Today marks the kickoff of Amazon’s annual semi-secret MARS Conference in Palm Springs, which means two things.
- No, you weren’t invited.
- The start of several days of pictures featuring Jeff Bezos palling around with his best robot friends.
Last year the ‘bot loving billionaire wowed the internet with a fairly menacing shot taken inside 1.5 ton giant mech suit, breaking the apocalyptic ice a bit by comparing himself to Ellen Ripley. This year’s first shot from the event is a bit more subdued, with Bezos taking “my new dog,” the latest iteration of Boston Dynamics’ electric quadruped SpotMini out for a stroll.
Jeff Bezos playing beer pong with a robot #mars2018 pic.twitter.com/K1DQzDNvuY
— Cosima Gretton MD (@cosgretton) March 19, 2018
Of course, the robot appears to have just been on loan — Bezos and company have been steadily building up Amazon Robotics with logistical automation acquisitions, but Boston Dynamics only changed hands from Google to SoftBank early last year.
“That’s super cool”- @JeffBezos getting followed by a #gita at #MARS @P_F_F @AmazonRobotics pic.twitter.com/oNWUUiAMc5
— Sasha Hoffman (@sashaphoffman) March 19, 2018
And besides, there appear to have been plenty of other robots competing for the billionaire’s time at the invite-only. Here’s Bezos challenging a robotic arm to a bottle flipping game, and here’s a pair of Piaggio Gita delivery robots playing follow the leader with SpotMini and Bezos, while a drone flies overhead.
Because if you were the billionaire owner of Amazon, you’d probably spend your Monday palling around with robot friends, too.
