

720
00:38:53,320 --> 00:38:57,080
Speaker 1: at least in their initial approach. Instead, what they want

721
00:38:57,440 --> 00:39:00,279
Speaker 1: is to design a robot that when you, when you

722
00:39:00,320 --> 00:39:02,879
Speaker 1: take possession of it, when someone gives it to you,

723
00:39:02,880 --> 00:39:06,799
Speaker 1: you are tasked with performing a good deed, however you

724
00:39:06,880 --> 00:39:10,680
Speaker 1: define it, and it gets documented by the robot itself.

725
00:39:10,760 --> 00:39:13,240
Speaker 1: The robot you take along with you to do whatever

726
00:39:13,280 --> 00:39:16,560
Speaker 1: this good deed maybe idea, and then you pass it on.

727
00:39:16,640 --> 00:39:18,680
Speaker 1: It's like a pay it forward. You pass the robot

728
00:39:18,680 --> 00:39:21,160
Speaker 1: onto someone else and it is their duty now to

729
00:39:21,239 --> 00:39:23,640
Speaker 1: go out and do a good deed. And the idea

730
00:39:23,760 --> 00:39:27,480
Speaker 1: to kind of a tone for the horrible murder of

731
00:39:27,600 --> 00:39:32,200
Speaker 1: hitchbot by promoting good deeds, and the robot is the

732
00:39:32,320 --> 00:39:34,880
Speaker 1: kind of the almost like a totem for that. I

733
00:39:34,920 --> 00:39:36,320
Speaker 1: was going to say, I like this idea, but you

734
00:39:36,320 --> 00:39:38,520
Speaker 1: could do the same thing with a with a carved stick.

735
00:39:39,080 --> 00:39:42,200
Speaker 1: You could hand a carved stick to somebody. Now that

736
00:39:42,239 --> 00:39:44,200
Speaker 1: you're in possession of the stick, it's your duty to

737
00:39:44,239 --> 00:39:46,560
Speaker 1: do a good deed and pass the stick onto somebody else.

738
00:39:46,560 --> 00:39:48,880
Speaker 1: It doesn't have to be uh, something that collects and

739
00:39:48,880 --> 00:39:51,279
Speaker 1: gathers the information. But I guess that keeps everybody kind

740
00:39:51,280 --> 00:39:53,520
Speaker 1: of honest, doesn't it. Well? Yeah, and I think also,

741
00:39:53,640 --> 00:39:56,280
Speaker 1: you know you I. They also are planning on having

742
00:39:56,440 --> 00:39:59,239
Speaker 1: the robot, which I am going to guess it is

743
00:39:59,280 --> 00:40:01,480
Speaker 1: going to be another really another computer or not so

744
00:40:01,560 --> 00:40:03,839
Speaker 1: much a robot. They're going to have it capable of

745
00:40:03,880 --> 00:40:07,719
Speaker 1: interacting with you, just as the hitchbot could. So in

746
00:40:07,719 --> 00:40:11,360
Speaker 1: other words, there will still be that robot human interaction

747
00:40:11,440 --> 00:40:16,000
Speaker 1: element that will play a part in this experiment, but

748
00:40:16,760 --> 00:40:21,520
Speaker 1: the nature of the the overall experiment, the the perceived

749
00:40:21,680 --> 00:40:24,480
Speaker 1: purpose will be different. Now. Isn't it funny? Because I

750
00:40:24,560 --> 00:40:26,560
Speaker 1: wonder what some people are going to consider a good

751
00:40:26,600 --> 00:40:28,960
Speaker 1: deed too, because there might be some comical examples of

752
00:40:29,000 --> 00:40:32,080
Speaker 1: what people consider to be their good deed for humanity,

753
00:40:32,360 --> 00:40:35,200
Speaker 1: like one I I I. I imagine we would see

754
00:40:35,200 --> 00:40:37,640
Speaker 1: everything from someone saying, all right, I'm gonna take this

755
00:40:38,520 --> 00:40:41,440
Speaker 1: robot with me while me and my company while we

756
00:40:41,520 --> 00:40:43,799
Speaker 1: go out and we clean up a neighborhood. That could

757
00:40:43,840 --> 00:40:45,799
Speaker 1: be one, or it could be I'm going to set

758
00:40:45,800 --> 00:40:47,560
Speaker 1: this robot here on the corner so it can watch

759
00:40:47,640 --> 00:40:50,360
Speaker 1: me as I stopped traffic so this mama duck and

760
00:40:50,400 --> 00:40:52,520
Speaker 1: her baby ducks can get across the street. It could

761
00:40:52,520 --> 00:40:55,640
Speaker 1: be anything. Yeah, like oh man, you almost filled your beer,

762
00:40:55,680 --> 00:40:59,279
Speaker 1: but I I saved you. I'm passing this thing on.

