Amazon CEO and fifth richest person in the world Jeff Bezos was in the Coachella Valley this weekend – but not to lounge by the pool, play golf, or see all the cool wildflowers. Nope. Bezos invited a bunch of robotic enthusiast VIPs to his annual MARS conference where he piloted a robot that looks like it came straight out of a James Cameron movie.
Bezos tweeted out the photo – which, let’s face it, is just freakin’ awesome on Saturday night:
I just got to pilot an awesome (and huge) robot thanks to Hankook Mirae Technology. Nice! #MARS2017 pic.twitter.com/MvN6ghEYFi
— Jeff Bezos (@JeffBezos) March 20, 2017
Here’s the robot in action in some videos geotagged at the Air Museum:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BR2UWIYAEK9/?taken-at=750868
@JeffBezos "Why do I feel so much like #sigourneyweaver ?" @amazon #MARS2017 #openpodbaydoors ?? pic.twitter.com/HRRzmQtZbh
— Caleb Harper (@calebgrowsfood) March 20, 2017
As the Verge points out, the robot is the Method-2, which was built by a South Korean company and first came to public attention last December when videos and pictures of the bot circulated online.
Not much else is known about what else was going on with Bezos and company on Saturday night at the Air Museum – but I am guessing nothing topped this.