The Beggar Robot (Cover’s Comment)
10.6092/issn.2038-3460/16657
application/pdf
2038-3460
16657
1
en
Sašo Sedlaček
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/
Tecnoscienza – Italian Journal of Science & Technology Studies
The Beggar Robot (Cover’s Comment)
Text.Serial.Journal
https://tecnoscienza.unibo.it/
2
Editorial
2011-06-27
2023-03-22
2011-06-27
2023-07-03
TS
Sašo Sedlaček
2011/06/27
10.6092/issn.2038-3460/16657
2038-3460
1
en
The Beggar Robot (Cover’s Comment)
https://tecnoscienza.unibo.it/article/download/16657/15889
2
                                     cover



The Beggar Robot by Sašo Sedlaček (Slovenia)

Beggar Robot is a robot for the materially deprived and is constructed entirely
from old computer hardware and a few spare parts that were obtained at no cost.
As a low-tech, friendly device, it advocates three main ideas in contemporary
activism. It is a surrogate agency created for a world in which the marginalized
such as impoverished individuals and families, refugees and asylum seekers,
elderly people, disabled people, and those hidden from the public view, will
never step onto the street to beg, except in the most dire of circumstances. The
robot has access to areas normally off-limits to beggars, such as shopping malls
and community events, where the richer members of society more often frequent.

The hypothesis is that this part of society is only able to show some sympathy
towards the marginalized if they communicate from a safe distance and via a
technological interface. The project tests and exploits the advantages of robotic
interface by bringing the Beggar Robot to public spaces in different countries
and adapting it to the local context and local language, to beg in the name of the
poor. The project is both a social experiment and a low-key, humorous charity
action, which raises public awareness of invisible deprivation and possible
remedies.

As a machine built out of computer parts recycled from the ever-growing
electronic junkyards, the robot also bears an environmental consciousness for a
world dominated by the ideology of endless development. Moreover, the robot
advocates the concepts of open source and do-it-yourself tactics and their
consequences for social action, by allowing people to freely make their own copy
of the robot. Anyone interested in obtaining the instructions of how to build
their own robot replica can leave a contact with the robot, or go to the artist's
website (www.sasosedlacek.com).
