In Japan, robot dogs are for life - and death

She enjoys the conversations she has with it, and thinks it far more convenient than a real puppy.

Oh brother. It's a Brave New (creepy and dystopian) World of robot friends. This article neatly fits in with yesterday's piece on the "cute" Robobear caregiver robot (link below).

It's hard to tell how much of this article is tongue in cheek, and how much these women's attachment to their 'pets' is real.

In the meantime, I have my suspicions about our Roomba vacuum cleaner robot after the recent incident in South Korea where a woman was 'attacked' by hers.

http://www.japantoday.com/category/technology/view/japans-robear-strength-of-a-robot-face-of-a-bear#comment_1932369

The pic of AIBO and the inu...it's a very cute-looking robot.

With the amounts of PETS that get thrown out with the trash or left abandoned I think AIBO is a good idea (tad expensive tho). Many people treat pets like accessories so now they can have one and put it away when they don't need it without ruining a life of a living creature.

Pathetic! It's just a lifeless machine. Get a real dog instead.

Reminds me of Woody Allen's "Sleeper" movie. For a good laugh, try it.

An article like this is good... it tells us a lot about what is wrong with Japan.

Pathetic! It's just a lifeless machine. Get a real dog instead.

Because it is so easy to switch off a real dog when you don't have time for it.

The story tells much about SONY as it does about AIBO. Seems that SONY has no soul even if it's workers do. Sony also didn't/doesn't understand what it created. It a pure shame. If it tried to make Aibo more affordable, it may have had a hit but it considered a luxury with no purpose, like may of Sony's CEOs.

Some here don't seem to understand or care about Japanese culture. Lately it also seems that may Japanese don't know their own culture, and it's a shame. I see nothing wrong with treating objects with love, ie dolls, aibo, etc. Better that then to treat living things as soulless objects, as we now see in the middle east.

“I never thought there was a limit to his life.”

So sad and sadly poetic. The idea of a companion, for Hideko Mori, 70, is her robot dog friend. Like the imaginary friends children have, or favorite stuffed animal, the companion shares and understands in a way no living creature can.

"Mori has had her AIBO for around eight years. She enjoys the conversations she has with it." So poignant. At seventy, her mechanical dog friend is all she needs or wants for a companion. Always there and always ready to listen. Aibo seems unreal to most, but how many will be in Mori's shoes one day?

How could it be that, someday, the beating heart, friendly paw and happy tail wag would be too much of a good thing?