Keepon, the robot which was once just a oneoff hand-crafted project is now being mass produced by its creators who have started their own company called BeatBots. The little guy will (actually, is now) be on sale for a base price of $30,000, primarily targetting researchers interested in the field of robotics or more specifically the subject of Human Robot Interaction.

Now, obviously I realise what you are probably thinking right now, that little thing for 30-grand? But, apparently, if you wait a little while, they are planning to come out with a new version which will use a simpler mechanism and have a cheaper price tag.

Watch this video of Keepon in action, then you might know what all the fuzz is about…

For those who are unfamiliar with Keepon, it is a robot initially developed by Prof. Kozima to do research on interaction between robots and children – thus the cuddly features. His observations of autistic children playing with Keepon have led him to think about the quintessence of autism and ways of applying such robots to therapeutic care.

Meanwhile, Marek, who is a Ph.D. student at Carnegie Mellon University, met Prof. Kozima through a former advisor and developed software that made Keepon react to rhythms and music. When he posted a video of a dancing Keepon to YouTube, it became a global sensation. WIRED Magazine produced a promotion video last year with Keepon and the rock band Spoon.

Now Marek is exploring the role of rhythm in human-robot social interaction using Keepon as his thesis platform. Humans nod and display rhythmic motions when communicating with each other, but how about robots? Would robots be able to communicate with people more efficiently if they used rhythmic synchrony?

HRI is a hot topic in the robotics community and some groups use advanced humanoid robots to do research. Keepon, on the other hand, represents a minimalistic approach. Its appearance and behavior are simple yet dynamic and expressive enough to be able to conduct meaningful social research.

[via GetRobo]