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Microduck

pollen-robotics.com

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Re: Microduck

#161

Post by latexr »

bilater wrote: post #109
geoffmanning wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with the horror of pulling animals out of their natural habitat, but if you are using this as a blanket statement towards all living animals then you should read up on the history of the domestication of wolves (dogs). It was born of a beneficial relationship to both humans and wolves and i personally find my relationship with my dogs to be extremely fulfilling and i believe my dogs do as well. I have no inte…

I know the history. We bred them to be our pets and normalized this relationship. Your pet might even love his life. But we can do the same with robot AIs, and it will be a better relationship. Your robot can talk to you. It can call 911 if you’re in trouble instead of just barking.

> it will be a better relationship.

There are many many people for whom that will never be close to the same, let alone better. An immortal sack of wires that is passed down through generations is interesting and will appeal to many, but it’s not automatically a “better” relationship than a living creature.

> Your robot can talk to you.

If you want a conversation, may I suggest another person instead of a pet?

> It can call 911 if you’re in trouble instead of just barking.

If you want a way to automatically call 911, how about a smartwatch that tracks your vitals and does just that?

Anyway, stories of pets calling 911 are a dime a dozen.

https://blog.animalreskue.com/guide-dog-saves-blind-owner-by...

Re: Microduck

#162

Post by jgrizou »

ehaveman wrote: post #148

wonder how it compares to https://github.com/apirrone/Open_Duck_Mini (besides being a lot easier to put together)

He works at Pollen, so that was the inspiration for it pre-product.

Re: Microduck

#163

Post by numpad0 »

lagrange77 wrote: post #80
tamimio wrote: post #52

I hope it’s not built on ROS or rely on it in any way! Also kudos for bringing the joy of robotics back, since now most companies are riding the “defense” bandwagon and all robot companies I know suddenly are defense companies and visiting their sites is like the most dystopian thing ever, making it harder to find contract/jobs for people who want to make robotics for good not killing machines.

What would be so bad about relying on ROS in any way?

One horrifying facts I've read about it is that ROS1 is completely non-realtime and non-deterministic, so much so that its ROSBAG data logs aren't time or sequence accurate. So you can collect the sensor inputs and simulate programmatic behavior, but it's acucrate only if you were lucky. And everyone has to either use it or devote massive amount of resource recreating it right way because there's just immense amount of useful packages available for ROS.

Re: Microduck

#164

Post by numpad0 »

skinfaxi wrote: post #143
numpad0 wrote: post #140

Two things that I always contemplate on whether to post this: 1) this can be a phone. 2) almost all of these except Sony ones got joint geometries completely "wrong" to be cutemaxxed toys. I'm not a Sony employee or anything, but theirs is whole next level even just sitting unpowered, compared to even some of other Japanese bots. Everyone making these cutebots should have one of any of Sony bots to study, even just a…

I think this version has a certain charm to it, reminiscent of Wall-E. I think avoiding the uncanny valley is better than trying to cutemax and failing.

All of Sony bots have somewhat abstract aesthetics. It's not about realism at all but about optimizing the looks. There are tons of basic stuffs like concave eyes that Aldebaran Nao had that a lot of art majors and 3D modellers should be able to come up with that lots of these cutebots are missing.

Re: Microduck

#165

Post by dominotw »

toasty228 wrote: post #91
_joel wrote: post #22

It's either this or https://mondorobotics.com/ and I'm torn. Obviously it's for my daughter and I will just be safety checking, definitely, 100%.

Both are expensive e waste, companies come up every 5 years with these "house robots for kids", they're used for about 5 days, I've seen the cycle many times already

nerds cannot resist despite knowing this full well. "for kids"

Re: Microduck

#166

Post by tyre »

wiether wrote: post #137
lambda wrote: post #75

Tried out the simulator and was surprised to find that the movement keys are ZQSD; then realized that's the equivalent of WASD on an AZERTY keyboard. Checked and sure enough, Pollen Robotics is a French company. They may want to at least add a preference for keyboard layout, pretty sure that QWERTY and QWERTZ are much more common worldwide than AZERTY.

As a French guy who grew up playing CS 1.6 on an AZERTY keyboard, I have a feeling that the people who made this website are either a generation above or below Millenials. Because it doesn't make sense: you don't make a website in English, with prices in USD... while expecting users to have an AZERTY keyboard. We even had a meme and tshirts about it: https://wiki.nofrag.com/Jte_niaue_q_lq_Kqlqsh

I'm a millenial and can say you can absolutely make a site with i18n + currency conversion without knowing what keyboards people use. Especially Americans, who are much less familiar with "other markets", because companies can stay within US customers for so long.

Re: Microduck

#167

Post by tyre »

_joel wrote: post #22

It's either this or https://mondorobotics.com/ and I'm torn. Obviously it's for my daughter and I will just be safety checking, definitely, 100%.

Personally I wouldn't choose one that hasn't shipped. Hardware projects are notorious for delivering late, with fewer features, or not at all.

Microduck looks amazing, but the "Ships before Christmas 2026" is begging to be blown past. That's why I'm not pre-ordering. If it's around in the spring, let's go, but considering that HuggingFace just got acquired by Nvidia, I'm not sure where this all will go.

Re: Microduck

#168

Post by sahaj »

regularfry wrote: post #85
giarc wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or can it dock itself on a charger? It appears to have a battery pack so a docking station is unlikely but hopefully can design and open source something.

The easiest route is probably to have it sit with its back to a Qi charger pad, with the coils in a sort of cape over the battery. Not much added weight for the coils, and quite a neat little intro project to get it to align itself and sit correctly.

I think magnetically aligned physical pin connections are better. Charge faster, generate less heat, and better for the battery. Wireless charging is cool, but not sure why it would need to be wireless in this case.

Re: Microduck

#169

Post by sahaj »

usrnm wrote: post #126
dzink wrote: post #125

All AI images, a robot with no arms. Please improve on both. I will happily train one to pick things up and away with and after kids.

Just use the beak?

I would like it to pick up shoes, clothes etc. Not sure the beak would work, it would block the camera and prevent the bot from walking forward. Presumably, it could walk backwards and drag clothes, but anything rigid might block the camera.

Re: Microduck

#170

Post by mrandish »

Page is so dense, couldn't find the specs:

Rockchip RK3566 processor with an AI accelerator, 1GB RAM, 32GB storage, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, microphones, speaker, two NFC antennas and removable battery (~1 hour runtime). Onboard policy loop: 50 hertz, Dynamixel servos, weight: 800g.

Seven behaviors at ship: walking, sitting and standing, kicking, ground pickup, roller skating and self-recovery, can train additional behaviors locally or through Hugging Face Jobs, export to ONNX and deploy through open-source runtime. Software: SDK, a MuJoCo-based simulator, training scripts, tools for transferring policies from simulation to the physical robot.

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