763
00:40:59,440 --> 00:41:03,279
Speaker 1: And see that that also again because of you Look,

764
00:41:03,320 --> 00:41:05,560
Speaker 1: if you look at it as the as an experiment,

765
00:41:06,520 --> 00:41:10,160
Speaker 1: that's still meaningful data. Right. That's true. It's it's interesting,

766
00:41:10,360 --> 00:41:12,600
Speaker 1: you know, it's kind of like a joke, but it's

767
00:41:12,600 --> 00:41:16,279
Speaker 1: also that's humanity too, That's true. And that's exactly what

768
00:41:16,440 --> 00:41:18,839
Speaker 1: the initial goal of this whole thing was. I mean,

769
00:41:18,840 --> 00:41:21,480
Speaker 1: it's to see what happens. It wasn't the goal of

770
00:41:21,520 --> 00:41:23,600
Speaker 1: getting this thing across Canada, because they could put in

771
00:41:23,640 --> 00:41:25,880
Speaker 1: a box and ship if they want, or just have

772
00:41:25,960 --> 00:41:27,680
Speaker 1: a trucking company hall it. Like we said, you know,

773
00:41:27,719 --> 00:41:30,080
Speaker 1: one shot all the ways straight across. But the idea

774
00:41:30,280 --> 00:41:32,520
Speaker 1: was to see what happens along the way. It's like

775
00:41:32,560 --> 00:41:35,680
Speaker 1: the journey is better than the destination exactly. Yeah, And

776
00:41:35,719 --> 00:41:40,760
Speaker 1: that it's those experiences that were important and that documenting culture.

777
00:41:40,880 --> 00:41:44,160
Speaker 1: And we're talking about an emerging culture now, not just tradition,

778
00:41:44,360 --> 00:41:48,359
Speaker 1: not just the embedded culture that's been around for generations.

779
00:41:48,600 --> 00:41:52,839
Speaker 1: We're talking about an emerging culture of technology and our

780
00:41:52,920 --> 00:41:57,160
Speaker 1: daily lives intermingling on a level that has been it's unprecedented.

781
00:41:57,520 --> 00:42:01,200
Speaker 1: We've never seen it like that, and it grows every day,

782
00:42:01,280 --> 00:42:06,560
Speaker 1: so fascinating, really a fascinating experiment. I wouldn't call it

783
00:42:06,600 --> 00:42:08,920
Speaker 1: a failure at all. I mean, I'm sad that the

784
00:42:09,000 --> 00:42:11,680
Speaker 1: Hitchbot didn't get further along in its journey so that

785
00:42:11,760 --> 00:42:14,799
Speaker 1: more people could experience it and that we could have

786
00:42:14,920 --> 00:42:19,960
Speaker 1: more stories. But it's all right, because the story continues.

787
00:42:20,080 --> 00:42:25,080
Speaker 1: It's just the Hitchbot chapter is over. So when you

788
00:42:25,120 --> 00:42:28,799
Speaker 1: look at it that way, it's actually really interesting and inspiring.

789
00:42:28,840 --> 00:42:30,640
Speaker 1: And you know, of course, you might say, well, I

790
00:42:30,680 --> 00:42:34,279
Speaker 1: hope that the next robot meets with more success and

791
00:42:34,320 --> 00:42:37,359
Speaker 1: doesn't have the same kind of encounter. But if we

792
00:42:37,440 --> 00:42:39,960
Speaker 1: do see these kind of encounters happen again and again,

793
00:42:40,000 --> 00:42:42,640
Speaker 1: then we have new questions to ask, like, why is

794
00:42:42,719 --> 00:42:45,600
Speaker 1: this happening? Uh? You know, what are what are the

795
00:42:45,640 --> 00:42:49,120
Speaker 1: motivations behind it? Are there things we need to look

