Rizzbot secrets revealed: Who is the mechanical man stalking Austin?
AUSTIN (KXAN) — For weeks, it has been the question on the lips of many Central Texans: Who or what is Rizzbot? A cowboy hat-wearing, three-foot-tall robot, making waves on social media; Rizzbot has been spotted around downtown Austin flirting, singing, dancing and occasionally flipping the bird.
The account behind Rizzbot (@rizzbot_official) has racked up nearly half a million followers and has received over 20 million likes.
The account’s owner declined an interview request, but we couldn’t stop ourselves from investigating the most important question of the moment: Who is Rizzbot?
Here’s what we know about Rizzbot:
- The mechanical man is a Unitree G1 humanoid robot.
- The base model of this robot series starts at $15k.
- He weighs roughly 77lbs without the cowboy hat, according to the manufacturer.
- His dance moves were taught to him at the University of Texas.
Kyle Morgenstein, a Ph.D. student at UT Austin’s Texas Robotics program, taught Lady Gaga dance moves to Rizzbot.
“Before he was Rizzbot, he was still had his training wheels on, learning the ways of the world and how to put on a good show,” Morgenstein said.
Rizzbot spent several weeks at the Texas Robotics lab at UT, learning the basics of rizz (modern slang for charisma). “He always had the cowboy hat, sunglasses. He’s always a very cool looking customer the nice shoes, but he didn’t really know what he was doing with himself yet,” Morgenstein said.
The team taught Rizzbot by using dance simulations that showed Rizzbot where and how to angle its joints for optimum rizz. The team also used data gathered through motion capture technology to map the dance moves onto the robot.
“The Rizzbot and many other humanoids tend to be a little bit shorter, and so when you capture motion capture data, unless you’ve got a person of the exact same proportions, you have to remap what the person does in a way that is more easy for the robot to understand.”
Bringing the party to the streets
Rizzbot is often seen interacting with random people on the street. Something that may seem simple, but actually involves advanced computing.
“One of the challenges for the longest period of time was, how do you control the joints on this complicated robot such that it’s able to move around naturally in the environment while being safe around humans,” said Joydeep Biswas, an associate professor at the computer science department at UT Austin with a focus on robotics.
Rizzbot has some functionality that assists in these processes. “You can’t be always be telling the robot: ‘This is where to place your foot, this is the angle of your ankle that it should have.'” Biswas said.
Computers in the machine tell it how to make minor adjustments to its movement to prevent falling down. Human brains do something similar. We may think about where we’re going, but not how to place our foot so we don’t fall down.
Biswas says one of the challenges for the humanoid robots is where to put these advanced computers. “It provides constraints on what you cannot, can and cannot do on the robot,” he said.
The man behind the myth of Rizzbot
Morgenstein worked directly with the owner of Rizzbot, who wishes to remain anonymous.
“He really loves to dance and entertain. He likes to make people laugh. I think the core goal of Rizzbot is really to show people what these robots can do, what’s out there beyond sort of the tedious work and a lot of the conversations that people have about what robots might do for the economy,” Morgenstein said.
Morgenstein revealed the owner is a former YouTuber and trained biochemist. His ultimate goal is to have Rizzbot breakdance.
Rizzbot is not an AI. His owner is nearby, operating the machine using a control. All of the gestures are preprogrammed and are activated with the press of a button.
“It looks very fluid and natural, but it’s all programmed and controlled,” Morgenstein said.
Rizzbot isn’t cheap. Morgenstein estimates the bot costs closer to $50k. Biswas said that while that may be a lot of money, for researchers, it’s actually not bad.
“Until a few years ago, robots like with with these amazing capabilities would have been, of the order of hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars,” Biswas said.
Where can you find Rizzbot?
The mysterious man has been spotted throughout Austin, with many sightings on Congress and 6th Street. He has also been spotted in New York and, most recently, in Los Angeles.
“I think when people think of robots, they either think of big industrial robots, or maybe they think of like Robocop and more dangerous and scary robots. But I don’t think people have a good mental model for what it looks like to engage with the robot in a way that’s fun and playful and experimental,” Morgenstein said.
