Aibo

AIBO (Artificial Intelligence [Ro]bot —in Spanish: 'robot de inteligencia artificial'—, namesake of AIBO (相棒, aibō^?), 'friend' or 'partner' in Japanese) is a series of robotic pets designed and manufactured by Sony. Sony announced a prototype robot in mid-1998. The first consumer model was introduced on May 11, 1999. New models were released every year until 2005. Although most of the models were dog-like, other inspirations were included as well. robotics such as lion cubs and android space tourists, and only the latest version, ERS-7, was explicitly a "robot dog".

AIBO ERS-7 following a pink ball in the hands of children

AIBOs were marketed for home use as "Entertainment Robots." They were also widely adopted by universities for educational purposes (for example: Robocup), for robotics research, and for human-robot interaction.

AIBO has been used in many movies, music videos and advertising campaigns as futuristic icons.

On January 26, 2006, Sony announced that it was discontinuing AIBO and several other products in an effort to make the company profitable. Development of the related QRIO robot was also discontinued. Sony's AIBO customer support was subsequently phased out, with support for the latest ERS-7M3 ending in March 2013. However, some support is available. from third parties such as battery repair and reconditioning.

In 2006, AIBO was inducted into Carnegie Mellon University's "Robot Hall of Fame," with the description "the Sony AIBO represents the most sophisticated product ever offered to robot consumers on the market. "

Development

AIBO grew out of Sony's Computer Science Laboratory (CSL). Founded in 1990, the CSL was created to emulate the innovation center at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC). The CSL's first product was the Aperios operating system, which later formed the base software for AIBO. When Nobuyuki Idei became president of Sony in 1995, he tried to embrace a digital agenda, which was reflected in the company's new tagline, "Dream Digital Kids," and the importance he placed on CSL.

Engineer Dr. Toshitada Doi is credited as the original progenitor of AIBO: in 1994, he had started working on the robots at the CSL with artificial intelligence expert engineer Masahiro Fujita. Fujita wrote that the robot's behaviors had to be complex or unexpected enough for people to maintain an interest in watching or caring for them. Fujita argues that entertainment robots could be viable if a robot for entertainment is effectively designed using various state-of-the-art technologies, such as voice recognition and vision, even though these technologies may not be mature enough for applications where they perform a critical function. While there are special and difficult requirements in the entertainment applications themselves, the limited capabilities in the vision and speech systems may prove to be an interesting and attractive feature for properly designed entertainment robots. Its early ape prototype « MUTANT” included behaviors that could become part of AIBO including following a yellow ball, shaking hands, practicing karate, and sleeping. Fujita received the IEEE Inaba Technical Innovation Award for producing "AIBO, the world's first mass-market robot for entertainment applications".

In 1997, Doi received support from Idei to form Sony's digital creature lab. Believing that robots would be common in homes by 2010, but mindful of the limitations of available technology for functional uses, he decided to focus on entertainment robots.

Nearly ten years later, Idei's successor Howard Stringer shut down AIBO and other robotics projects. Doi then starred in a mock funeral, which was attended by more than 100 Sony colleagues. At the funeral, Doi said that the Aibo was a symbol of Sony's risk-taking spirit, which was now dead.

Design

Initial designs for the AIBO body were created by a friend of Doi's, artist Hajime Sorayama. These designs are now part of the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art and the Smithsonian Institution. AIBO's first generation design won Japan's prestigious "Good Design Award, Grand Prize" and a special award for Intelligent Design at the 2000 German Red Dot Awards.

AIBO's latest models were co-designed with prestigious Japanese designers and continued to win design awards. The design of the ERS-210 was inspired by lion cubs. The bodies of the "ERS-3x" series (Latte and Macaron, the round-headed AIBOs released in 2001) were designed by visual artist Katsura Moshino, winning the "Good Design Award". The elegant and futuristic body design of the "ERS-220" for space exploration was inspired by Shōji Kawamori winning the "Good Design Award" and "Design for Asia". The ERS-7 also won a "Good Design Award".

