By: Daniel Yao

The future has been reached. Now you can have someone to talk to even if you’re alone. In Sacramento County, staffers at the Agency on Aging are testing out ElliQ, a new type of companion robot. But so far, the benefits are being used statewide primarily to invest in smartphones, tablets including those designed specifically for older adults.

The Mattlins have all sorts of robots. The couple worked together in retail electronics and software, and Ken Mattlin still sells Wi-Fi streaming boxes, some of which were stacked on the dining room table. So the stereotype about older adults not being technologically advanced does not apply at least in the case of Ken. His body might have aged, but his brain is still in its teens. He can turn house lights off and on from his chair, and he rigged the commode with a bidet and a push-button device that raises and lowers the seat.

Ken said he paid about $900 for an early version of the Astro robot (it now sells for about twice that amount), and a few hundred dollars for ElliQ, plus a monthly subscription fee of $29. Jibo is a bit of a dead soldier whose commanding officers went out of business. But its spirit lives on through what’s left of the original programming. Ken said he thinks it depends on the individual and the situation, but he and Audrey both say ElliQ is a good companion. That was illustrated at one point when Ken briefly dozed off but Audrey still had someone to talk to.

ElliQ asks Audrey what plans she has for the day, tells her the weather, offers to take her on a virtual tour of an art museum, can scroll through family photo albums and puts her through a two-minute breathing meditation. The robot can also be programmed with reminders about taking medication or keeping appointments, and Audrey often uses it for games.