Roboexotica Going Well
I’ve been here a week in Vienna, Austria for Roboexotica, the conference for cocktail robots. It’s been a blast hanging out with my new Austrian friends @ monochrom. Plenty of impressive drink serving bots abound. This photo is of the Kal Spelletich’s Vino-Viper, an articulated arm attached to a wall that is controlled by a glove and blow tube. You move the arm around by moving your fingers and then can serve wine by blowing into a tube. Only the hardy and ambidextrous are successful at getting a decent amount of intoxicant in their cup.
Other interesting bots include Anika and Daniel’s Digi Colada, the Cocktail-Katapult which launches maraschino cherries into a large transformer bot for delivery, the WERP-Bot which facially recognizes and launches a cigarette into a waiting smoker’s mouth. Much local SF representation here with David Calkins‘ drink serving Chapek & Tyler’s WaiterBot, Simone Davalos‘ El Espanol Borracho which makes a mean flaming spanish coffee. Also David Fine and Jonathan Moore’s External Combustion Engine which uses RFID cards to serve up various cocktail recipes. Pals Violet Blue, Jake Appelbaum, V. Vale & family are also here making mayhem. Much more I’m missing, though you can catch a bunch of it in these videos I shot. Also, Roboexotica GETV episode is up.