Official News page 5

REAL LIFE NEWS: SCHOOL BY ROBOT

by Hazed

A Texas student is attending school remotely by sending a robot as his surrogate.

Lyndon Baty has kidney disease and recent treatments have affected his immune system so that he cannot risk contact with other children. So he uses a telepresence robot to go to classes. The four foot tall bot on wheels has a small screen, camera, speakers and microphone at the top. Lyndon logs into the robot from home using his PC and a webcam, then drives the robot around the school to switch between classes just like the other students.

The robot has been manufactured by a company called Vgo. It retails for around £6,000. The company has allowed Lyndon to use it for free, which is a nice gesture but has also generated them some good publicity, so everybody wins.

The technology involved in the Vgo telepresence robot is not cutting edge - the only thing that stopping it from becoming a big thing is the price tag. Once it drops to, say, $500 you can expect to see telepresence robots in offices, schools, as an alternative way to keep in touch with friends and family...

This article goes into detail about the implications of this technology, and also has a video showing Lyndon using his robot to attend school.

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