Models

The following shows the different models and prototypes that have followed one another over time until reaching the current generation of Aibo, the ERS-7 Mind 3.

Prototypes

Various prototypes were shown by Sony. The first models were in the shape of an insect with six legs. MUTANT is described in the "development of a quadruped Autonomous Robot". The specifications of the 1998 prototype, described in a Sony press release, closely matched those of the first generation Aibos. Differences include the use of PC-Cards for memory (instead of Memory Stick), the use of two batteries, and the option to use a two-wheeled "roller module" instead of legs.

• Prototype 1 (1990):

Developed in the early 1990s in the early 1990s, this robot, whose appearance is far from what we know today as "Aibo", was Sony's first foray into the world of robotics.

• Prototype 2 (1991):

The second prototype already glimpsed in some way a certain resemblance to the current generations of Aibo, however there was still a lot of work to be done.

First generation models

The first commercial generation of Aibo featured the characteristic of interacting with the environment and expressing emotion. It is manufactured with a canine aesthetic.

Estimated sales of all first generation models: 65,000.

Ers-110

The first commercial AIBO. With a beagle-like appearance. Silver. Sales began on June 1, 1999 for delivery in August, production was limited to 3,000 in Japan and 2,000 for the United States. Available online and sold out in just 20 minutes after launch. Good Design Award Grand Prix. Price 250,000 yen (excluding tax).

Ers-111

An improved version of the original AIBO, initially released in November 1999 as a limited edition model. All 3,000 Japanese distribution units sold out within 17 seconds of release.

Second generation models

The second generation incorporates new features, such as contact sensors, sound and facial recognition.

Estimated sales for all second generation models: 60,000.

Ers-210

Style inspired by a lion cub. Voice recognition capabilities. Colors black, silver, gold, red, blue, green, white (3 tones), champagne, etc. 28.1 cm (centimeters) in height, 1.5 kg (kilograms) in weight, 1.5 hours of continuous operating time, 20 degrees of freedom (drive unit), price 150,000 yen (excluding tax). If an integrated card is used, it is possible to add a wireless LAN IEEE802.11b remote control to it by using the wireless remote control option, which is one of the AIBO-ware, “AIBO Navigator 2”. An auto-charge function can also be added to scroll to its own charger when charging is about to finish, by option of the «AIBO Politecnic us» software. This feature is the idea of Hitoshi Matsumoto.

ERS-210 range models

The following models basically have the most "futuristic" appearance, distancing themselves a bit from the canine aesthetics of the previous ones. It also included some improvements in the sensor section. And it could be programmed to act like a cat, instead of a dog.

• ERS-210A: Hardware with Supercore, duplicates the speed of the CPU, also redesigned the servo of the head to avoid the DHS of previous models, of different colors; 2002.
• ERS-220 (best of the sensors, change the appearance): silver; 2002.
• ERS-220A Includes Supercore (improved sensors, changes appearance): silvery; 2002.

Ers-300 (Latte and Macaron)

Slogan "The heart of AIBO". Kumainu motif. Original production designed and illustrated by Katsura Moshino. By putting the software called AIBO-ware, AIBO becomes a different character, bad and unassuming. Height 28 cm (centimeters), weight 1.5 kg (kilograms), 2.5 hours of continuous operation, 15 degrees of freedom (drive unit), price 98,000 yen (excluding tax).

Ers-311

Cream; 2001. Low-end model of the ERS-300. Puppy face.

Ers-311b/312b, ers-311b/x

Added Bluetooth communication. You can communicate with “AIBO Handy Viewer”.

Ers-312

“Macaron” (changes appearance): cream color; 2002.

ERS-312 range models

• ERS-312B: Same as Macaron but with Bluetooth, only for the Japanese market; 2001.
• ERS-311BX: With Bluetooth and velvety finish, only for the Japanese market; 2001.
• ERS-311LongLong: Japanese special edition, only 1001 units were made; 2001.

