[Robotgroup] Robots, Groups, Art, Technology

[Glenn Currie]

Alex Iles, Brooks Coleman, Dave Santos, and Bill Craig worked on some
projects at a "hands on" science center called "Discovery Hall".  One of the
founders of Discovery Hall,  was professor Jack Turner, who was a 
physics professor at U.T.

The Discovery Hall building was on Congress Ave, and had served as an
office building, a bus station etc.  When this collection of individuals 
labeled
by others at Discovery Hall, as "The Robot Group", were asked to leave 
the building at,
what seemed to be an unreasonable hour, they walked to a near by
diner - Ted's Greek Corner at 417 Congress Ave.

The food at Ted's was not all that great, but coffee would not kill you 
(immediately), so
the collection of individuals continued to meet and stuff their faces while
discussing projects.  There was no set time or set agenda - this suited this
collection of individuals well.  They had more than enough meetings, held
as specific times, with endless "Power Pointless" slide presentations, where
more effort was put into a glitzy presentation, than into the content.

By the way, the guy that ran the diner was Greek, his name was not
"Ted", he was a hard working, hard nosed business man, and he
was too cheap to change the sign.

The lack of a set time and agenda was fine with some people, others just
didn't know how to deal with it and found it frustrating.  Without a set
time or agenda, this collection of individuals built a lot of cool stuff.

The world is full of organizations that have form but little substance.  
People
get used to this and come to believe this is the only way things can be 
accomplished.
At meetings, many tend to fall into using a half assed version of 
"Roberts Rules of Order",
to conduct the meeting. 

Do you have a copy of Roberts Rules of Order?  Next question, have you ever
read it?  Some organizations have in their official documents a 
statement that
meetings will be conducted under Roberts Rules of Order.  Roberts Rules
of Order are the ultimate in form over substance.  This is where ideas like
"I make a motion that ...", and "I second the motion...", comes from, they
are certainly not in the bylaws of The Robot Group Inc.

These "early members", were individuals, that were seen in close 
proximity on several occasions,
so the people at Discovery Hall started calling them "The Robot Group" 
because
humans tend to name things as a kind of short hand.  Pigeon holing 
people and
groups of people, is a simplistic method of modeling things.  In 
slapping a label
on something, it makes it easier to talk about.  There is no effective 
enforcement
mechanism, to be sure that the labels are accurate.

I refer to these early "members" as a collection of  individuals, as 
they were and
remain original thinkers.  The word "anarchist" comes immediately to 
mind - that is
to say, not a group.  This is uncomfortable for many.

In the years I have been associated with The Robot Group Inc., and 
before the Inc.
I have observed that there are a limited number of people that have 
ideas and
want to build things.  The next collection of people are those that are 
happy to help
build things that others design, and pay for.  The largest category, if 
I am forced to
attempt to describe them, is the "hangers on" that hang with the group 
when something
interesting, to them, is going on.  Like havening a camera crew to come 
through the shop
and create videos, that they sell for big bucks, and the RG folks get to 
sign a document
that legally lets the video producers do anything they want with the 
footage, and
the RG only gets a bit of publicity, is an example of such an event.

The group is essentially is a group of volunteers.  Look up descriptions 
of volunteer groups
in the literature.  The specifics differ but the interaction is 
absolutely nothing new going on.
Absolutely no mystery to it.

Alex, Bill, Dave, and Brooks always had, and still have, ideas for 
projects.  Edwin
built a huge pneumatic spider like robot.  Several of us worked out a 
chassis design
and welded up at least 5 custom chassis, wheel chair powered robots.

Eric, Derek and I helped on the Austin Robot Technology autonomous vehicle
entered in the DARPA Grand Challenge.

Lots of projects.

There is not concise definition of what a robot is.
Asimov offered "Computer plus machine" which is concise, but only pushes
the definition on to the next level - what is a computer and what is a 
machine?

A crowd that attends some event is usually labeled as "the audience".  This
group is particularly ephemeral, even during the "performance".  When one
or more gets up to pee, the group changes.  Some like music albums
that are "live" in that it give them the feeling that they are "there".  
Others
like studio albums - they are interested in the music, not a bunch of 
screaming
fans.

Much of what The Robot Group means to people is a social gathering to trade
ideas, bullshit, and stuff your face.  At the old shop, some regularly 
drank beer
to get into the swing of, social, things.  There is nothing at all wrong 
or right
about the social aspects of the "group", it is what it is, and what the 
"group"
is "doing" differs from each persons view point.

What I have observed is very little apparent awareness of the 
interactions of
the "group" members.  If you want to build some sort of robot, what is 
your model?
Humans?  Members of The Robot Group"?  Build some robots  that drink beer,
tells jokes, stuff their intakes with an over abundance of fuel and 
"chat" at ever
increasing levels of volume, until all are shouting - even those within 
3 feet of
each other.  Have the robots move form one impromptu clump of "members",
to another if some "interesting" word is parsed from the shouting.  No need
to stay in context.  Stay up too late and have to go to work the next day.
Posting comments to a group email would be trivial.
Surely these would be simple robots to build - but would you want to?

As I have said, many times, the group is defined by the currently active 
members.

There have always been people that initiated projects, and those that 
helped or
watched and told you how you could do it better, that their brother 
knows someone
in that did catering for the CIA, and the military has a better one, 
whatever it is.
The question for those that are really lost, is "How much does that cost?".
Get them to define "cost", and broaden their port hole on the universe.

At the shop, we finally decided that you really could not get much done on
"meeting nights"   The tools
could be dangerous, noisy, and there were people that assumed you were doing
performance art, and were there to justify and explain your project to 
them.  It is
easy to loose body parts when using power tools, and explaining what you 
are doing
and why.   Some felt the shop was the robot equivalent of a "petting 
zoo" where
they could paw through the materials and pick up every tool in the 
place, and
were offended if you asked them to stop.

So if you want to build something, get started on it, others will help 
if you if you ask,
but you need to be able to explain what is needed, then get some help - 
not just
explain it over and over to people that showed up because they were 
looking for
a substitute for watching T.V., drinking beer, and stuffing their face, 
at home.

There are a lot of people in the Austin area that have a lot of 
technical talents.
Many of them like to use their skills on "things they can't build at work".
RG gathering is a good place to meet these people.

There are books on AI, and there books on human psychology, sociology, etc.
Although the specifics of a particular project can differ, the larger 
picture of
human interaction has been observed by some, and lived by many, since before
recorded history.  Same song, different verse.  Write your own melody 
and lyrics.
If you do that with a welding torch and servos, well that's up to you.

Focus on the meaning of "art" and "technology" and you will find there 
is no
technology without art, and there is no art, devoid of some sort of 
technology.
To consider them separate, distinct and unrelated implies a fundamental 
lack of
understanding of either. Clarify these meanings and and pick a direction 
to go.
Without some focus, the "group" will resemble Wendy's hamburger eaters,
playing "Pin the tail on the robot".

There are lots of interesting projects, pick one and go for it.  As for 
me, I have
some projects to get back to. ;-)

Cheers,

-Glenn