796
00:42:49,160 --> 00:42:52,760
Speaker 1: at as a as a society, not just not because

797
00:42:53,400 --> 00:42:57,200
Speaker 1: we want to protect robots, but are there underlying issues

798
00:42:57,280 --> 00:42:59,920
Speaker 1: that this is just an indicator of it, and may

799
00:43:00,040 --> 00:43:02,080
Speaker 1: be there are things we need to fix it's real

800
00:43:02,160 --> 00:43:06,760
Speaker 1: anger and deep seated anger against robots, or or even

801
00:43:06,800 --> 00:43:11,480
Speaker 1: just one of those situations where clearly the person who

802
00:43:11,760 --> 00:43:13,560
Speaker 1: was trying to scavenge it wanted to get it for

803
00:43:13,600 --> 00:43:16,680
Speaker 1: the parts to sell for some reasons. And then that's well,

804
00:43:16,760 --> 00:43:19,040
Speaker 1: if that's in fact the answer, then you're you. You

805
00:43:19,120 --> 00:43:21,280
Speaker 1: might say, all right, you know, this is yet another

806
00:43:21,320 --> 00:43:26,200
Speaker 1: indicator that there are conditions that maybe we should look

807
00:43:26,200 --> 00:43:28,600
Speaker 1: at and really talk about. And yes, this is a

808
00:43:28,680 --> 00:43:31,960
Speaker 1: kind of trivial way of highlighting that, and it's stuff

809
00:43:32,000 --> 00:43:35,440
Speaker 1: that we already know, but it's another way to say,

810
00:43:36,239 --> 00:43:38,960
Speaker 1: think about this. I mean, we're really, we're really talking

811
00:43:39,000 --> 00:43:41,840
Speaker 1: about compassion, and on a level, that is a very

812
00:43:41,880 --> 00:43:44,879
Speaker 1: you know, human trait, a very innate trait in us.

813
00:43:45,600 --> 00:43:47,920
Speaker 1: Maybe we should apply that to our fellow humans, to

814
00:43:48,160 --> 00:43:51,160
Speaker 1: not just to the robots, even even the even the

815
00:43:51,239 --> 00:43:54,160
Speaker 1: humans that cause damage to the robots, we should show

816
00:43:54,200 --> 00:43:58,319
Speaker 1: compassion too, because we don't know the reason behind it,

817
00:43:58,400 --> 00:44:01,840
Speaker 1: and there may be reasons that we can't even identify

818
00:44:01,920 --> 00:44:04,959
Speaker 1: with because we're not in that situation, and that's all

819
00:44:05,040 --> 00:44:08,000
Speaker 1: the more reason to show compassion. And that's exactly what

820
00:44:08,040 --> 00:44:10,400
Speaker 1: they're Again. I keep going back this, but that's exactly

821
00:44:10,440 --> 00:44:12,480
Speaker 1: what they were looking for when they started this whole

822
00:44:12,480 --> 00:44:15,360
Speaker 1: experiment a couple of years ago. So this has really

823
00:44:15,440 --> 00:44:18,359
Speaker 1: been fascinating and I can't wait to see what the

824
00:44:18,400 --> 00:44:21,080
Speaker 1: next phase will bring to us. Can I ask you

825
00:44:21,080 --> 00:44:23,120
Speaker 1: one question before we leave here? And I think we

826
00:44:23,160 --> 00:44:25,719
Speaker 1: had discussed this, but only briefly and we didn't really

827
00:44:25,760 --> 00:44:29,719
Speaker 1: get into much detail. But um, had you not known

828
00:44:29,760 --> 00:44:32,399
Speaker 1: about hitchpot, right, had you never heard of this whole

829
00:44:32,400 --> 00:44:34,919
Speaker 1: thing exactly you passed it on the on the city

830
00:44:34,920 --> 00:44:38,480
Speaker 1: streets driving, would you stop to pick it up? None

831
00:44:38,520 --> 00:44:42,920
Speaker 1: a chance at all that I would stop because and

832
00:44:43,000 --> 00:44:45,280
Speaker 1: you made me think about this because I was coming

833
00:44:45,320 --> 00:44:49,040
Speaker 1: to it from the perspective of knowing about Hitchbot. If

834
00:44:49,040 --> 00:44:52,520
Speaker 1: I saw hitch Bot, I'd think, holy crap, there's the

835
00:44:52,560 --> 00:44:55,440
Speaker 1: hitchhiking robot. We've got to take part in this. This

836
00:44:55,560 --> 00:44:58,000
Speaker 1: is something special. And I feel the exact same way.

