(Newswire.net — August 2, 2015) — Philadelphia, PA – A Canadian sociology experiment that captured the hearts of Canadians and Europeans, ended ingloriously in tThe US, CBS Boston reported.
Measuring just some three foot tall, HitchBOT was on his cross-country route from Boston to LA. The hitch-hiking robot was programmed to communicate but was not able to move by itself. HitchBOT represented a cute companion who wanted to join you on your commute. After the robot successfully traveled across the Canada and some EU countries, Canadian AI hitcher HitchBOT was stuck in Boston for a week after people drove it around, but not where it needed to go.
Finally, HitchBOT left Boston, putting up its thumb and asking for a ride. It survived Salem, Gloucester, Marblehead and New York City but was found vandalized in Philadelphia.
“HitchBOT was very well received as it made its way across Canada, Germany, and the Netherlands – proving that robots can indeed trust humans,” said HitchBOT’s co-creator Professor Frauke Zeller. Zeller is an assistant professor in the School of Professional Communication at Ryerson University. Those remarks came when HitchBOT started its journey across the US.
HitchBOT just recently reported that he was “California dreamin’” but never made it to the West Coast.
Researchers told AP they had no clue who had destroyed the robot, or why. Reportedly, the creators were sent an image of the vandalized robot, but researchers couldn’t track its location because the battery was dead.
The robot, about the size of a 10-year-old child, was a core of the Canadian research on how would people react to robots. It is immobile and thus entirely dependent on humans, complete strangers, to understand what it is, put it in the car and transport it from place to place.
It had a bucket for a body, foam noodles for arms and legs and wore yellow rubber gloves and patterned rubber boots. The photo from Philadelphia revealed HitchBOT arms had been removed and its head, once a square LED display that could show messages, was missing.
HitchBOT equipment included GPS navigation and a Wi-Fi connection, and it snapped photos to document its whereabouts. With its humanized voice, HitchBOT could engage in limited conversation and give people random facts from Wikipedia.
Reportedly, during its past travels, HitchBOT crashed a Calgary couple’s wedding last August; hitched a ride in a sports car and on a bicycle in Germany this past February. It also had its portrait painted in the Netherlands in June. Last Friday, the HitchBOT was seen at the Red Sox game.