Robot ramen chefs call it quits, get a promotion
In the real future, we will not eat actual ramen but special pills with microchips that replicate the experience of eating ramen. (Video from YouTube user morimrim)
A recent "New York Times" story on robots mentions the famous robot ramen restaurant FA-men (ふぁーめん) in Nagoya -- a place where two robots make up to 800 bowls of ramen per day, and in their off time, battle with knives. If this is not the future, we don't know what is.
Unfortunately, it looks like FA-men has closed its doors for good. An announcement on the restaurant's website from Store Manager R2B1 -- a robot -- tells us that the robot chefs quit the biz on January 5, 2010. Although the goodbye message is vague, it seems that the robots will be converted to other industrial purposes -- most likely work that actually warrants the use of $200,000 technology.
The idea of robot ramen chefs was a great way for robotics lab aisei to promote their masterworks but the lack of humanity going into the noodles probably went against everything we learned from the Juzo Itami film "Tampopo." A great bowl of ramen is not just the result of a mechanical process but requires a whole lot of heart and soul.
