5 Of The Best Products Sony Should Have Never Discontinued – SlashGear

Some of the products on this list were high sellers in their time but discontinued due to age or technological irrelevance. The Sony Aibo is not one of those products. The Aibo (which stands for Artificial Intelligence Robot) line consisted of robotic animals. These were primarily dogs, but a few other Aibo species were created, including lions. The robot pets came with touch sensors that let them know when they were being petted and enough moving parts for physical versatility.

The Aibo litter was born from Sony’s Computer Science Laboratory, the lab set up in the ’90s as an innovation center. They were never massive sellers, moving only 150,000 units in the seven years they were for sale. Despite not being a huge money maker, the Aibo designs are still featured in the Museum of Modern Art and the Smithsonian. There’s even one in the Carnegie Mellon University Robot Hall of Fame!

This product line also stands out from the others because while it was discontinued in 2006, Sony actually has brought it back. The new Aibo has a hefty price tag (around $3,000), and Sony boasts it can form an emotional bond with its owner. While that sounds nice… we have seen the movie M3gan. The new Aibos are even illegal in Illinois, thanks to state regulations on face-detecting technology. We think maybe we just want the original Aibos back to be the good boys they were.