Claims have emerged that Tesla copied the design from the movie ‘I Robot (2004).’
On the thirteenth (local time), film director Alex Proyas, who produced iRobot, posted six photos comparing movie scenes and Tesla products through did it
This post, which compared scenes from the movie with on-site photos of the CyberCap, Robovan, and Optimus unveiled by Tesla at an event last week, recorded 7.6 million views in sooner or later;
There have been also 4,900 comments, a lot of which refuted Director Proyas’ claim, saying, “Similar designs already existed before iRobot.” Even scenes from the 1927 film ‘Metropolis’, which featured humanoids for the primary time, appeared as comparative data.
Because the backlash grew, director Proyas emphasized on Instagram, “I collaborated with a really talented design team to create the film’s visuals.” He added, “Elon Musk, then again, has a design team that is just not very talented, and so they appear to have watched a whole lot of movies, including iRobot.”
Patrick Tatoplos, who was in command of design at iRobot, also said on Instagram, “I could be the just one who feels this, but I should feel honored that Elon was inspired by my design.”
It is not uncommon for technology corporations’ products to be identified as appearing in existing science fiction. Probably the most famous example is when Samsung Electronics submitted a scene from the 1968 movie ‘Space Odyssey’ as evidence in 2011 to Apple’s claim that the Galaxy Tab copied the iPad. A tablet just like the iPad appears here.
Meanwhile, there’s an excellent reason for claiming plagiarism from Director Proyas. To begin with, it’s a widely known undeniable fact that CEO Musk was greatly influenced by science fiction. Even the xAI chatbot ‘Grock’ is a term that appears in science fiction novels.
Moreover, the title of this event, ‘We, Robot’, is thought to have been taken from Isaac Asimov’s original novel, which can also be the title of the movie. It appears that evidently the title of the event already provided an excuse for the design problem.
Reporter Lim Da-jun ydj@aitimes.com
