Gadgetory

hey if you haven't already noticed I'm British from Brit land and actually I'm still there right now my boss has decided that I should get to know people in our New York office so they got me this thing it's a telepresence robot the people who make it say it's going to be all the rage in the offices of the future so we thought we test it now it's perfect now telepresence robots have been around for a few years but they've not yet caught on this particular model is made by a company named double robotics and it's a good template for the genre they're basically screens on wheels that you move around either with an hour or in a browser you log in basically just like a Skype call and then you're good to go in this thing I can move around as we're doing now kind of shakily I can go up with the screen like this and I can also go down as well and I can also turn around I can do the slowest pirouette you've ever seen here we are still happening and there we are we're back in hey but our telepresence robots actually any good when it comes to being in office well yes and no the times I did work using the bots like talking to my editors about a story for example we're great we sat in a room together and I got to do the whole reading facial expressions and interpreting tone of voice thing but I never have over email but this was just a face-to-face conversation we might as well have been talking over Skype and when it came to actually moving about the office like now things were a little less smooth for start it feels a bit weird to make people talk to a robot like it's a normal conversation you know everyone's just thinking wow this is deeply deeply silly but they have to pretend like it's not and the bot also has the motor skills of a toddler which is good in some ways because people felt sympathetic for me they'd pick me up when I fell over and they made sure I didn't roll into any walls order however I'd hate to use this thing as a boss and try and tell someone off it just wouldn't stick so this is the thing about telepresence sports they're just not serious devices and you wouldn't want your whole presence in an office to be based on using one that fun yes and they're satisfying to use but I don't think they'll ever be more than a nice product they're for emergencies or special occasions if you want to work remotely you've got a wealth of options and you don't have to wait around for people to open doors for you