Behold the ROBOT RECTUM... medics' relief

Rise of the machines: Spare a thought for the only Rectal Teaching Assistant in the UK who has lost his livelihood to a cold, metal bastard. A bionic booty comprising prosthetic buttocks and anus with in-built robotic tech was developed by the white coats at Imperial College London to help doctors and nurses practise probing a …

[arctic_haze]

An idea worth of the 21th century

Robot inserting metal objects in your rectum? What can go wrong?!

[frank ly]

Re: An idea worth of the 21th century

You seem to have misunderstood the technical details. Or was it wishful thinking?

[Banksy]

Rise of the Robots

Remember, robot bottoms have feelings too. This sort of thing is highly likely to trigger a robot uprising.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Rise of the Robots

ehhhh...which meaning of "robot bottoms" are you using there?

[Banksy]

Re: Rise of the Robots

Any and all possible meanings :D

[Joe Harrison]

Only one rectal teaching assistant in the country

Surely there should be more volunteers for this vital work. Where do people sign up? Asking for a friend.

[AIBailey]

Re: Only one rectal teaching assistant in the country

He really must have been at the arse end of the queue at the job centre!

[Pirate Dave]

Re: Only one rectal teaching assistant in the country

He was a bit behind on Job Assignment Day. He'd had a long night at the pub and was a bit pooped, which tainted his assessment.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Only one rectal teaching assistant in the country

Must have been fun at parties.

"So what do you do for a living?"

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: rectal teaching assistant / "So what do you do for a living?"

I once was told "I study the transmission and effects of chlamydia in koalas", but only after I asked a second time.

[sandman]

Truly dreadful

"The medics trialling the robo butt gave it a thumbs up." Possibly one of the most appalling puns of all time - I'm annoyed I didn't think of it.

[foo_bar_baz]

Re: Truly dreadful

"medics' relief" was even worse - or better.

[zen1]

Re: Truly dreadful

Genius... pure diabolical genius!

[XSV1]

Finger pointing

Look, I wouldn't want to point any fingers, but you have to hand it to these guys. For once, there are no arseholes working on the project.

[Bucky 2]

"the trainer then inserts an index finger"

Yeah. His "index finger."

[TRT]

Re: "the trainer then inserts an index finger"

I tried one of these and the mechanism went wrong,You should have seen the state of my hand afterwards.

Did it damage your fingers?

Wrecked 'em.

[foo_bar_baz]

A robot arsehole for only £10K?

Managers world over are fearing for their jobs now.

[TitterYeNot]

Re: A robot arsehole for only £10K?

"Managers world over are fearing for their jobs now."

Not realistic enough to mimic senior management I'm afraid, the robo rectum doesn't spout enough shit.

Unfortunately all this android anus will do is give them something on which to practice shafting their minions...

[oiseau]

Re: A robot arsehole for only £10K?

"Managers world over are fearing for their jobs now."

Absolutely brilliant !

Made my day.

Thanks. =-)

[zen1]

Re: A robot arsehole for only £10K?

But wouldn't that require a refit to this equipment to fit the average sized human cranium.

[Scott 53]

I could do that job

I'm convinced I could make a good fist of it.

[Francis Boyle]

Re: I could do that job

I don't think those German speciality videos were approved for medical training purposes.

[allthecoolshortnamesweretaken]

RTA - that goes straight into my list of real but improbable jobs.

Also, I would have liked to make something out of Bender's 'bite my shiny metal ass' catchphrase for this context, but nothing doing, sorry.

[John70]

I'll give you +1 for just mentioning Bender's phrase

[Jon Massey]

Took em a while

I remember having a play with an early version of the Haptic Cow http://www.live.ac.uk/haptic-cow at Glasgow over a decade ago!

[Rich 11]

Re: Took em a while

Have you been taken off the watchlist yet?

[Anonymous Coward]

I do hope they called the function in the programming "cheekyfinger" because lets be honest you can't beat a cheeky finger.

[Anonymous Coward]

The red 'meaty' flesh inside is quite disturbing. Especially since there is a distinct lack of organs, bone, muscles etc.

[Michael H.F. Wilkinson]

So is this a true SmartArse (tm)?

This must be a candidate for the Ig Nobel prize in medicine. After all, it is certainly research to first make you laugh, and then make you think. Good work!

[AIBailey]

Re: So is this a true SmartArse (tm)?

