Skip to main content

Sex with a robot is improved with Realbotix, the talking sex doll

Yangyang - female robot
Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters
In a world where virtual reality often rivals actual reality, it comes as little to no surprise that even intimate interpersonal relationships have been replaced by technological “advancements.” Improving upon the pre-existing sex dolls are Realbotix, animated sex dolls that talk back to their users, providing a more, say, humanized experience. With the recent innovation of penis wearables and the iPhone sex tracking app, bizarrely enough, this concept doesn’t actually seem that far-fetched. Rather, having your sex doll talk back to you simply seems like the next step in automating away human interaction.

The genius behind Realbotix is a man named Matt McMullen, whose first claim to fame was the invention of the RealDoll, the self-proclaimed “world’s finest love doll.” Now, his company is moving on to bigger and better things, namely making these female robots blink and, more importantly, respond to your most pressing questions. As it stands, the plans for Realbotix only involve a talking head, which consumers can attach to RealDoll bodies for an all-inclusive experience. The next phase, of course, would be developing artificially intelligent robots that include both body parts above and below the neck.

The purpose behind the project is to create an illusion of reality when it comes to sex with a doll. In explaining the project, McMullen asked, “What is she thinking, does she like it?” He continued, “If you can create that, or the illusion of that, it is going to be a much more impressive payoff than ‘Wow, she can gyrate her hips by herself.'”

The robotic heads of Realbotix are still two years away from becoming a reality, and they don’t come cheap. For a cool $10,000, you’ll be able to buy the head alone, and in the next few years, the whole package will set you back between $30,000 and $60,000. But for the virtual reality of intimacy, that may not be such an absurd price tag after all.

Lulu Chang
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Fascinated by the effects of technology on human interaction, Lulu believes that if her parents can use your new app…
Digital Trends’ Tech For Change CES 2023 Awards
Digital Trends CES 2023 Tech For Change Award Winners Feature

CES is more than just a neon-drenched show-and-tell session for the world’s biggest tech manufacturers. More and more, it’s also a place where companies showcase innovations that could truly make the world a better place — and at CES 2023, this type of tech was on full display. We saw everything from accessibility-minded PS5 controllers to pedal-powered smart desks. But of all the amazing innovations on display this year, these three impressed us the most:

Samsung's Relumino Mode
Across the globe, roughly 300 million people suffer from moderate to severe vision loss, and generally speaking, most TVs don’t take that into account. So in an effort to make television more accessible and enjoyable for those millions of people suffering from impaired vision, Samsung is adding a new picture mode to many of its new TVs.
[CES 2023] Relumino Mode: Innovation for every need | Samsung
Relumino Mode, as it’s called, works by adding a bunch of different visual filters to the picture simultaneously. Outlines of people and objects on screen are highlighted, the contrast and brightness of the overall picture are cranked up, and extra sharpness is applied to everything. The resulting video would likely look strange to people with normal vision, but for folks with low vision, it should look clearer and closer to "normal" than it otherwise would.
Excitingly, since Relumino Mode is ultimately just a clever software trick, this technology could theoretically be pushed out via a software update and installed on millions of existing Samsung TVs -- not just new and recently purchased ones.

Read more
AI turned Breaking Bad into an anime — and it’s terrifying
Split image of Breaking Bad anime characters.

These days, it seems like there's nothing AI programs can't do. Thanks to advancements in artificial intelligence, deepfakes have done digital "face-offs" with Hollywood celebrities in films and TV shows, VFX artists can de-age actors almost instantly, and ChatGPT has learned how to write big-budget screenplays in the blink of an eye. Pretty soon, AI will probably decide who wins at the Oscars.

Within the past year, AI has also been used to generate beautiful works of art in seconds, creating a viral new trend and causing a boon for fan artists everywhere. TikTok user @cyborgism recently broke the internet by posting a clip featuring many AI-generated pictures of Breaking Bad. The theme here is that the characters are depicted as anime characters straight out of the 1980s, and the result is concerning to say the least. Depending on your viewpoint, Breaking Bad AI (my unofficial name for it) shows how technology can either threaten the integrity of original works of art or nurture artistic expression.
What if AI created Breaking Bad as a 1980s anime?
Playing over Metro Boomin's rap remix of the famous "I am the one who knocks" monologue, the video features images of the cast that range from shockingly realistic to full-on exaggerated. The clip currently has over 65,000 likes on TikTok alone, and many other users have shared their thoughts on the art. One user wrote, "Regardless of the repercussions on the entertainment industry, I can't wait for AI to be advanced enough to animate the whole show like this."

Read more
4 simple pieces of tech that helped me run my first marathon
Garmin Forerunner 955 Solar displaying pace information.

The fitness world is littered with opportunities to buy tech aimed at enhancing your physical performance. No matter your sport of choice or personal goals, there's a deep rabbit hole you can go down. It'll cost plenty of money, but the gains can be marginal -- and can honestly just be a distraction from what you should actually be focused on. Running is certainly susceptible to this.

A few months ago, I ran my first-ever marathon. It was an incredible accomplishment I had no idea I'd ever be able to reach, and it's now going to be the first of many I run in my lifetime. And despite my deep-rooted history in tech, and the endless opportunities for being baited into gearing myself up with every last product to help me get through the marathon, I went with a rather simple approach.

Read more