837
00:44:58,080 --> 00:45:01,160
Speaker 1: But not knowing about Hitchbot, not knowing about it, and

838
00:45:01,200 --> 00:45:05,840
Speaker 1: seeing a bucket that has electronics attached to it, even

839
00:45:05,920 --> 00:45:09,400
Speaker 1: with the happy face, maybe particularly with the happy face,

840
00:45:10,000 --> 00:45:13,000
Speaker 1: I might think, oh, what this is like a suspicious

841
00:45:13,000 --> 00:45:15,759
Speaker 1: device of something I thought? I said, it looks a lot,

842
00:45:15,800 --> 00:45:17,960
Speaker 1: an awful lot like an I E. D. And I

843
00:45:18,000 --> 00:45:20,360
Speaker 1: thought it's not too far off in the description. I

844
00:45:20,400 --> 00:45:24,160
Speaker 1: know that they're a little more um I guess camouflaged

845
00:45:24,200 --> 00:45:26,520
Speaker 1: in the way that they typically do those things. But

846
00:45:26,800 --> 00:45:29,600
Speaker 1: this just seems to me like not a good idea

847
00:45:29,640 --> 00:45:31,279
Speaker 1: to pick something up, like, you know, something like this

848
00:45:31,440 --> 00:45:33,040
Speaker 1: up on the street and you know, strap it in

849
00:45:33,040 --> 00:45:35,880
Speaker 1: the car next to your kids. Yeah, not really, but

850
00:45:35,920 --> 00:45:38,560
Speaker 1: I mean, knowing what it is, Yeah, of course you'd

851
00:45:38,560 --> 00:45:39,680
Speaker 1: want to do that. You'd want to you know, it

852
00:45:39,719 --> 00:45:41,640
Speaker 1: would be a great experience for you and your family,

853
00:45:41,680 --> 00:45:43,600
Speaker 1: you know, to to do something with us, even if

854
00:45:43,600 --> 00:45:46,320
Speaker 1: you'd drive it a mile or five miles or whatever.

855
00:45:46,880 --> 00:45:48,880
Speaker 1: Just take a quick photograph with it and say you

856
00:45:48,920 --> 00:45:50,960
Speaker 1: were part of that journey. That's kind of cool. It's

857
00:45:50,960 --> 00:45:55,359
Speaker 1: actually kind of interesting to me that Hitchbot spent seven

858
00:45:55,440 --> 00:46:01,239
Speaker 1: days in Boston because Boston is also where we had

859
00:46:01,280 --> 00:46:06,080
Speaker 1: the Aquitine Hunger Force Moononite bomb scare. It was in

860
00:46:06,120 --> 00:46:09,879
Speaker 1: two thousand seven and it was in Boston. Yeah, yeah,

861
00:46:09,920 --> 00:46:13,480
Speaker 1: that's with the neon or not. I'm sorry. L D. Yeah, um,

862
00:46:14,040 --> 00:46:15,799
Speaker 1: well yeah, yeah, you can tell them what it was. Yeah,

863
00:46:15,840 --> 00:46:18,560
Speaker 1: the the L E ED There were these two characters

864
00:46:18,600 --> 00:46:22,200
Speaker 1: from Aquitine Hunger Force, these two Moonites from the Moon

865
00:46:22,239 --> 00:46:25,960
Speaker 1: they look like uh like, yeah, the eight bit characters

866
00:46:26,000 --> 00:46:28,759
Speaker 1: from a really crappy video game that they're specifically made

867
00:46:28,760 --> 00:46:31,600
Speaker 1: to look like that they're two dimensional, they're they when

868
00:46:31,640 --> 00:46:34,440
Speaker 1: they turn sideways, you don't see him anymore because they're gone.

869
00:46:34,480 --> 00:46:38,160
Speaker 1: And as they're hilarious. They are hilarious. They are incredibly inappropriate,

870
00:46:38,320 --> 00:46:41,640
Speaker 1: as is everything on Aquitine Hunger Force, but they are hilarious.

