Slog - Comments on Roomba Love

Comment by tsm

tsm — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 13:47:37 -0800

I love our Roomba. It saves us from one of our more hated household tasks, and looks cute doing it.

Comment by Amy Kate Horn

Amy Kate Horn — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 13:49:20 -0800

Do you dress it up?

Comment by tsm

tsm — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 13:56:54 -0800

Oh, please, don't give my girlfriend any ideas. It definitely becomes a pet of sorts, though. We run it during the day when we're at work, and occasionally we come home and it got stuck on something, and she'll say, "Oh, poor little guy!", bring it back to its base, and pat it lightly.

It's programmable, too, and someday I hope to start hacking away at it to make it dance. I could get a whole troupe of them.

Comment by me

me — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 14:01:24 -0800

Or why not the Woomba?

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8454096746873918663&q=SNL+Roomba&total=1&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0

"It cleans my business. My LADY business."

Comment by Mr. Poe

Mr. Poe — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 14:02:20 -0800

You aren't going to think your Roomba is cute when it's sucking your girlfriend's brains out and burying your cat.

Comment by PA Native

PA Native — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 14:07:19 -0800

iRobot enables those who dress up their Roombas by selling skins to make them look like a pizza, quarter or whatever other pics you send along.

Mine is still the same gray color as when I got it. It's a great product.

I think their virtual visiting robot is going to take the emotional attachment even further.

Comment by Cascadian

Cascadian — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 14:10:40 -0800

Our Roomba's name is Hungry, but we don't dress him up. It is fun to follow him around and watch him get into trouble, though.

When we called iRobot tech support because Hungry wasn't keeping a schedule any longer, they asked us if we had given him a name. They're collecting data about how many people name their robots and what names are most popular. Rosie (pictured above) is the most popular name. Their support is really good--we have to send Hungry back to be reprogrammed, and they've already sent his replacement, Hungry Too.

Comment by arduous

arduous — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 14:11:30 -0800

ok, but to be fair, i know people who name non-robots like say ... cars or computers. when i was a kid, we named the automatic pool cleaner that cleaned our pool. his name was fred. i think we actually also named our trash compactor but i can't remember her name. i do know she was a girl though!

Comment by sleestak

sleestak — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 14:28:44 -0800

I can't believe nobody has made a Buster joke yet.

"What did you expect mother? I'm half machine!"

Comment by PdxRitchie

PdxRitchie — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 14:30:59 -0800

I wish I named my Roomba before it died. I feel bad knowing it went to an early grave and I can't put a name on it's gravestone.

Comment by shane

shane — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 14:57:11 -0800

oh..it's hungry..

Comment by Anne

Anne — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 18:15:31 -0800

I named my roomba Marvin after the robot in Hitchhiker's. Because every single time we told the roomba to clean, no matter how it was programmed, it seemed to find its way to a dark corner and stay there until its battery ran out, rather than find its way back to the home base. It seemed like a depressive behavior and thus the name. No, it's never been dressed up, but the cats love to chase it.