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Dec 2, 2009 12:30 PM
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If you could have a personal robot that did just one thing, what would it be? That's what futurist Mike Treder asked the readers of his blog, and the top answers revealed what we secretly (or not so secretly) suspected.
Remember, this is a personal bot, so you couldn't have it do things like run the US economy or reorganize the military. What I thought was interesting was that the top two uses that people voted for - housework and sex work - are traditionally "feminine" forms of labor. We want our robots to replace housewives and hookers.
Of course, we don't know for sure if these results were skewed by the options on offer. For example, we don't see any poll options for stereotypically "masculine" jobs like "fix my computer," "do household repairs," or "work a job you hate all day to earn money." I mean, given the choice, would you rather have a personal robot who does your housework, or a personal robot who does your crappy day job so you can stay home and work on that artistic masterpiece or go surfing?
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Send an email to Annalee Newitz, the author of this post, at annalee@io9.com.
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