[Njagdu] guide dogs and service robots

[Trisha]

How will guide dogs react to service robots?
https://www.zdnet.com/article/how-will-guide-dogs-react-to-service-robots/#f
tag=RSSbaffb68

By Greg Nichols
December 31, 2018 -- 11:53 GMT (03:53 PST) | Topic:

We once had a dog that went berserk every time a drone was in hearing 
distance. At first it wasn't such a big problem. Drones were rare and it 
was easy enough to extricate fido from the situation. Fast forward a 
couple years and the ubiquity of drones became a real issue as we took 
our furry dude on walks, to the beach, or hiking.

That's just one example of the unintended and largely unforeseen 
inconveniences brought about by wide public adoption of new 
technologies. As  autonomous mobile service robots march, roll, and fly 
into public view, we're bound to see lots of growing pangs like that. 
And for reasons I have newfound insight into, one group that's 
understandably concerned is the guide dog community.

At least according to the preliminary results of a study conducted by 
the nonprofit Guide Dogs and Starship Technologies, an autonomous mobile 
delivery service provider, those who rely on service dogs can breathe easy.

For the study, working guide dogs and their owners met Starship's 
delivery robots in real life scenarios. During the simulation, the 
robots approached the dogs from the front and rear, overtook the dogs 
from behind, and were overtaken by the dogs and their owners. The dogs 
also met the robots head on while crossing a road.

In a sign my sample size may not have been large enough to draw broad 
conclusions about dogs and unmanned vehicles, all of the dogs in the 
study reacted calmly. The results are not altogether unexpected. 
According to Starship's internal data, the company's robots have 
interacted with over 600,000 non-working dogs in the course of 
deliveries and field tests, with similar reactions.

"We believe that autonomous delivery can play an important role in 
supporting all individuals within communities by making people's lives 
more convenient, including the visually impaired," says Lex Bayer, CEO 
of Starship. "Working seamlessly alongside residents is a top priority 
for us, and we are continually looking at ways to enhance our services 
by engaging with organisations such as Guide Dogs to do just this".

The pace of robotics development has been blistering, in some cases 
outpacing compliance and regulatory efforts.
There's speculation in the industry that rapid adoption of autonomous 
mobile robots is creating some dangerous situations that will only come 
to light through unfortunate and preventable accidents.

So it's nice to see Starship taking a lead in testing how its technology 
will impact one oft-overlooked community. The company plans to continue 
testing the impact of robots on people with a wide range of visual 
impairments.