How googly eyes solved one of today’s trickiest user acceptance issues #Robots #Robotics @fastcompany
Katherine Schwab writes in Fastcompany about the issue of users accepting robots in places like a library in Helsinki. Adding Googly Eyes made all the difference!
Addressing the complexity of human-robot interaction was the goal of the designers behind a new robot at the central Oodi library in Helsinki, Finland. The library brought in the digital consultancy Futurice to help it to transform some of its existing robots—which help move books between floors—into ‘bots that could help librarians with other tasks.
Futurice came up with a simple interface: Googly eyes. Inspired by one of Disney’s 12 basic principles of animation, Axelsson decided to use googly eyes combined with sound and movement to both show the robot’s intent and express its state of being. Most importantly, the eyes are programmed to indicate the robot’s direction to customers, so they’re not caught unaware when it’s moving around.
The small change shifted the robot from a utilitarian automated book cart on wheels to a robot with personality. That was a big bonus: “It’s more approachable with the eyes.”
Earlier this year, the supermarket chain Giant Food Stores similarly added googly eyes to customer-facing robots, which it rolled out to 172 stores on the East Coast. The company reports that people like to take pictures with the bots.
Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7:30pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat and our Discord!
