This is just one of a lot of signs that the home robotic market is gaining a lot of momentum. There are new successfully funded kickstarters almost weekly. Many of these are funded by over 200% and then start making stretch goals.

The home is ready for robots if they are not too lifelike or too large.

I think much of the home robot sales are from people who just want one because they are cool. Some will be interested in them for what they are, but many fewer than the new and hip crowd. 70% of them will be garage/yard/Craig's List sale items in a year or two. In the case of the larger ones, like Pepper, clothes racks. The newness will wear off all too soon. Like the kids who show interest in astronomy and their parents get them a cheap telescope on a cheap mount. Most of the kids will get frustrated with the crappy images and hard to adjust mounts and forget it. It's the ones truly interested who will continue. Even improve the mount using a barbeque grill motor and some string (that's what I did).

In the end, that doesn't matter since the initial rush will bring down prices and cause others to jump onto the bandwagon with newer, better, bigger models. And prices will come down for everything associated with them. Not to mention the great new devices that will be brought to the market. That's one thing about the electronics industry. You can't blame it for inflation. Unlike many things, like cars, prices go down constantly yet quality improves, often dramatically. If prices stay the same it's only because the device gets bigger and bigger, like TVs.

It's going to be an interesting and great time whatever happens. Buckle up! Keep hands inside the vehicle and enjoy the ride. I know I will.

@Richard, why is it a waste of money? Is this because it doesn't have an EZ-B inside or is not an InMoov? I say that with no disrespect but it seems every time anyone mentions anything that's not EZ-B or InMoov related you will immediately state it's rubbish. Case and point, this topic and one a few weeks back where Arduino were dismissed without realising the potential they have when used in conjunction with the EZ-B.

Not every consumer wants to have to spend thousands of hours building and programming their robot. The average consumer wants and out of box product that works. Pepper will do this, and in that respect Pepper is already "better" than any of the revolution robots, InMoovs, XL-Robots, etc.

For those who have the time, the money and the desire to create a robot like most on this forum then Pepper may be a poor choice but for the average Joe it's a robot that works out of the box. And since it looks like robots may become popular to the average Joe, Pepper may very well become a popular choice for a social robot.

No disrespect is meant by anything in this post but some people may need to remove the blinkers and see that there are many more options available which may be better suited in some circumstances. If Jarvis relied purely on EZ-Bs and ARC he would not be as sophisticated (or as cheap!) as he currently is. In fact, there are "modules" on Jarvis where Arduino were an obvious best choice and the EZ-B was an extremely poor choice. Select the correct tool for the job. Pepper may not be that tool for you but it most likely will be for someone else.

@rich

welspoken.i think if you love robots,you will find lots that you like.
sofar pepper doesn sell outside japan.and to think he cost 1400 euro.
its not only the robot,you need to find one with a software that ,
you can learn .and where you get some help.ARC is the ,
best sofware i ever seen.this chould be the standard for avery robot.
i was lucky to have a NAO and i was able to get it connected but there,
it stops.no tutorials like here,one question a month a forum only,
for the elite.i was just as happy when i got jd and good forum,
and really good tutorials as a non programmer.
aldebaran wil be the robot there robot has it all and i mean just the robot.
hands fingers voice eyes.rich i like your open minded.

white versoin of darwin for those who are less in programming

Pepper costs $1700 + $200 per month for the next 3 years on contract. Interesting pricing model. It only costs $9500 for the first 3 years to own one. I'd pay $1700 for it no problem. The $200 a month is a bit steep though.

Ah ... so there's the rub. They don't mention the fees you have to pay for years. Much like the cell phone sales model it appears. For $9500 I'd buy a NAO. Well, actually I wouldn't pay $9500 for a NAO either come to think about it. That's also way too much for that little robot, nice though it is. Not to mention it seems to have some sort of yearly obligation as well. Back to JD.

@d.cohran

i didn know that it was that much.i know for nao it also 200 euro,i dont pay that.
just for using there program.





@WBS00001


indeed they dont tell you that.

I think this is the pricing model that will be common among those selling IoT based robots. IoT services costs money per transaction. For example, great speech to text services cost .008 per 1000 characters. That cost has to be covered. The seller of the robot platform has to decide if they are going to eat the cost (which is not a wise business model), have the customer pay the IoT service directly (which becomes a pain for the customer when there are 20 different IoT that are used), charge per transaction (which becomes a billing nightmare) or charge a flat rate per month that allows everyone to share in the cost (unfair for those who dont use these much). It is a struggle that I am trying to figure out now with my product.

I do think $200 per month is steep but understand that they have probably worked out a deal with the IoT services for a set monthly rate. My hope would be that as more customers come on, they would decrease this cost but I seriously doubt that will happen.

I have scraped up my life's savings and sold almost everything I have to be able to afford the Pepper. (I am not there yet, but I have some of it. I wanted a robot that I do not have to work on since medically, I can't) , and one that I could play with programing it. And, one that could live with me the rest of my old age without having me to fix it or such. Chroregraph is an Excellent software. It is the main reason for purchases of Pepper or Nao. In contrary to what was said earlier, Choregraphe is FREE on the Aldebaran Site for Developers. And they have sold around 7000 peppers so far. They have been selling 1000 a month for many months now in a row.

Pepper is not perfect. But the subscription you buy is for the warranty and the Watson software for the speech recognition and for Watson's Deep Learning A.I.

There have came forward many ways this year in speech recognition. Now google has not only Google Voice, but Cloud Vision. It is an optical recognition that lets you recognise most household and other items flawlessly because they are saved in the cloud. Aldebaran purchased the most effective navigation system for Pepper in the world. But, it may only be used in comercial Business Peppers, maybe.

Also, McDonalds purchased 25,000 Humanoids to work there and run the McDonalds with their human counter parts (about 3 humans).

I know, now you are going to say "There goes our jobs". All you have to do is adapt. People said the same thing in 1975 about our microprocessors. It actually created jobs for people. It will be good for us if we have the right Polititions. Fortunately, I don't have to worry about this because I am retired.

Thank all of you for your advice and concerns.

I am going to show the retailer what I have saved and throw myself at the mercy of the place to put the rest on credit. IF they say "no" I will try outside sources. If no then, I will purchase just the Pepper without any software.

There are other companies that officee A.I. in the cloud services for a modest fee a month.

moviemaker

what do you think off this one.


ub tech robot

I looked at that one very very hard. It is almost a NAO. But, sadly, none of the robots but Pepper, Romeo and NAO come with Choregraphe which is what I need to program them with.

Year 2016 . . . .

this will be known as the year of the robots!

choreograph cost 150 euro each year.
ub tech 2 can do all nao can.

Aldebaran is giving choregraphe away FREE. Are you telling me you can simply hook up the Ver 2 Alpha and it will work with Chroegraphe. Just like that! I would be surprised.

no no alpha 2 has its own program

sofar the pepper doesn chip outside japan for now.
i believ first year is chreograph for free then its 150 euro.you can choose,
not to pay and still use the program but you dont get help.
atleast thats my exsperiants.

Nomad,

That is a thousand (1,000) sold every month in a minute, not year.

MovieMaker

thanks for correcting the info.

MovieMaker, Did you see this article? http://www.engadget.com/2015/12/11/pepper-the-robot-train-station/

Apparently the French National Railway Company bought 3 Pepper's to act as information guides for train passengers. I work for Amtrak and I have told my manager that when we do this, I want to work on the project.

Alan