英闻天下——59 Romo: The World's First Smartphone Robot

 　　It first showed up in October 2011 on Kickstarter, the world's largest funding platform for creative projects. Then Romo quickly won people's hearts around the world.

 

　　It's the world's first smart phone robot. An iPhone or an iTouch is his face and brain. It moves with two pedrails just like Wall-E. You can control it with wi-fi, which means, you can control it almost anywhere in the world.

 

　　All one must do is to download an app, plug in your phone, and watch it come to life.

 

　　Romotive the company that developed Romo, built a manufacturing plant in China last October, producing as many as 12,000 Romos a week. This is a major jump in order to satisfy the upsurge in demand around the world.

 

　　The visionaries behind the next high-tech¹ craze see Romo, weighing only half a kilogram, as the creative force behind them.

 

　　Keller Rinaudo is the CEO of Romotive.

 

　　"What are you going to do with your old iPhone or with your old iPod? And that's a really cool answer to say, 'Well I will just take it and put on a robot'."

 

　　Romo is the first affordable² smart phone robot in the world. Keller says he only needs a smart phone to be his "brain" together with a robotic base and a navigation system.

 

　　"So the advantage of using a smart device as Romo's brain is that people already have these devices."

 

　　All one must do is to download the app, plug in your phone and watch him come to life.

 

　　And what's cool is one can control Romo from anywhere in the world using a computer. But Keller says they are developing an app that will allow the user to control Romo, using an iPhone from anywhere in the world.

 

　　"You see everything that the robot sees and it's kind of like Skype if you can move around in a three-dimensional space."

 

　　According to Keller, an important reason why people are obsessed³ with it is that people feel they share an emotional connection with their robot.

 

　　"Actually one of our investors⁴ that bought a robot, I remember him calling us and being like my nephew is – obsessed with the robot! But we've been shocked by is the way that humans interact with Romo, it's very emotional, when that device has a face on it and it is wandering around murmuring in like baby robot language and bumping into your bed. People have an emotional connection, they feel that it's something they have to take care of."

 

　　Even though Romo still has many little glitches⁵, it's hard for people not to fall madly in love with Romo with a price tag of just 150 US dollars. It's quite an easy sell, as it is a pet, a playmate, a companion and a stroke of genius.

 

　　For CRI, I am Li Dong.

1 high-tech   

adj.高科技的

参考例句：

• The economy is in the upswing which makes high-tech services in more demand too.经济在蓬勃发展，这就使对高科技服务的需求量也在加大。
• The quest of a cure for disease with high-tech has never ceased. 人们希望运用高科技治疗疾病的追求从未停止过。

2 affordable   

adj.支付得起的，不太昂贵的

参考例句：

• The rent for the four-roomed house is affordable.四居室房屋的房租付得起。
• There are few affordable apartments in big cities.在大城市中没有几所公寓是便宜的。

3 obsessed   

adj.心神不宁的,鬼迷心窍的,沉迷的

参考例句：

• He's obsessed by computers. 他迷上了电脑。
• The fear of death obsessed him throughout his old life. 他晚年一直受着死亡恐惧的困扰。

4 investors   

n.投资者，出资者( investor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a con man who bilked investors out of millions of dollars 诈取投资者几百万元的骗子
• a cash bonanza for investors 投资者的赚钱机会

5 glitches   

n.小过失，差错( glitch的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Manufacturing glitches have limited the factory's output. 生产中的故障影响了该厂的产量。 来自辞典例句
• Another kind of period variation,\"Glitches,\" are seen in several pulsars. 在几个脉冲星中还看到了周期的另一种变化，即“自转突快”现象。 来自辞典例句