I think one thing we can all agree on is that robots are cool.

Really cool.

Robots come in many shapes and sizes.

There are dancing robots, scary robots , villanous, murderous robots, surgery robots, romantic robots, domesticated robots, and robots that entertain cats.

Ultimately, the dream of robots is that they will perform many of the tedious or dangerous tasks that human’s don’t want to or can’t do.

Someday soon, I’m sure we will see a murder of robots congregating in public. I know that a murder is the herding or venery term for crows, but since robots don’t appear in the 1486 Book of Saint Albans under the section Companynys of Beestys and Fowlys, I am going take the liberty of borrowing murder. It was that or steal wisdom from wisdom of Wombats, since Wombats don’t actually form groups in the wild, making the term generally under-utilized.

We even already have laws for these robots we will one day encounter. The three laws of robotics as established by national treasure, Isaac Asimov, are:

First Law

A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

Second Law

A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.

Third Law

A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

So you can imagine my excitement when I heard the term Robotic Process Automation or RPA. I could picture myself looking into the soulless red eyes of these process obsessed automatons.

It was my disappointment to learn, however, that these robots are in fact non-corporeal software entities.

But, to their credit, they are actually incredibly useful systems that fulfill the promise of robots by relieving humans of tedious and repetitive tasks that they are not well suited to do. These software robots can perform tasks at a high rate of speed without the kinds of errors humans tend to introduce.

They can interact with data and systems to interpret information, trigger actions, and communicate with other systems, performing an endless array of repetitive tasks without sleep and without mistakes. Best of all, the can greatly reduce the amount of time it takes to perform these actions.

So while they are not inscrutable mechanical beings with questionable intentions, they are extremely useful tools that deliver on the promise of lifting humanity from the tedium of our soul sucking corporate existence

And that, is progress