8 Billion other options
In a world with around 8 Billion people some will look to robots for companionship, really ?
That must the one of the saddest articles I have ever read.
It's as clever as using heroin to relieve stress.
New humanoid robots from China look like creepy pop star action figures – complete with slightly dodgy lip-synch
One of China’s emerging humanoid robotics companies has launched its most-realistic looking models yet and says it has already taken over 13,000 orders for the $17,600/ £13,300 machines. Here’s a shot of the new machines. UBTECH's UWORLD U1, which it bills as "The World's First Full-Size Mass-Produced Ultra-Bionic Humanoid …
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Friday 3rd July 2026 08:13 GMT DS999
Re: 8 Billion other options
A lot of people like being told what they want to hear so I can totally believe there's a huge market for robot companionship even among people able to find human companionship - they'll feel the robots make better companions due to their agreeableness.
Just look at people falling into "AI psychosis". And is clearly not restricted to lonely people - at least the stories I've read about are about men (and yes it is mostly men who are afflicted with the "being told what they want to hear" trait) who are married and the wife thinks he's having an affair, but it turns out he's spending all his time talking to ChatGPT and being told how wonderful he is.
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Thursday 2nd July 2026 08:55 GMT Bebu sa Ware
Re: Did anyone actually say sexbot?
Somewhere between "daily companionship" and "premium domestic services", I suppose.
Surprised that Bonkatronics isn't a major cross-discplinary area yet- no I am not thinking of S&M… well not particularly. Could make soft matter physics sexy again. :)
The prior art is a bit rough-and-ready. Seeing a young miss on u-tube screwing the head on to the body of her new (female) sex doll was one of the funniest thing I had seen for years. I suppose these new chinese ones - out of the box - will be able screw their own heads on like Worzel Gummidge.
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Thursday 2nd July 2026 09:19 GMT jake
Realistically ...
... as I first postulated quite a few years ago, a general purpose humanoid robot won't be what it says on the tin until it can make my bed, wax the car and fly it around to the front, change the sprog's nappies, dig the spuds, pick the tomatoes and make & pressure can tomato sauce, mow the lawns (and take care of the equipment required), do the dishes and the laundry (including properly putting away both), fetch me the snail-mail and a beer, and the sprog's nappies will need changing again.
Come to think of it, I think I'll wait until the sprog is old enough to be trained to do the above. It'll be easier, faster, much, much cheaper and a lot more fool-proof.
Actually, the sprog is in her forties ... and doing a good job of training her own sprog to do all the above. Except flying the car, of course.
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Friday 3rd July 2026 10:56 GMT I ain't Spartacus
Re: Realistically ...
All that suggests that this general purpose robot is going to need a method to wash its hands - and wipe the bloody mud off its feet/boots/whatever before it's allowed into my nice clean kitchen!
Also, can it be programmed to worry about philosophy and watch TV for me?
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Thursday 2nd July 2026 09:43 GMT Jonathan Richards 1
Sprog-care
It's interesting [1] that the use-cases for these things often mention "elder care" by which I suppose they don't mean removing the elder tree weeds from my garden, or harvesting the elder-berries, but more like calling an ambulance when Grandad falls over again. What they don't seem to mention is the use-case that Jake cites, i.e. looking after young humans that can't look after themselves. Is this because we are inherently more protective of our children than our old folk? Would we sooner hand off the Grandad-wrangling than the care and feeding of babies? Personally, I find both distasteful.
[1] Interesting to me, you may think otherwise!
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Friday 3rd July 2026 08:06 GMT retiredFool
Re: Sprog-care
While I agree, I agree more with the parent. Old people are put out to pasture in assisted living. The wealthy, like a couple of my neighbors, get 24 hr in home care. Quite expensive. This might reduce the cost, or at least when put out to pasture, maybe a few more robotic aids to feed, clean and interact with you.
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Thursday 2nd July 2026 12:16 GMT Pete 2
Re: Mono-Something
> dressed like something from the 1980s.
So that when they are sent back in time they will fit in?
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Friday 3rd July 2026 08:07 GMT Anonymous Coward
"UBTECH says the bots use a “biomimetic fast-and-slow brain architecture” that “draws on cognitive neuroscience principles, enabling a 500-millisecond intuitive response system alongside deep reasoning capabilities powered by models with hundreds of billions of parameters.”
I already have that - coffee mode and beer mode.
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Friday 3rd July 2026 08:07 GMT powershift
what is the point
if you can't get it to smack talk, say all the bad words, sex talk, do things for you like the dishes, mop the floor. All the inputs are probably tracked and associated with a unique owner ID gathered at purchase. Then they will push ads through it implanting bad ideas into your head in your living room. Yeah, no thanks.
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Friday 3rd July 2026 08:11 GMT Gavsky
Sex...
It's powered human development & commercialisation of technology for decades. Um, along with killing each other. Camcorders, video, streaming (ugh - please wipe that up), payment systems, VPNs, 'anonymous' browsing, the Dark Web, DVD, The Interwebs - they all got a big boost from 'adult material'.
The first, really capable sex robot will sell millions. If it can microwave your dinner as well, billions...
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Friday 3rd July 2026 08:12 GMT TheMaskedMan
I've been following these developments on various YouTube channels for a while. These things are both a little creepy and very impressive, even though I'm sure they won't do everything it says on the tin.
I, too, wondered about their more intimate capabilities, though I assume the Chinese government wouldn't be overtly involved in the sex bot market. Besides, I'm not sure that recognising 20+ emotional states with a mere 90% accuracy will be sufficient for any kind of marital relationship. Many husbands are expected to recognise and respond appropriately to more than that before breakfast!
And then there's the Chinese government, again. We're told that the middle Kingdom is generally up to no good, what with espionage, backdoored kit etc. If those rumours are even part true, these things will almost certainly be backdoored (not necessarily in the adult sense) and capable of sending info back to the mother ship. They might even be open to remote control, or at least open to receiving instructions from Beijing.
Not so much Autons as Robots of Death, methinks.
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Tuesday 7th July 2026 07:15 GMT The Organ Grinder's Monkey
A former workmate had a simple chant that summarised his aspirations when evaluating a potential new girlfriend:
Can she cook, can she f**k, can she do the washing up?
He'd likely be a customer, if it weren't for the fact that he was observably a fanny magnet, couldn't beat them away with a shitty stick. Woman can be their own worst enemies.
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