Polypedal pots are a class of whimsical
robots which
date from the late 1st Century a.t. to present times. As the name
suggests, they are legged, motile containers that generally house
plants or sessile
animals.
Originally developed as a student project by Alina Ovseenko, Sanjog
Shaara and Nicolas Matheson at the Old Earth college Massachusetts
Institute of Technology (MIT) in the early 70s a.t. (2040s Old
Earth c.e. calendar), the design was purchased, modified and marketed
by the Sony-Hitachi-Isuzu-Toshiba megacorporation in 77 a.t. and
became a wildly popular fad consumer product of the time, due to the
"cute" design and playful personality of the pots' AI.
During the first month of sale, the corporation's bulk nanofacs met
only 15% of product demand. Examples of the novelty bot sold on illicit
markets for ten or more times its market price. By early 78 a.t.,
the fad had run its course, leaving hundreds of thousands of
unpurchased bots to be disassembled.
A few practical niche applications for the bots were found in the years
following the collapse of the fad, and one-of-a-kind artisan-crafted
varieties fashioned from precious and semi-precious materials of the
period adorned the homes and outdoor property of the esoteric
technophilic wealthy, but it wasn't until centuries later, when the
first
provolved
plants and sessile animals were created, that polypedal pots became
more than rare technological curiosities once
more.
The design of polypedal pots varies wildly, with virtually the only
feature they all have in common being they have six or more
legs, generally in a splayed configuration. As with billions of other
robot designs, polypedalism is employed because at least three legs are
on the ground at any giving time during walking or running motion,
providing stability and the ability to halt motion without toppling at
any time.
Pots have wildly different intelligence levels. Some have none at all,
and are operated by their passengers, generally via direct neural
interface. Most however have at least near sophont intelligence, and
sometimes intelligence equal to or greater than their passengers (such
pots are
sometimes called 'pot
vecs'), and
almost always form social/emotional bonds with their sophont
passengers. The types of relationships include pet/master, friends,
sensual lovers and master/pet. Some instances have occured of a highly
sentient potvec controlling or subverting its passenger, sometimes due
to an infection by an
ai virus).
Although unusual in modern times due to modern methods of dealing with
depression and the increasingly rare occurrence of non-voluntary
irrevocable death, there have been cases of undiagnosed pots
terminating their existence after their companions did without backup
technology and could not be retrieved.
