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\u201cThe decision to introduce that first was because it\u2019s visceral and people want to watch that, but also because that\u2019s technically what was possible.\u201d Bulatov said. \u201cThrowing punches is one of the easier things we could be doing in robotics.\u201d<\/p>\n
The May 14 event marked the Ultimate Fighting Bots\u2019 first foray into competitive dancing, with the robots performing \u201cdances.\u201d<\/p>\n
Minh Connors\/For the S.F. Chronicle<\/p>\n
The May 14 event marked the UFB robots\u2019 first foray into competitive dancing, which Bulatov sees as the company\u2019s next venture. Toward the end of the match, a robot performed \u201cdances\u201d programmed by different teams, staggering around the ring to a remix of A-ha\u2019s 1980s hit \u201cTake on Me.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
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It was also UFB\u2019s first event in partnership with Nebius, an AI infrastructure platform backed by tech giant Nvidia. Akshai Parthasarathy, Nebius\u2019 director of solutions marketing, said the company was keen to show off its robotics technology in a public arena, rather than inside a hospital or laboratory.<\/p>\n
The company is at a transitional moment as it works to push its product into the mainstream. That effort has included marketing alongside celebrities\u00a0\u2014 among them, rapper Wiz Khalifa and comedian Reggie Watts\u00a0\u2014 and recruiting a mix of tech founders and content creators to control the robots during the fights.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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LEFT: A dance robot stands in front of a crowd at “Ultimate Bots: Fight x Dance” on May 14. RIGHT: A dancer from TURFinc, an Oakland-based dance company, performs at the event.<\/p>\n
Photos by Minh Connors\/For the S.F. Chronicle<\/p>\n
TOP: A dance robot stands in front of a crowd at “Ultimate Bots: Fight x Dance” on May 14. ABOVE: A dancer from TURFinc, an Oakland-based dance company, performs at the event.<\/p>\n
Photos by Minh Connors\/For the S.F. Chronicle<\/p>\n
San Jose-based filmmaker Chris Yen donned a racer jacket and reflective sunglasses to pilot a robot on Thursday night after UFB approached him online.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the randomest,\u201d Yen said before the match, eyeing the two robots in the corner of the room. \u201cI kind of thought they\u2019d be life-size.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Instead, the robots were roughly the size of 8-year-old children.\u00a0<\/p>\n
They edged around the ring, controlled by a device resembling a Nintendo Switch that \u201cpilots\u201d operated from the sidelines. Occasionally, one of them lost their bobbed wig or fell over during a bout, drawing a roar from the crowd, which was mostly young and male.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The matches were divided into three rounds, won by the number of \u201ccleanly landed punches\u201d in a 90-second bout, Bulatov explained. Those rules were not always clear to onlookers: Shrey Kothari bet $20 on one of the robots, but he wasn\u2019t sure whether he had won or lost until his competitor came to collect the cash.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s so frustrating,\u201d Kothari lamented, watching a robot swing, fail to make contact, then jerk backward. \u201cI don\u2019t think this current format is the future. I feel like the next step is them fighting autonomously.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Chris Esquivel, who works in real estate, felt like he was in the minority of people in the room who weren\u2019t employed by the tech industry. But the 29-year-old, who heard about the bouts from a friend, sees events like robot fighting as par for the course in San Francisco.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cLiving in the Bay, I\u2019m very ingrained in the tech bubble,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m expecting to see something I\u2019ve never seen before and hopefully be wowed and wondered.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In San Francisco, the artificial intelligence boom has driven up housing prices, boosted tourism and fueled the emergence…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":682406,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[447],"tags":[62657,703,49,48,5886,82,64],"class_list":["post-682405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-bay-area","tag-boxing","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-san-francisco","tag-sports","tag-tech"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682405","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=682405"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682405\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/682406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=682405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=682405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=682405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}