871
00:46:41,719 --> 00:46:48,400
Speaker 1: And there was a publicity stunt where uh these l

872
00:46:48,440 --> 00:46:51,120
Speaker 1: e ed signs of the two characters were put up

873
00:46:51,120 --> 00:46:55,520
Speaker 1: in various locations, and in Boston it caused a bomb scare.

874
00:46:55,560 --> 00:46:59,239
Speaker 1: People thought that maybe it was the indication of an

875
00:46:59,239 --> 00:47:03,680
Speaker 1: explosive divice ice nearby, and so they were dismantled, and

876
00:47:03,800 --> 00:47:07,760
Speaker 1: it very quickly became kind of a joke slash a

877
00:47:07,800 --> 00:47:10,799
Speaker 1: discussion about you have to be very careful in the

878
00:47:10,800 --> 00:47:14,480
Speaker 1: way you present these kind of guerrilla marketing attempts because

879
00:47:15,160 --> 00:47:17,120
Speaker 1: in a in a post nine eleven world they can

880
00:47:17,200 --> 00:47:21,000
Speaker 1: be misinterpreted. It was post nine eleven and pre marathon

881
00:47:21,040 --> 00:47:23,960
Speaker 1: bombing too, Yeah, so it's kind of in between. But um,

882
00:47:24,000 --> 00:47:26,280
Speaker 1: they were on high alert there for a while about

883
00:47:26,280 --> 00:47:30,000
Speaker 1: these signs, and then you know, chepishly Cartoon Network had

884
00:47:30,040 --> 00:47:32,520
Speaker 1: to say, oh, that was us, yeah, and I here's

885
00:47:32,560 --> 00:47:35,120
Speaker 1: what happened. But in fact they were a little reluctant

886
00:47:35,120 --> 00:47:38,080
Speaker 1: to say that was us. Well, but you know, then

887
00:47:38,120 --> 00:47:42,239
Speaker 1: again bad press is still pressed. That's true. So I'm

888
00:47:42,280 --> 00:47:45,839
Speaker 1: actually amazed that the that hitchbot didn't meet with any

889
00:47:45,920 --> 00:47:49,640
Speaker 1: hitches in Boston based on that um and and as

890
00:47:49,680 --> 00:47:52,799
Speaker 1: you when you asked that question, you gave the qualifier, Hey,

891
00:47:52,840 --> 00:47:54,719
Speaker 1: you've never heard of hitchbot and you see this thing

892
00:47:54,719 --> 00:47:57,319
Speaker 1: on the side of the road. I definitely would have

893
00:47:57,320 --> 00:47:59,399
Speaker 1: wondered what the heck it was, and I probably would

894
00:47:59,400 --> 00:48:01,720
Speaker 1: have thought I might not want to get too close

895
00:48:01,760 --> 00:48:05,040
Speaker 1: to that, just in case. Yeah. Sure, And imagine if

896
00:48:05,040 --> 00:48:07,440
Speaker 1: you were, uh, you know somewhere in Canada, you know

897
00:48:07,440 --> 00:48:10,440
Speaker 1: where it's it's wide open, you know farmland, and uh,

898
00:48:10,560 --> 00:48:12,839
Speaker 1: you know, there's it's it's a mile between houses, and

899
00:48:12,920 --> 00:48:15,400
Speaker 1: this thing is propped up on its it's its legs

900
00:48:15,400 --> 00:48:18,560
Speaker 1: and its tripod seat there out in the middle of nowhere.

901
00:48:19,080 --> 00:48:21,359
Speaker 1: I don't think I'd stopped and pick In that case,

902
00:48:21,400 --> 00:48:24,959
Speaker 1: I probably would stop, only because I would think who

903
00:48:25,000 --> 00:48:29,160
Speaker 1: the heck would set up something sinister in the middle

904
00:48:29,239 --> 00:48:32,560
Speaker 1: of nowhere where you are not likely to affect much

905
00:48:32,600 --> 00:48:34,920
Speaker 1: of anything at all, and that's how they get you,

906
00:48:36,560 --> 00:48:39,960
Speaker 1: whereas I would be more concerned about the the city location,

907
00:48:40,000 --> 00:48:44,600
Speaker 1: where the the opportunity is higher. Yea, yeah, I just

