Apple Robotics?
What Would Life be Like if Steve Jobs had Built Robots Instead of Computers?
If you hang around me long enough you might hear me complain about how robotics is still, 30 years after Androbot, in its infancy, especially AI. So, I got to thinking--what if Steve Jobs had built robots instead of computers?
1. Apple Robotics would start in a garage using stolen motors, computer boards and sensors producing his first line of robots "AppleBots".
2. His robots would have cost more than any others but still users would be proud to own an AppleBot.
3. Apple Robotics would next have stolen the Asimo technology and called his next line of robots "MacinBots".
4. Jobs would have been the first out with a voice-controlled robot. And the early adopters would be proud to own them as well even if they did make people laugh as the robots’ totally messed up even simple commands. "Robot get me tea." (The robot would then return with the wife's dentures, hearing "teeth" instead of "tea".)
5. Bill Gates would have gotten into robotics in the early 80s too, creating "MSROS" and later "WinBots" in the process. Nolen Bushnell would compete fiercely to get his "Topo" out to market to take the biggest share of the personal robot market.
6. He would have been first to marked a home robot vacuum system that would become a common house tool that most families could not live without.
7. He would follow that up with pool cleaning robots, yard cleaning robots, and finally a reliable domestic robot that could be rented or purchased and eventually the price would come down low enough that a large bit of the population of the US could afford them by paying a monthly maintenance fee and would use constant robot upgrades as a way to keep his customers coming back.
Keep building. Keep inventing. Keep "thinking different".
--Thomas