Despite the growing popularity of sex dolls, and soon sex robots, buyers of Pepper, the robot, have been told that not having sex with the AI is a condition before they could purchase it.
When Softbank, the maker of Pepper, released the robot in Japan this summer, it was sold out. Because of its popularity, the first four shipments of 1,000 robots sold out in less than 60 seconds. The next batch of robots would be sold by the end of October. After meeting demand in Japan, Pepper would soon be sold overseas in the coming months.
The four-foot robot could talk, tell jokes and dance, but the owner is not allowed to do any sexual act on it, according to the usage agreement, reports AFP Jiji Press.
The user agreement specifically cites sexual intercourse and lewd acts as the prohibitions. Pepper also could not be used to stalk others. Softbank also does not allow the owner to hack Pepper's voice software so it would sound sexier. However, it remains unclear what the robot-maker would do to those who would breach the terms of agreement.
Pepper costs $1,650 or 198,000 yen. Other prohibitions, according to the Guardian, are to take off Pepper from its owner's premises and to use it to harm others.
Pepper was initially built by Aldebaran, a French robotics firm now owned by Softbank. Masayoshi Son, chief executive of Softbank, says that by putting emotions into Pepper and giving it a heart, it would debunk the description of emotionless people as robots.