{"id":35004,"date":"2023-10-25T18:18:59","date_gmt":"2023-10-25T16:18:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/0e6320cd-6562-4f8e-9b74-1b5096c2ef6d"},"modified":"2023-10-25T18:46:15","modified_gmt":"2023-10-25T16:46:15","slug":"this-ai-robot-is-billed-as-the-footballer-of-the-future-its-hilariously-bad","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/rss_feed\/this-ai-robot-is-billed-as-the-footballer-of-the-future-its-hilariously-bad\/","title":{"rendered":"This AI robot is billed as the footballer of the future. It’s hilariously bad"},"content":{"rendered":"

ARTEMIS is not so great at the great game. <\/p>

By Alex Hughes\n <\/p>

Published: Wednesday, 25 October 2023 at 16:18 PM<\/p>

\n\n

A robot<\/a> should be the perfect football player. They\u2019re hardy, can run long distances without getting tired and when they break a leg, it\u2019s a quick fix-up before they\u2019re back on the pitch. But it turns out they\u2019ve got a long way to go.<\/p>

ARTEMIS<\/a> is a robot designed to challenge the world of football. While it stands for Advanced Robotic Technology for Enhanced Mobility and Improved Stability, its creators affectionally refer to it as \u2018Robot That Exceeds Messi in Soccer’.<\/p>

It\u2019s always bold to claim something is better than\u2026 well, one of the world’s best, so does ARTEMIS live up to that claim? Unfortunately, no. In a demonstration at the tech conference GITEX 2023<\/a>, the robot was let loose on a football, kicking it back and forth with its team of creators.<\/p>

While ARTEMIS landed the occasional kick, sending the ball back with a light roll, the robot more often let it gently roll past it, or even straight over its own foot. The machine did this all while jogging on the spot in what can only be described as a nervous ‘do you know where the restroom is?’ energy.<\/p>

\u201cThe locomotion part is not artificial intelligence, it is model-based. However, its autonomy is done using AI so when the camera looks around, it needs to know where the ball is and where the players are using digital-based localisation, it needs to plan to play soccer\u201d, Dennis Hong<\/a>, founding director of the company behind ARTEMIS told BBC Science Focus<\/em> at GITEX.<\/p>

\u201cThis is a one-of-a-kind robot. It can walk, jump and run. It is also the world’s fastest human-shaped robot and it is fully autonomous.\u201d<\/p>

The next football World Cup<\/strong> \u2013 of robots<\/strong><\/h2>

Despite its slightly wobbly demonstration, ARTEMIS is poised to revolutionise the football world, or at least that is the plan for it. <\/p>

\u201cThere is a competition called RoboCup. It\u2019s an international autonomous robot soccer competition. The goal is that by the year 2050, we will play the current World Cup-winning team,\u201d Hong explained.<\/p>

\u201cWhen that game does finally happen, they want it to be a fair match. So the robots can have two cameras in the front, replicating human vision, but they couldn\u2019t have one in the back.\u201d<\/p>

The RoboCup group has held yearly matches since 1997 and will once again meet in 2024 to put their robots to the test. While that 2050 goal is still a long way away, there is still a lot of progress to be made.<\/p>

In the 2023 RoboCup, ARTEMIS was pitched against Sweaty, a robot named after its ability to self-cool its motors via evaporative cooling (how very human). The matchup felt similar to what we imagine two babies playing football would look like \u2013 a lot of support, plenty of falls, and a crowd of people cheering on for every attempted kick made.<\/p>