2006 Rockefeller New Media Foundation Proposal

Abstract

In Companion Projects I am specifically contesting the domestic robots marketed to people of all ages by creating robots with complicated psychological states similar to those that people might have, such as anxiety, neuroses, and psychoses. Omo, Amo, and Umo are three series of soft, lap sized, egg shaped, organ-like robots with secret lives, strange reactions, uncanny communications and neurotic propensities. They are held by people, and communicate through body signals. They are responsive to people (and animals, and machines) interacting with them, but unlike machines designed as consumer items, these robots are designed to be provocatively unstable. They are not emotionally subordinate, soothing, and "perfect" all the time - even if a person shows them affection they maintain the ability to misbehave. This presents people with emotional dilemmas and contradictions, as people vitally do with each other.