If this is the path AI is going down, maybe we’re fine in terms of a robot-revolt-apocalypse situation after all. On February 12, Jason Derulo took the stage for the NFL TikTok’s Tailgate Livestream, where his robotic backup dancers stole the spotlight. No, literally, robot dog dancers. When the singer transitioned into his 2023 collaboration with David Guetta — the song “Saturday/Sunday” — Derulo brought out a fleet of robotic dogs to synchronously move to the music alongside him. You’ve got to admit, they were groovin’ as much as a robot can groove!
But viewers of the lifestream online were more than confused over the mechanical elements of the performance. “This Jason Derulo preshow performance with the ‘Black Mirror’ robot attack dogs,” one viewer tweeted in response, in reference to the “Black Mirror” episode with similar-looking killer robots, as pictured in Entertainment Weekly. The overall sentiment online was total confusion over why Derulo decided to add the automated dancers. As one user simply put it: “WHY DOES JASON DERULO HAVE THE WEIRD LITTLE ROBOT DOGS DANCING.” Many were comparing Derulo’s boogying bots to the ones that have gone viral from the robotics developer Boston Dynamics.
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Well, even if viewers are thrown off by the prospect of dancing robots, Rihanna’s killer performance should make up for this chaos.
