While an inexpensive toy robotic arm is simply hardwired and no computer controllable interface is generally provided, wouldn't it be neat to use such an arm as the basis for a machine reenactment of the Monty Python sketch [I'll describe as] the "Society for putting things on top of other things." With machine vision, computer interfaced relays and the proper algorithms for sizing up, sorting (as in largest on the bottom) and stacking any assortment of flat objects set before it, it would be performance art. As a grand flourish at the end, the arm would knock everything down and start over. Conceptually, that's how I roll, baby, without the slightest chance I'll ever be able to do this.
Add note: stacking identical sized blocks is apparently 'child's play' for the robotics gurus. Plenty of robotic arms stacking things found on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=A6SAfEBuFXE&feature=related-- daddyvortex, Mar 23 2012 Add a hidden speaker, or perhaps an animatronic mouth, playing the audio from the original sketch, and you have my bun. Aw, hell, have it anyway. Do I just set it down here, or do I have to hand it to the machine?-- Alterother, Mar 23 2012 I like the idea of the blockstacking bot, and then a snickering human adds a pyramid or a sphere to the pile.
This would be a good "color" feature for a robot character in a scifi show: it likes to have things stacked on top of each other. I envision the character at its console with a small stack of items off to the side, different in each episode. When the character is thinking or talking, it is also stacking objects on top of each other. Sometimes the other characters take their things back out of the pile.-- bungston, Mar 23 2012 I'm picturing an advanced AI-controlled 'bot that exhibits an obsessive/compulsive stuff-stacking behavior. Its designers are proud as piss with their creation, but unable to eliminate the 'bug'. Hilarity ensues.-- Alterother, Mar 23 2012 I like this. It's definitely one of your three best ideas. [+]-- MaxwellBuchanan, Mar 23 2012 How many blocks would a stackbot stack if a stackbot would stack blocks?-- MaxwellBuchanan, Mar 23 2012 Baked: SHRDLU. OK, it predates Monty Python, but it was precisely what you describe: a small robot arm, whose entire world consisted of putting things on top of other things.-- spidermother, Mar 24 2012 SHRDLU's arm, like it's world, was virtual. This proposal is for a real arm. Of course, maybe the distinction between real and virtual isn't so important.-- mouseposture, Mar 24 2012 I thought they did a version with a real arm ... my mistake.-- spidermother, Mar 24 2012 random, halfbakery