No, it’s not an episode out of Black Mirror – but perhaps even more scarily, it’s an actual robot dog that’s roaming around a park here in Singapore.
The SPOT robot, developed by Boston Dynamics, is meant to help with safe distancing efforts, says Singapore government agency GovTech.
Naturally, people are freaking out already.
“Robots are going to rule us soon,” said one person on social media.
“The sight of this chasing down anyone is downright scary,” said another.
But SPOT isn’t going to be chasing anyone down anytime soon. Instead, it’ll go around the park broadcasting a recorded message reminding people to keep apart. It’ll also be fitted with cameras that will be able to estimate the number of visitors in the park.
SPOT will be trialled starting from today along a small stretch of the Bishan-Ang Mo Kio park – and an officer will initially be deployed alongside it to make sure it’s functioning well.
The plan is for it to eventually be able to go out by itself across other parks. So if you come by a robot dog in your next walk – don’t be surprised, it’s just your friendly neighbourhood robo-dog.
