Meet Valerie (for $59,000, including a two-year warranty).
"We are now accepting orders for up to 6 complete and operational Valerie androids for delivery at Christmas of 2004. Valerie is the most advanced android in the world having more degrees of freedom than any android shown up to now. She uses the AT&T speech synthesizer giving the most human-sounding voice available today. She is also easily the most anthropomorphic android available.She will have a high degree of artificial intelligence due to our proprietary AI software – and a generalized interface to the internet (the only existing super-intelligence). Order now – before you get backlogged in a 3 year waiting list!"
Update: BoingBoing reader Rion says, "You may want to inform your readers that this same Chris Willis (who, as you write, is selling his supposed "domestic android" for $59,000) is also selling tickets for a manned trip to Mars at the cheap cheap cheap rate of $2,000,000 a head. Not quite sure whether it's a harmful or harmless prank — but anyhow, while Android World looks like a very cool compendium of robotics research, his claims for "Valerie" are a similarly a fair bit outlandish."
Link (Thanks, secret submitter)
