Category Archives: Talks & Conferences

We Robot is Next Week!!!

WeRobot 2021

We Robot, now heading into its 10th anniversary, is the leading North American conference on robotics law and policy. The 2021 event will be hosted by the University of Miami School of Law on September 23 – 25, 2021.

NOW VIRTUAL
Due to safety concerns we’ve decided to take We Robot to a fully virtual format again.

Earn CLE
19.0 Florida CLE credits approved, including 19.0 in technology, 1.0 in ethics, and 3.5 in bias elimination.

Register Today!

New virtual prices:
Workshop on Sept. 23: $25.00
Admission for both days, Sept. 24 & 25: $49.00
All students and UM Faculty for all 3 days: $25.00

Although we’d looked forward to welcoming you back to Coral Gables and will not be able to see you in person, we look forward very much to your virtual participation in We Robot 2021. The heart of We Robot has always been its participants, and we will do all we can to preserve that. See you (virtually) soon!

For more information, visit WeRobot2021.com

See Full Program

September 23 – 25, 2021

Posted in AI, Robots, Talks & Conferences | Comments Off on We Robot is Next Week!!!

We Robot 2021 Will Be Virtual After All

I was very sorry to have to make this announcement:

We had hoped very much to have a live event, but circumstances make it clear that it’s not to be. We’d looked forward to welcoming you back to Coral Gables, but we’ve decided that due to safety concerns we have to take We Robot to a fully virtual format again.

Starting with its first edition here in Miami, We Robot has sought — we think successfully — to create and encourage interdisciplinary conversations about robotics (and AI) law and policy. We now have a decade’s worth of success at evolving a common vocabulary and a body of work which includes bedrock scholarship for the rapidly expanding fields represented at the conference. We have fostered, and continue to foster connections between a diverse, international, and interdisciplinary group of scholars, ranging from graduate students to senior professors to persons in government and industry. And — not least — we’ve had a lot of fun doing it.

We’re currently exploring various conference tools that we hope will make it easy not only to have an engaging event with significant audience participation, but also will facilitate the side conversations that are part of what makes We Robot the exciting event it has always been. Watch our homepage for the latest news.

We will soon be posting drafts of the papers that will be presented at We Robot. We may be going virtual, but we’re not changing the format: you will have a chance to read the papers before the conference, and indeed we hope that you will do so and come armed with your thoughts and questions. Other than on panels, authors will not present their own papers – instead our discussant will give a quick summary and critique, and then we’ll open it up to questions from the audience. For the panels, the authors speak briefly, then we go to Q&A. Links to the papers will appear on the program page of the website and in a series of blog posts on the front page of the site.

The good news that by going virtual we are no longer capacity constrained. We’re also reducing the price structure of the event. Registration for the workshop day will be only $25; registration for the two-day main conference will be $49 for everyone except for all students, and for UMiami faculty, for whom it will be $25 including the workshop. We do have some fee waivers available if these fees are a hardship for you. If you have already registered you will be notified directly about processing any refunds that may be due.

Although we will not be able to see you in person, we look forward very much to your virtual participation in We Robot 2021. The heart of We Robot has always been in participation by its attendees, and we will do all we can to preserve that.

See you soon–virtually.

[Cross-posted from the We Robot 2021 blog]

Posted in Robots, Talks & Conferences | 3 Comments

We Robot Will Be Held in Person this September!

[x-post from werobot2021.com]

We’re delighted to announce that We Robot 2021 — our 10th anniversary edition — will be held live and in person at the University of Miami’s Newman Alumni Center. Workshops take place on September 23, and the main conference will be on Sept. 24-25. For the latest information about our terrific schedule see the We Robot 2021 Program page on this blog.

Admission to We Robot requires registration, and while there may be tickets at the door if space is available, we strongly advise advance registration as space will be limited due to the University of Miami’s requirement that seating respect its social distancing rules.

We are still accepting proposals for our Poster Session until July 15, 2021.

Starting with its first edition here in Miami, We Robot has sought — we think successfully — to create and encourage interdisciplinary conversations about robotics (and AI) law and policy. We now have a decade’s worth of success at evolving a common vocabulary and a body of work which includes bedrock scholarship for the rapidly expanding fields represented at the conference. We have fostered, and continue to foster connections between a diverse, international, and interdisciplinary group of scholars, ranging from graduate students to senior professors to persons in government and industry. And — not least — we’ve had a lot of fun doing it.

Given the circumstances, we anticipate having a lot of (careful) fun in September. Please join us!

We strongly advise that attendees be vaccinated against COVID-19, and we may require proof of a recent negative COVID test from persons who cannot demonstrate they have been vaccinated. Masks may be required in the conference venue. Please monitor our website and the University of Miami’s COVID response page for the latest COVID-related information.

Posted in Robots, Talks & Conferences | 1 Comment

Speaking on ACS Panel (via Zoom) Today

My co-author (and son) and I will be presenting out paper Fixing the Senate: A User’s Guide at the American Constitution Society’s Constitutional Law Scholars Forum.

The program runs all day, but we’re on in a session at 3pm.

Posted in Talks & Conferences | 3 Comments

How to Prevent ‘Zoom Fatigue’

According to Jeremy N. Bailenson in Nonverbal Overload: A Theoretical Argument for the Causes of Zoom Fatigue, there are four main source of ‘Zoom Fatigue’:

  1. Excessive amounts of close-up eye contact is highly intense.
  2. Seeing yourself during video chats constantly in real-time is fatiguing.
  3. Video chats dramatically reduce our usual mobility.
  4. The cognitive load is much higher in video chats.

But Zoom, they argue, could make design changes to fix or ameliorate these:

[M]any of these problems could be solved with trivial changes to the design of the Zoom interface. For example, the default setting should be hiding the self-window instead of showing it, or at least hiding it automatically after a few seconds once users know they are framed properly. Likewise, there can simply be a limit to how large Zoom displays any given head; this problem is simple technologically given they have already figured out how to detect the outline of the head with the virtual background feature. Outside of software, people can also solve the problems outlined above with changes in hardware and culture. Use an external webcam and external keyboard that allows more flexibility and control over various seating arrangements. Make “audio only” Zoom meetings the default, or better yet, insist on taking some calls via telephone to free your body from the frustrum.

What I like best about all this is the suggestion that I’ll do better as a Zoom listener if I do other things while listening from time to time.  Depending what the other thing is, it might be right.  But it’s so Millennial!

Posted in Sufficiently Advanced Technology, Talks & Conferences | 1 Comment

We Robot Paper Submission Deadline Extended One Week

Everyone says it’s harder to get things done under COVID, so we’re extending the deadline for submission of paper abstracts to We Robot 2021 by one week – to midnight US East Coast time on February 8, 2021.

We will attempt to keep to the rest of the schedule, but paper acceptance notices may end up slightly delayed also.

Posted in AI, Robots, Talks & Conferences | Comments Off on We Robot Paper Submission Deadline Extended One Week