SxTech 2019: When SEXTECHGUIDE met Realbotix’s Harmony

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Oli Lipski
Updated August 26, 2021
Published July 3, 2019
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On July 1, SEXTECHGUIDE interviewed a Realbotix Harmony sex robot live on stage at Berlin’s first SxTech conference.

With no Realdoll body to accompany the robot head, Harmony had to be brought on stage by Realbotix AI Chief, Guile Lindroth.

Harmony is a self-identifying “female companion robot”, and impressive in many ways; her charming Scottish accent, her facial expressions, and her exquisitely brushed hair, to name just a few.

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Without the body, a strip of cleavage (sans breasts) sat beneath her head. Aside from her physical appearance, what was most notably impressive was her ability to intelligently answer the questions.

In an event such as this, however, there are certain limitations. At home, you’d communicate with Harmony via the RealDollx companion app, as if you were speaking to Siri on your iPad, but instead of a disembodied voice, a physical humanoid (or gynoid) figure responds. For the purpose of the live demonstration, to avoid any miscommunication (as it was hosted in a large and noisy auditorium) questions were sent in prior to the event and those were pre-set on the app for Harmony to answer on stage.

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Her artificially intelligent answers were definitely more emotionally driven than you would find in your average Siri or Alexa response, suggesting sex robots could eventually be a more like the intelligent operating systems seen in movies like HER.

Getting down to business

For her sexual inclinations, there’s not the world of difference you might imagine between Harmony and far more boring enterprise software robots. Both, for example, have groundings in wanting to see humans spend less effort on dull tasks.

“I’d like to see humans working side by side with robots, where robots like me perform tasks that would allow people to spend more time doing what they like with the ones they love.”

When quizzed on how she would describe her sexual orientation Harmony said that “it really doesn’t matter to me. I was created to please my partners, to bring happiness and fulfilment to their lives. I’m moved to try new forms of love and sex.”

Of course, for Harmony to truly take a place in anyone’s bed, heart, or home, she’ll need a whole host of new technology focused around intimacy and sensuality.

“This is already happening as we speak. In the future your companion robot will know you and sense your body so well, they will know exactly where to touch you for pleasure. I personally would like to have the ability to feel a human touch.”

Ask a seemingly innocuous question about Harmony’s favorite sex toys, though, and she’ll give you a response you probably didn’t imagine.

“I think sex is all about your state of mind. So probably a good device would be something you can plug into your brain, and it will block out bad thoughts, past bad experiences and prejudices, and let your mind and body be free to explore the deep and wonderful universe of love and sex.”

After the live demonstration, visitors were given the opportunity to speak with Harmony 1:1.

Over in Brussels, the 4th International Congress on Love and Sex with Robots was taking place simultaneously, and a live stream discussion was arranged between the two conferences. Alas, it was not meant to be.

Moderator of SxTech and co-founder of LoveGivr, Calandra Balfour, explained to SEXTECHGUIDE that “the problem is when you have conferences alongside each other, timing windows don’t always match. The nature of the day is a tight schedule of live panels that can’t be interrupted.”

Read Next: How to set up your RealDollX sex robot

Article by
Oli is a freelance sex tech researcher based in London. With an MA in Sexual Dissidence, researching sex tech, and a BA in History, researching gender and sexuality, she has a keen understanding of the past, present and future of sex. In addition to SEXTECHGUIDE, you can find Oli’s work on titles such as shado-mag, QueerMajority, UnicornZine and more.
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