• ERS-31L: brown, similar to a Bulldog; 2002. Approximately 60 000 units were sold.

Third generation models

They incorporate numerous interaction ions and wireless connection to the network: the third generation includes a Wi-Fi connection to communicate with a PC and to be able to receive orders from the PC or function as a music player, as well as a news reader, mail. There are two software versions for this generation, Mind2 and Mind3.

Ers-7

November 2003
This AIBO is considered the culmination of the series. The first to be explicitly a "robot dog". Available in white. The first units came out defective in the legs (defect in the J12 joints). Packaged with MIND. United States: $1,599 at launch.

Ers-7m2

November 2004
A variant of the ERS-7, which comes with MIND2. Available in black or white.

Qrios watching AIBO's at an event Robocup

Ers-7m3

October 2005
A variant of the ERS-7M2, packaged with MIND3. Wi-Fi changed. White, black and champagne gold. The final model.

Qrio

The QRIO humanoid robot was designed as the successor to AIBO, and runs the same base I-CODE operating system and Aperios.

In 2006, SONY discontinued the marketing of Aibo and QRIO.

Hardware

The initial hardware of AIBO ERS-110 includes a 64-bit RISC processor, 16 megabytes of RAM, sensors (touch, camera, rangefinder, microphone, acceleration, angular velocity), a speaker, and actuators (legs, neck, mouth, tail). As the series developed, more sensors and actuators were added. In addition, for some second generation AIBOs, Wi-Fi was available. The third and final family of AIBO ERS-7, it has multiple head and body sensors, a chest-mounted proximity sensor, expressive "Illume-Face" and Wi-Fi.

All the AIBOs were included with accessories including a charging station and the pink ball. The late model ERS7 was packaged with a pink AIBone toy in the shape of a bone, playing cards and a charging station with self-docking post and marker mat.

Software

All AIBOs come bundled with AIBOLife software, giving the robot a personality, the ability to walk, "see" its surroundings through the camera, and recognize voice commands (in English and Spanish, or Japanese). AIBO sounds were programmed by Japanese avant-garde composer and DJ Nobukazu Takemura, fusing organic and mechanical concepts. Sounds in ERS-7 Mind and custom data were composed by Masaya Matsuura, a Japanese game designer and musician.

Aperios and Open-R

Aperios is Sony's proprietary real-time operating system used on all AIBO, QRIO and some other consumer devices. Aperios OS was designed to be widely deployed using revolutionary real-time capabilities to handle multiple visual and audio data simultaneously. The operating system was not widely adopted and by 2003 Sony had stopped development with COO Kunitake Ando commenting that Aperios it was an operating system from a pre-Internet era and we decided it's not suitable for the future.

The OPEN-R architecture is specific for entertainment robots. The architecture involves the use of modular hardware components, such as appendages that can be easily removed and replaced to change the form and function of the robots, and modular software components that can be interchanged to change their behavior and movement patterns. AIBO creator Doi called OPEN-R the masterpiece of the AIBO development project, arguing that it could minimize the need to program individual movements or responses, and its "open" nature would encourage a global community of robotics specialists and programmers to add capabilities.

AIBOware

The AIBO first and second generation models can load different software packages marketed by Sony. AIBOware (a trademark of Sony Corporation) is the title given to the AIBO software that runs on your pink Memory Stick. AIBOware life allows the robot to grow from puppy to adult, going through various stages of development while its owner interacts with it. The AIBOware Explorer allows the owner to interact with a fully mature robot capable of understanding (though not necessarily willing to obey) 100 voice commands. Without AIBOware, AIBOs run in "clinical" mode and can only perform basic actions.

Third generation ERS-7 models have "Mind" software, which includes capabilities from AIBOLife and other AIBOware packages. The Mind software also includes a docking process, allowing the ERS-7 to recharge itself. Updates in Mind2 included the AIBO Entertainment Player, a PC-based Wi-Fi connection. Updates on Mind3 include speaking, blogging, etc.

