South Korea hearts robots!!!

South Korea loves robots

Some of you may remember back in September, I published a short article “Human Beings Rendered Obsolete: Go Go girls in trouble”.  Well, it seems this tragedy is not going to end with them. Even professions that involve high levels of skill and personal involvement are being threatened. Some of you may know that South Korea is aiming to be a leader in the field of robotics, and it is no doubt an exciting field but I ask you fine readers and internet citizens – Where does it end?

…….and then they came for the babysitters

The above video is an advertisement for Kibot. Kibot is basically a toy shaped like a monkey that entertains kids through games and stories as well as let’s their parents look in on them and vice versa. If a parent wants to check up on their child they can call the Kibot and actually control it’s movements and see their child via a built in video camera. If their little girl or boy wants to talk to them, they have a card that contains a chip the Kibot can read and automatically video call their parents for them. They can even learn English from the Kibot!

Which brings us to Engkey…….

ATTENTION FORMER GEPIK AND SMOE TEACHERS YOUR REPLACEMENT IS AN EGG! That’s right this little beauty may very well be what you got traded in for. But who will grade all those papers and tests you ask? It’s ok they’ll just pile on more work for the Korean English teachers and still pay them the same salary because it’s not like they are pulling-their-hair-out-busy as it is. No biggie!

Although this technology is all well and good, I can’t help but be reminded of the report published about 2 years ago by the  International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement. They ranked South Korea as number 35 out of 36 countries for poor social skills, doing the worst in the areas of relationship promotion and social cooperation. The latter honestly surprised me, but with a robot for a teacher relationship promotion, a very important life skill, will only worsen.

now that we’ve got the foreigners out how can we keep it that way?

This video shows the South Korean border guard robots developed by Korea University and Samsung. That’s right the same company that helps people to connect and be entertained can now help kill you as well. What will they come up with next!? Reportedly, each robot costs about 200,000 USD and took millions of the Korean government’s and private investors money to develop. As you can see in the video the robot can spot humans up to a mile away and also has “ears” for hearing a special “don’t shoot”  password, which you’de better know if you don’t want to be on the wrong side of the barrel. I hope the “ears” are better than those of some of these automated customer service directories people are forced to use, which coincidentally have been  known to make we wanna kill as well.

Well what about those we need to keep “in”?

Unfortunately, I could not find a video of this one in action but it’s purpose is to patrol prisons and identify abnormal behavior as well as communicate with human guards in the event of an emergency. Nothing says “prison” like a big pair of yellow robot eyes!

These are just some of the ways that South Korea is utilizing robotic technology. There are also robots being used as waitresses,bartenders,wedding MCs as well as singers and actors in public performances.  Something tells me it is only the beginning. Kamsamnida Mr. Roboto!

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