This New Samsung Robot Looks Like It Comes Straight Out Of A ‘Black Mirror’ Episode
Samsung has released a new robotic personal assistant named Ballie that follows you around the house. It’s meant to anticipate your needs and serve as a life companion. It contains built-in artificial intelligence capabilities, a camera, and a mobile interface.
According to the commercial (which you can watch below) the robot is capable of entertaining your pet throughout the day, and can also show you live footage of your pet while you’re out of the house.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7N5UDZX7TQ
Even though the robot is intended to help make lives easier, viewers are already saying it looks like something straight out of Black Mirror. In other words, it sounds like a disaster waiting to happen. Not to mention, pet owners don’t think these things are going to last long when their animals are in the mood to play.
https://twitter.com/JohnHarker16/status/1214600322963968007
This level of automation is really fucking cool but there's always gonna be that small part of me that thinks "but what if it becomes self aware or has a program error & becomes a deathbot & attacks" so just in case I treat all robots with kindness & respect https://t.co/qkHRK26D9T
— Katie | Liberate 🇵🇸🇨🇩🇸🇩 (@PikaChulita) January 7, 2020
These things will not last 5 minutes in any house with a dog. Who decided to make this look like a tennis ball?? https://t.co/HjXVeGWSFe
— §këwë§ (@exSkewesme) January 7, 2020
BB-8 but make it NSA hackable https://t.co/AmGvJTgLCr
— Katelyn Burns (@transscribe) January 7, 2020
In an age where consumers are already worried about their phones listening to everything they say, having a device like Ballie following them around the house and documenting their every move might not be the best idea. The idea might work better as an episode of Black Mirror.