I, Robot, Pronounce You Husband & Wife

by Anne Chertoff, Posted May 17th 2010 4:30PM

What does every 21st century wedding need? A robot officiant, of course! A Japanese couple said "I do" while a 4-foot tall robot performed their wedding ceremony in front of 50 guests. Watch the ceremony below.

The robot, named I-Fairy, is the first of its kind to perform a marriage ceremony, according to the company that produced it Kokoro Co.

I-Fairy wore a wreath of flowers as it led the rooftop ceremony at a restaurant in Tokyo.

As the ceremony came to an end, the robot said, "Please lift the bride's veil," raising its arms in the air as the newlyweds kissed.

Since a robot can't think for itself, a man sat behind a curtain (á laThe Wizard of Oz) and entered commands into a computer.

The bride, Satoko Inoue, works at Kokoro and said of her wedding, "This was a lot of fun. I think that Japanese have a strong sense that robots are our friends. Those in the robot industry mostly understand this, but people mainly want robots near them that serve some purpose."

"It would be nice if the robot was a bit more clever, but she is very good at expressing herself," said the groom Tomohiro Shibata, a professor of robotics at the Nara Institute of Science and Technology in Japan.

Do you and your groom consider yourself techies? The I-Fairy sells for about $68,000 and there are currently three in use in the world, located in Singapore, the U.S. and Japan, according to a company spokesman. It has 18 degrees of motion in its arms, and mainly repeats preprogrammed movements and sounds.