908
00:48:44,600 --> 00:48:46,640
Speaker 1: see it as like and that was the last thing

909
00:48:46,640 --> 00:48:49,080
Speaker 1: that he thought. Well, I already told you that I

910
00:48:49,120 --> 00:48:51,480
Speaker 1: was worried that my obituary from yesterday was going to

911
00:48:51,480 --> 00:48:55,719
Speaker 1: say choked to death on twizzlers. So it's actually much worse. Yeah, no,

912
00:48:55,840 --> 00:48:58,799
Speaker 1: especially since I hate twizzlers all right. Well, at any rate,

913
00:48:58,840 --> 00:49:00,760
Speaker 1: this was really a lot of fun to talk about,

914
00:49:00,960 --> 00:49:03,520
Speaker 1: and it was fun to kind of, you know, think

915
00:49:03,560 --> 00:49:07,200
Speaker 1: about the weird adventures, which are all, like I said, documented.

916
00:49:07,239 --> 00:49:09,560
Speaker 1: You can go to the hitchbot website and read up

917
00:49:09,560 --> 00:49:12,440
Speaker 1: on the different days and events and things that it

918
00:49:12,600 --> 00:49:15,760
Speaker 1: encountered in the people it met. So many successful journeys

919
00:49:15,760 --> 00:49:18,400
Speaker 1: and so many events and things that had happened that happened,

920
00:49:18,440 --> 00:49:20,759
Speaker 1: and and it posted about all that stuff, and all

921
00:49:20,760 --> 00:49:23,600
Speaker 1: those interactions are recorded in some way, which is great,

922
00:49:23,640 --> 00:49:26,560
Speaker 1: so you can actually go back and relive those journeys.

923
00:49:27,160 --> 00:49:31,400
Speaker 1: And I do hope that we see some further experiments

924
00:49:31,440 --> 00:49:34,239
Speaker 1: that that are in the same spirit, whether or not

925
00:49:34,320 --> 00:49:37,440
Speaker 1: it's another hitchhiking thing, or it's like the Philly love butt,

926
00:49:38,000 --> 00:49:41,640
Speaker 1: or I know, it's like it's like I'm ten years old.

927
00:49:41,680 --> 00:49:44,200
Speaker 1: I can't you can't say that, and I still giggle

928
00:49:44,239 --> 00:49:46,359
Speaker 1: every time. But you know, I see what you mean.

929
00:49:46,400 --> 00:49:51,600
Speaker 1: I anticipate a bunch of copycat hitchpots popping up. Um,

930
00:49:51,640 --> 00:49:53,879
Speaker 1: here's another little thing that I I we didn't get

931
00:49:53,880 --> 00:49:55,520
Speaker 1: to really talk about this, but I think the very

932
00:49:55,520 --> 00:49:57,319
Speaker 1: next thing we're going to see out of this. Unfortunately,

933
00:49:57,800 --> 00:49:59,799
Speaker 1: and this is just my gut feeling. You said, somebody

934
00:50:00,080 --> 00:50:04,880
Speaker 1: we scrapped the head, you know, the control unit. I

935
00:50:04,960 --> 00:50:06,719
Speaker 1: have a feeling we're going to see a photograph of

936
00:50:06,760 --> 00:50:08,480
Speaker 1: that show up somewhere that's going to be sent to

937
00:50:08,640 --> 00:50:12,600
Speaker 1: the creators of a hitch pot, which to the creators

938
00:50:12,600 --> 00:50:16,160
Speaker 1: probably would just be yet another data point. Probably, Yeah,

939
00:50:16,200 --> 00:50:18,680
Speaker 1: But I see it as going like the way a

940
00:50:18,800 --> 00:50:22,160
Speaker 1: real crime against a human would have gone, Um, you know,

941
00:50:22,200 --> 00:50:24,480
Speaker 1: and that there will be next a kind of a

942
00:50:24,760 --> 00:50:27,480
Speaker 1: taunting note sent to them as well, which you know,

943
00:50:28,280 --> 00:50:30,879
Speaker 1: I hope I'm wrong that if that does happen, though

944
00:50:31,040 --> 00:50:34,120
Speaker 1: it is interesting because it's just that whoever does it

945
00:50:34,200 --> 00:50:37,640
Speaker 1: obviously would think of it as uh or at least

946
00:50:37,800 --> 00:50:40,319
Speaker 1: I would guess this is armchair psychology, but I would

947
00:50:40,320 --> 00:50:42,319
Speaker 1: imagine that they would think of it as like a joke.

