It seems that cordless phones have the problem of staying where you leave them, consequently never actually being where you are.

To date, solutions have typically centered around simply wearing them -- a headset perhaps, or a cellphone/cordless house relay, or having them be ubiquitous (i.e. House, Answer The Phone)

These approaches, however, have severe limitations -- you get home, you change, and therefore carying a phone on a belt is a pain, taking every call on house-wide speaker is impractical if not dangerous, etc.

In this proposal, a base uses wheels or other suitable types of transport (with a portable battery, it can double as a charger, and as a nice speakerphone).

The base can home in on the voice command and navigate the room Roomba style, and bring the phone. Once the phone is picked up, the base simply follows it around, staying at a respectful distance, so that when the conversation is over, you can simply put the phone in its charge slot.
-- theircompetitor, Jan 07 2005

(?) Baked for ipods, it seems http://www.cnn.com/...robot.ap/index.html
[theircompetitor, Sep 01 2006]

Follow Robots http://www.popsci.c...008-08/follow-robot
[theircompetitor, Aug 28 2008]

Sparki http://blog.makezin...new-favorite-robot/
Looks like a real platform, cool [theircompetitor, May 05 2013]

Phone Home similar idea [pashute, Oct 31 2013]

Budgee -- a Kickstarter project for a robot that follows you around http://www.kickstar...t-carries-your-stuf
[theircompetitor, Jan 21 2014]

I like the idea, but I'm a little confused, when it's following you around you're on speaker phone, yeah? Would it still follow you around if you were on the hand set? And in that case would it just then be the base / charger for the hand unit? Would it still need to follow you around at that point?
-- gorjabuble, Jan 07 2005


not exactly, gorjabuble.

The base is following the phone around -- you're using the phone in the usual way.
-- theircompetitor, Jan 07 2005


How does the base get charged?
-- jutta, Jan 07 2005


well, the base can get charged in the usual "corded" way, but contain a capacitor so that when unplugged it is able to maintain charge in the cordless phone
-- theircompetitor, Jan 07 2005


Cordless telephone base relay race.
-- tiromancer, Jan 07 2005


"It's for Katy. Go on phone, find her." [+]
-- wagster, Jan 07 2005


"What's that, Lassiephone? Timmy has a call?" [+]
-- wiml, Sep 01 2006


Well, just attach it to yourself, with a cord.
-- not_morrison_rm, May 05 2013


All your base are belong to us.

Brewing today - the phone is in the apron pocket. Gotta go, about to siphon the eighth gallon into a seven gallon container.
-- normzone, May 06 2013


Ahh, the Church of Transcendental Inebriation gets another follower.
-- not_morrison_rm, May 06 2013



random, halfbakery