Controllable from your smartphone?

Brings a whole new meaning to "choosing your ring tone"!

[WolfFan]

Very dissapointed

Was expecting to see an article about Donald Trump praising Scots for leading the charge to get the UK out of the EU. Now that's the kind of robot rectum I can get behind. This one? Boring.

[Phil O'Sophical]

Re: Very dissapointed

that's the kind of robot rectum I can get behind.

What can I say...?

[cosymart]

Where From Here?

Rectal Teaching Assistant ... if there is an assistant there must be a fully fledged arsehole.

It also begs the question of career prospects, if you are stating at the bottom the only way must be up. Think I need to rephrase that last line. :-)

[Speltier]

Probeur

So how is the haptic rectum programmed? By a properly instrumented sensor-- jiggly joggly and collect the data to program the feel in the haptic rectum. Indeed, one could even have remote probing so third worlders could be probed by not only local despots and rapacious (!) businesses, but also by people in in the first world.

Security? what security? All this information will be available on YouProbe....

[Andrew Commons]

Re: Probeur

Can you imagine some of the code?

class Finger extends Anus implements Surprise{}

What would be an appropriate language for this? Squeak perhaps? Regardless it would have to be Tworing complete!

[Sgt_Oddball]

So how long before it gets sent back under warranty rather stretched out with claims that it was only 1 finger honest...

[Anonymous Coward]

...and with a hamster living inside it...

[TRT]

You could ring the repair line. Or repair the ring line. Something like that.

[Rick Brasche]

and there goes the youthful mispronunciation

been hearing young children mispronounce "robot" as "robut" most of my life, to which many parents have corrected them with the response of "there is no such thing as a robut".

their objection is no longer valid. the Robutt does exist!

[Chris G]

iBum

It seems to have rounded corners too, I smell trouble brewing in the Apple camp.

One disturbing thought, in the article it says the bum is designed to feel like the real thing on insertion of a relevant digit. Knowing what I do about Medical Students.........

Edit: Looking at the headline made me think of ROTM;

Behold the ROBOT RECTUM? No, fucking ripped 'em to bits

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: iBum

> "Knowing what I do about Medical Students..."

This thing would certainly be in high demand for fraternity hazing purposes.

[TRT]

Robotic buttocks?

I bet it doesn't twerk!

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Robotic buttocks?

The twerking robotic butt is already here

https://youtu.be/U0eS3zC3Jco

[HieronymusBloggs]

Arse Technica

Isn't there a web site dedicated to this?

[rastuss]

Isn't this just the end-all of robot applications?

More jobs lost to robots... where will it end?

[Tromos]

Forget it.

Anyone buying one ends up getting a bum deal.

[Uplink]

There's another use for that

Stick in a RealDoll(tm). For a little extra you can have one in each orifice.

[VeganVegan]

Send it to Area 51

Maybe it will save some UFO enthusiasts from getting probed by aliens.

Wait: Is Imperial College London an undercover, alien institution, finally coming up with a product based on decades of alien abduction and probings?

[astrax]

A Beavis & Butthead design

The Great Cornholio: "I need IP...IP for my bunghole."

[Fruit and Nutcase]

The Kardashian

Perhaps Kim can be persuaded to make a useful contribution to society by allowing the form of this to be based on her posterior. It would certainly give the operators something substantial to hold onto.

[ladislav123]

Wondering what would Terminator say...

I doubt he'd be excited about the "I'll be back" line....

[Nixinkome]

Talking Bottoms [Heads]

Feedback from The World's Finest chatbot;

"How are you feeling, Dave?"

[Unicornpiss]

Quality control

I guess anyone that works in the plant where they produce these can come home and honestly say: "Honey I'm bushed. All I did was deal with assholes all day long."

[zen1]

hmmm nobody has really jumped into the gutter yet, but with the right engineering, this could make one hell of a splash in the adult industry... iButtz (tm) (c) (sm)... I can see it now in giant neon lights.

[Anonymous Coward]

There are various other probing procedures that need practice. The apparently simple task of micro-vacuuming an ear to remove wax can be painful in inexperienced hands. Think of what happens when a vacuum cleaner sucks up a loose carpet - then think of an eardrum.

It is always best to get such out-patient procedures scheduled for April to June. By then the previous August's intake of new doctors have had enough practice with audio feedback from patients.