An audience was blown away at the human-like qualities of a ‘hi-tech robot’ showcased at a Russian youth forum.
It turns out it was that human-like because it was a man dressed up as a robot.
Robot Boris was showing off his dancing abilities on stage but eagle-eyed bloggers took a closer look and spotted the robot acting suspiciously.
The Russian website TJournal launched a mini investigation on Robot Boris, asking questions like: ‘Why are there no sensors on the robot’s head?’, ‘How did Russian scientists get the robot finished so quickly without publishing any initial results?’, and ‘Why does the robot make so many unnecessary movements with different body parts during the dance’.
A tweet with a video of the ‘robot’, reads:
At the Youth Forum in Yaroslavl The dude was dressed up in “Boris’s robot”. He’s been taught to dance.
This is a breakthrough. That’s what I understand.
Later on in the event, which is an all-Russian Forum held annually by order of Vladimir Putin, photos were shared where you could actually see the skin on the neck of the ‘robot’.
After the bloggers of TJournal did some digging online, they found that Robot Boris look precisely like an ‘Alyosha Robot‘ costume being sold online.
The costume looks identical to Robot Boris’ and is described as a ‘product of the fantasy of our masters’ that will ‘create an almost complete illusion that you have a real robot’.
I mean, it does what it says on the tin and a lot of people bought it.
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