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"Autom is a tiny robot, and he's getting closer than ever to availability. His whole job? To coach you to lose weight... that's right, Autom is a dieting robot. You start off by entering the details of your diet, fitness level, and exercise into Autom's databank, and then he sits on your countertop and has daily 'conversations' with you -- which we assume are full of a lot of reassuring aphorisms and 'go get 'em' talk. Developed by Cory Kidd (who built the first iteration by hand) while studying at MIT, Autom is set to go into trials in the US sometime next year with a major insurance company. Now, we're all for healthy living, and everyone knows we love robots, but we're inclined to take a pass on Autom... if only because we can't stand to hear the truth 100 percent of the time. If you hit up the source link, you can see a video of the little guy in action. A video of an earlier version of Autom is after the break."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/21/autom-the-robot-weight-loss-coach-well-just-keep-the-friends/>