【I Want To Be The First Guy】

In case you missed it,I Want To Be The First Guy the robots are here.

No, not the apocalyptic hordes of artificially intelligent machines that some believe are destined to enslave or eradicate us (hello, Boston Dynamics!), but the everyday devices and companions that are rapidly becoming commonplace. After decades of lofty sci-fi-inspired promises, robots like iRobot's Roomba vacuums and the many iterations of the Sony Aibo robodog are slowly carving out their places in our domestic lives. Even Amazon's Alexa is arguably a disembodied robot.

SEE ALSO: This tiny robotic spider might one day perform surgeries inside your body

A new entry into the field is Anki's Vector. Vector is a small tabletop robot with big features. First and foremost, unlike other "robots" like those from Sphero or even WowWee, Vector doesn't need a smartphone to control it. It's fully autonomous and loaded with sensors, enabling it to interact with and learn from its environment from the get-go.

Mashable Light Speed Want more out-of-this world tech, space and science stories? Sign up for Mashable's weekly Light Speed newsletter. By clicking Sign Me Up, you confirm you are 16+ and agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Thanks for signing up!

Vector is another milestone for Anki, a company that's had one of the most interesting stories in tech. Unknown to the world before its splash launch at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in 2013, the robotics company has come out with several products, including intelligent toy race cars and a previous, more limited robot, Cozmo.

Where does the robustly funded company go next? And when will it move its robotics business into something more capable (i.e. not a toy). Anki CEO Boris Sofman dropped by Mashable's MashTalk podcast this week to give us the full story of his young company, why it's so focused on the "personality" of its robots, and what he sees in the future for domestic robots and AI.

You can subscribe to MashTalk on iTunesor Google Play, and we'd appreciate it if you could leave a review. Feel free to hit us with questions and comments by tweeting to @mashtalkor attaching the #MashTalk hashtag. We welcome all feedback.

---

Featured Video For You

---

The future of rescue robots looks a lot like a centaur

---

Topics Artificial Intelligence

• Science
• Games
• Deals
• Entertainment
• Shopping
• Tech
• Life
• Social Good

• The Afterlife of <em>Newsies</em>
• Chrissy Teigen swears she'll never use Twitter's new 280
• Progressives are cheering these LGBTQ wins from the 2017 election
• Vespa shows off its first all
• The Unofficial Chief of Staff
• Pollution in New Delhi is so bad it's a health emergency
• Snap loses its head of the engineering amid plans to overhaul Snapchat app
• Chrissy Teigen swears she'll never use Twitter's new 280
• What a great week to be a woman in media!!
• 'There's Someone Inside Your House' is full of slasher

• The Gray Place
• Hang the Landlord
• Tom Hanks: Typewriter Fetishist
• Over Our Heads
• Hugh Hefner Was Always an Abusive Creep with Bad Taste in Leisure Wear
• Greek Tragedy
• The Fatberg Cometh
• Spicer, Racked
• We’re Living in “The Thick of It”
• The Conversion of Gucci Mane

• Firing Lines
• Apple's AR headset could arrive as early as 2020
• Your star sign actually determines how you use your iPhone, trust us
• The sequel to 'Words With Friends' allows you to play without friends
• Zucktown, USA
• Khal Drogo and Tormund Giantsbane met IRL and slayed pints together
• Julia Louis
• Snap loses its head of the engineering amid plans to overhaul Snapchat app
• Best headphones deal: Save $120 on Sony WH
• Arctic blast invades U.S., targets Mid

• Who Framed Augmented Reality?
• Britney Spears sells original watercolor painting for $10,000
• We're losing our eyes on the rapidly warming, melting Arctic
• 'Call of Duty: WWII' delivers a gutless view of the Holocaust (review)
• Nanny State of Mind
• Ford signs deal to make all
• Second actress accuses 'Gossip Girl' star Ed Westwick of rape
• As a powerful male CEO, I didn’t believe in the gender pay gap. Then I got stuck in a well.
• Al Gore’s Pivot to Idiocy
• New Google Chrome feature blocks sketchy pop