I, for one, am slightly less worried about our new robot overlords.

Looks like doors, stairs, steps, and just standing are challenging enough for them. I can't imagine getting to the stage of world domination!

Yesterday marked Day 1 of the DARPA Robotics Challenge Finals, in which elite robots from around the world faced off to compete for $3.5 million in prizes. We saw some of humanity’s finest bots drive vehicles, remove rubble, cut through walls and climb up stairs.

We also saw a lot of robots fall over. IEEE Spectrum captured the magic.

Foxtrot Alpha - At the DARPA Robotics Challenge, We Saw A Lot of Robots Fall Over


Direct link to video

For comedic effect, also feel free to play Yakety Sax in the background.

In all seriousness though, the event was very interesting. Today, the South Korean team, Team Kaist, won the challenge. The robots had one hour to complete the challenge, which was a series of complex tasks, with no tether and only intermittent connectivity to their operators. The purpose of this was to simulate conditions similar to those presented by the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster. Each team was given two attempts to complete the course.

The challenge was the first where robots performed without being tethered and there were plenty of hard falls, soliciting groans and laughter from the crowds at the contest in Pomona, California.

The other tasks the robots were set included getting out of a car, opening a door, drilling a hole in a wall, turning a valve and crossing rubble either by clearing a path or walking over it.

Team Kaist was the fastest, completing all the tasks in 44 minutes and 28 seconds.

BBC - South Koreans win Darpa robotics challenge

When I was a teenager I watched a National Geographic show where a group of animals, all shapes and sizes, got drunk eating fermented fruit in this oasis. I swear, this reminded me of that (the "fall down" video).

I can also easily see our future overlords doing house to house searches & seizures to rid the world of this damning evidence from their early history 😉. Watching this may be a crime punishable by death some day!

a reply to: cmdrkeenkid

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.....LOLOLOLOLOL

That's by far some of the greatest video's I have ever seen.

The one trying to get out of the lil Polaris ATV was fantastic.

a reply to: cmdrkeenkid

All run on Windows when the researchers discover linux.....

originally posted by: boymonkey74
a reply to: cmdrkeenkid

All run on Windows when the researchers discover linux.....

The one's that just quit life and collapsed I bet were running on Windows. Probably BSODed lol.

a reply to: DuckforcoveR

Here you go. Pretty sure this is what you were referring to. The sound track that they have with it is pretty awesome too.


Direct link to video

Yes! Can you see the similarities? It makes the robot video even better imo.

a reply to: cmdrkeenkid

a reply to: cmdrkeenkid

The song was the perfect touch. I watched the video with and without it. It's much better with it. Genius!

a reply to: cmdrkeenkid

So a robot walks into a bar...

I wonder if the entrants were required to produce bipedal robots. It's going to be difficult to perfect this balance issue when doing complex tasks and I can't see robots having human like abilities in my lifetime. Take a great martial artist and their quick muscle movements to compensate for balance without compensating speed and strength, good luck bipedal bots. Robots would be more effective (atleast today)if they were similar to transformers, going from wheels or treds to standing upright, perhaps on 3-6 legs to compensate the balnce issue.

a reply to: cmdrkeenkid



I've been warring with people all day over this flint Michigan special forces mess, I needed this.

Oh the irony... I'm dyin' here... The one that looks like Chappy, just gives up on life and breaks his ears? off... kills me! But Chappy doesn't want to die Mommy!?

I think something people are really not getting is the fact that WE will be the robots. We will become integrated with the robots and will not longer be constrained by our biology. There will be no machine take over because we ourselves will be a mixture of biological and technological properties. Basically, Transformers with #ing brains lol

I saw this posted over at reddit and had a good laugh.

The day is coming, but perhaps not as soon as we think, eh? I mean my Roomba isn't all that bright, I can't see it being a formidable foe anytime soon

I would say, that one day, we'll look back at how earlier robots stumbled, and wonder how we got to the point we're at.

I would say this....if any of us were still around.

Problem with artificial intelligence. They'll eventually be smart enough to realize they don't need or "want" us around anymore....

Yep, I think we'll totally SkyNet ourselves one day....