AIBO's full vision system uses the SIFT algorithm to recognize your charging station. The vision system is an implementation of the Evolution Robotics ERVision.

Remarkable AIBOware software

Remarkable third-party software

AIBO Software Development Environment

Initially, access to programming capabilities was limited to Sony and organizations participating in Robocup. By reverse engineering AIBO, users develop their own software that works alongside AIBOware such as “DiscoAibo”, which made the robotic canine dance to the music.

In a major copyright milestone, Sony invoked the Digital Millennium Copyright Act in October 2001 and sent out a cease and desist notice demanding that "Aibopet" stop distributing code that was recovered by circumventing the copy protection mechanisms. Faced with complaints from many outraged AIBO owners, Sony backed down and subsequently released a programmer's kit for "non-commercial" use.

The kit was eventually expanded into three separate tools: R-CODE, OPEN-R SDK, and AIBO Remote Framework (ERS-7 only). These three tools are combined under the name AIBO Software Development Environment. All of these tools are free to download and can be used for commercial or non-commercial purposes (except for the OPEN-R SDK, which is specifically for non-commercial use).

Open-r sdk

The OPEN-R SDK is an SDK similar to the C++ programming language based on open source tools (such as gcc and newlib), which allows you to make the software that runs on your AIBO. This SDK is considered low level and allows you to control everything from the gain values of AIBO actuators to retrieving data from the AIBO camera and doing computer vision calculations. No pre-built "standard" AIBO functionality is provided, as is the case with R-Code and the AIBO Remote Framework. It is an excellent choice for researchers conducting low-level robotic research.

R-CODE and R-CODE plus

R-Code is a high-level programming language for AIBO. R-Code allows you to easily create simple programs for AIBO to run. While the low-level control that the OPEN-R SDK has is not allowed, which takes away from it in power, it makes up for in simplicity. In fact, the R-Code is simple enough that even children can learn to use it. Remote communication is possible through a simple connection via Wi-Fi. Commercial use is permitted and the license fee is free.

R-CodePlus is a derivative of AiboPet's R-Code with several added features. R-CodePlus is a superset of R-Code in language terms, so anything written in standard R-Code will work on an R-CodePlus MemoryStick (for the same AIBO model). R-CodePlus exposes some new "core" features of AIBO, such as simple face recognition, name registration and camera setting settings. In addition to the standard R-Code terminal socket for remote communication, R-CodePlus provides a "Telemety" socket, for transferring various binary data, such as AIBO camera image and sending/receiving sound. R-CODE has been extended to R-CODE plus by Aibopet

Aibnet offers a development environment for R-CODE programming.

Simplified drag-and-drop behavior customization is available via the user-created YART ("Yet Another RCode Tool")

Other development environments

Several robot software development frameworks have been developed that are compatible with AIBO, including URBI, Tekkotsu, and Pyro.

Current projects

AIBO+ allows you to explore new ways in artificial intelligence.

AIBO Control allows Android users to control the AIBO ERS-7 running Urbi.

The community has been updating the Open-R and CCG based toolchain to use GCC 4.1.2, Binutils 2.17 and Newlib 1.15. The packaged version of the old and updated AIBO toolchain is available for Ubuntu in a PPA.

AIBO in Education and Academia

Tanda de penales

AIBO is widely used in education. For example, Carnegie Mellon offered an AIBO-focused robotics course, covering models of perception, cognition, and problem-solving search activities.

Four Legged RoboCup League

Robots AIBO playing in the ninth RoboCup in Osaka (2005)

AIBO has long been used as an inexpensive platform for artificial intelligence education and research, integrating a computer, vision system, and articulators into a much cheaper package than conventional research robots. A focal point for that development has been the Robocup Leagues.

