I'm not too worried about our robotic overlords. They have to catch me first. A Japanese robotics company (Vstone) sponsored a marathon for bipedal mini-robots. To hear the Detroit News tell it, you'd think Japan used Custtomary: http://detnews.com/article/20110224/BIZ04/102240469/1001/BIZ " The race kicked off Thursday with the 1-foot-tall, battery-charged robots competing around a 110-yard racetrack. They will have to cover 26 miles."
IEEE Spectrum got it right (although they used an author from Japan: http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/humanoids/first-robot-marathon-ends-with-great-finale "The 42.195-kilometer race (the length of a real marathon) took place in Osaka, and a little humanoid robot called Robovie-PC was the big champion. It crossed the finish line on Saturday, after a grueling 54 hours, 57 minutes and 50.26 seconds" Some other articles make it clear it was 422 laps on a 100 m track, and mention the other contestants. The average speed was about 0.77 km/h; I walk about 5 km/h. http://www.sciencenewsdaily.org/robotics-news/cluster83497376/ http://www.plasticpals.com/?p=27046