948
00:50:42,840 --> 00:50:45,000
Speaker 1: That you know, I'm treating this as if it were

949
00:50:45,000 --> 00:50:47,879
Speaker 1: a real person. Meanwhile, there are other people who think

950
00:50:48,040 --> 00:50:50,759
Speaker 1: that's sick because they do think of hitch Pot as

951
00:50:50,800 --> 00:50:54,160
Speaker 1: at least some in some way similar to a person.

952
00:50:54,239 --> 00:50:57,160
Speaker 1: And this is again so that we're clear here, I

953
00:50:57,200 --> 00:50:59,160
Speaker 1: read a lot of true crime, so it's not that

954
00:50:59,200 --> 00:51:01,000
Speaker 1: I'm just thinking about this all the time. I mean,

955
00:51:01,680 --> 00:51:05,120
Speaker 1: I'm just saying around the one year anniversary, just pay

956
00:51:05,160 --> 00:51:07,240
Speaker 1: attention to what's going on the news. It might happen,

957
00:51:07,320 --> 00:51:09,440
Speaker 1: might not happen. I don't have any inside info or

958
00:51:09,440 --> 00:51:11,400
Speaker 1: anything like that. I could just as easily be that

959
00:51:11,480 --> 00:51:13,360
Speaker 1: someone saw it and thought, oh I want a tablet.

960
00:51:13,360 --> 00:51:15,040
Speaker 1: PC could be and it could it could have ended

961
00:51:15,080 --> 00:51:17,560
Speaker 1: up in a dumpster half a block away. Yeah, yeah,

962
00:51:17,680 --> 00:51:20,080
Speaker 1: it's it's hard to say, but this was a lot

963
00:51:20,080 --> 00:51:21,760
Speaker 1: of fun. Scott, thank you for coming on the show.

964
00:51:22,000 --> 00:51:24,480
Speaker 1: Thank you again. I appreciate it, and likewise I had

965
00:51:24,480 --> 00:51:26,640
Speaker 1: a good time doing it. Fantastic. If you guys want

966
00:51:26,680 --> 00:51:30,319
Speaker 1: to listen to more amazing content that's Scott and Ben

967
00:51:30,400 --> 00:51:33,120
Speaker 1: generate all the time. You've gotta check out car Stuff.

968
00:51:33,160 --> 00:51:35,879
Speaker 1: It's a great show. Shucks, it's it's tons of fun.

969
00:51:35,920 --> 00:51:38,640
Speaker 1: I've I've had so much fun listening to those episodes. Uh.

970
00:51:38,840 --> 00:51:41,319
Speaker 1: I thought you're gonna say those clowns right there, he said,

971
00:51:41,320 --> 00:51:42,920
Speaker 1: I've had so much fun listening to and there's a

972
00:51:42,960 --> 00:51:47,800
Speaker 1: little positive Well that's true outside of the room, like

973
00:51:47,880 --> 00:51:50,120
Speaker 1: in the studio or in the office rather well. I

974
00:51:50,120 --> 00:51:52,520
Speaker 1: appreciate it, Thank you very much. Yea. So, guys, if

975
00:51:52,520 --> 00:51:54,920
Speaker 1: you have any suggestions for future topics or you have

976
00:51:55,080 --> 00:51:57,440
Speaker 1: you know your own perspective on hitchbot and what that

977
00:51:57,520 --> 00:52:00,320
Speaker 1: experiment was all about, let me know. Similar Mel The

978
00:52:00,360 --> 00:52:03,520
Speaker 1: addresses tech stuff at how stuff works dot com, or

979
00:52:03,560 --> 00:52:06,280
Speaker 1: you can drop me a line on Facebook or Twitter

980
00:52:06,440 --> 00:52:08,880
Speaker 1: the handle of both of those it's tech stuff hs

981
00:52:09,080 --> 00:52:19,279
Speaker 1: W and I'll talk to you again really soon for

982
00:52:19,400 --> 00:52:21,719
Speaker 1: more on this and thousands of other topics. Is it

983
00:52:21,800 --> 00:52:31,880
Speaker 1: how stuff works dot com