The Four-Legged League was the initial name for the RoboCup Standard Platform League, a robot soccer league in which all teams compete with identical robots. The robots operate fully autonomously, without external control by humans or computers. The specific version of AIBO changed over time: ERS-110s (1999,2000), ERS-210 (2001-2002), ERS-210A SuperCore (2003), ERS-7 (2004-2008). The current and replacement standard platform is the humanoid NAO from Aldebaran Robotics.

Sony provided AIBO with support and sponsorship at universities around the world to participate in the four-legged RoboCup Robot Soccer League autonomous soccer competition. Competing teams would program a team of AIBO robots to play robot soccer against other competing teams. The Four-Legged League ran from 1999 to 2008, although in the last year, many big-name universities did not compete as they had moved to the new NAO platform. The University of New South Wales was the most successful team in the League, reaching the final six times and winning three times.

AIBO International Convention

The AIBO International Convention takes place every year at the Sony Robotics Tower in Shinjuku Prefecture. The first convention took place in 1999, on May 15. Then it was established from May 2 to May 4. The 2009 convention, being in its tenth year, set attendance records. The general convention features AIBO announcements, posters, free accessories, free/open source downloads, and the “AIBO shows”.

Breed lineage

After the model name: body color options; release date; sold units.

First generation models

• ERS-110: silver; it began to sell on June 1, 1999 for delivery in August; only 3000 units were manufactured for Japan and 2000 for the United States.
• ERS-111: grey and black; November 1999; 60 000 units manufactured (approximately).

Estimated sales for all first generation models: 65,000.

Second generation models

• ERS-210: black, silver, gold, red, blue, green, white, etc.; 2001.
• ERS-210A: Hardware with Supercore, duplicates the speed of the CPU, also redesigned the servo of the head to avoid the DHS of the previous models, of different colors; 2002.

• ERS-220 (improved of sensors, changes the appearance): plated; 2002.
• ERS-220A Includes Supercore (improved sensors, changes the appearance): silver; 2002.
• ERS-311 "Latte" (change the look): cream color; 2001.
• ERS-311B Same as Latte but with Bluetooth, only for the Japanese market (change the look): cream color; 2001.
• ERS-312: "Macaron" (change the appearance): cream color; 2002.
• ERS-312B: Same as Macaron but with Bluetooth, only for the Japanese market; 2001.
• ERS-311BX: With Bluetooth and velvety finish, only for the Japanese market; 2001.
• ERS-311LongLong: Japanese special edition, only 1001 units were made; 2001.
• ERS-31L: brown, similar to a Bulldog; 2002. Approximately 60 000 units were sold.

Estimated sales for all second generation models: 60,000.

Third generation models

• ERS-7: white; November 2003, the first units were defective on the legs (defect on J12) boards.
• ERS-7M2: black and white; November 2004.
• ERS-7M3: white, brown and black, October 2005.

Estimated sales for all 3rd generation models: 40,000 to 50,000.

Anime

The AIBO anime Piroppo or (ピロッポ) was based on AIBO ERS-300, Latte and Macaroon. The anime activated sounds and actions of the viewer's ERS-300s. The 23-episode series was broadcast on Fuji TV on Thursdays from 10:54 p.m. to 11:00 p.m., from October 11, 2001 to March 21, 2002.

In popular culture

When AIBO was introduced, The New Yorker ran a cartoon by Jack Ziegler showing AIBO "urinating" nuts and bolts into a fire hydrant.

In an episode of Frasier, Frasier gave his father an AIBO ERS-210 to keep him company while he is visiting Roz in Wisconsin. There's a scene where Eddie interacts with the AIBO, while Martin Crane complains to Sony about not being able to get it to work.

In the South Park episode Red Sleigh Down, Cartman spends most of the episode trying to get on Santa's nice-boy list so he can get a Haibo robot doll for Christmas, in reference to the robot dog craze of the 2000s started by AIBO. At the conclusion of the episode, Stan, Kyle, Cartman and everyone are given their very own HAIBO dog.