Your article (Never underestimate a droid: robots gather at AI for Good summit in Geneva, 6 July) begins by listing four of the robot delegates that are attending the AI for Good summit – all four are “feminised robots” – and I remembered the thought I had when I saw Ai-Da perform poetry at the Ashmolean in Oxford in 2021: why does a robot need boobs?
Robotics and AI are fields undoubtedly occupied primarily by men and yet many robots, and AI assistants (think Siri, Alexa and so on) often take on a “feminised” form. Perhaps we are more comfortable telling a feminised voice to do things for us.
