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Core Memory · 3 min · Oct 14, 2026
LLMs made robot conversations more flexible and memorable
Matt McMullen
Robot Designer, Realbotix
Ashlee VanceHost · CEO, Core Memory
Wrote the best-selling biography Elon Musk; covered tech for Bloomberg Businessweek, The Economist and The New York Times.
About this segment
McMullen traces the shift from scripted AIML responses to LLM-driven personalities, while Kiguel describes adding user-specific memory. This shows how language models made flexible robot interactions practical.
From “What Happens When AI Gets A Human Body?”, Oct 14, 2026. Watch the full episode
Thanks. We'll look at and fix what's off.
“But when LLM started to hit the mainstream, it was a game changer.”
Takeaways
- Their first AI used scripted AIML responses.
- LLMs added humor, knowledge, and more natural voices.
- Their system can remember details about the person it talks with.
In this episode
Full episode- 55:20Realbotix prioritizes autonomy and useful tasks over walking6:23
26:04LLMs made robot conversations more flexible and memorable2:45
Transcript
Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.
- 26:17
and like since you started on this originally llabs you know the ai is coming there are no l right yeah this has come along so yeah our our first ai was uh scripted using a language called aiml which is essentially a very elaborate uh a versus b like if this is what's said then one of these three responses will will come out and to some extent it was random but it's amazing how it came across as like super believable because it was so well done, right? Like the fundamental code was well thought out and very versatile about talking about a lot of different things. But when LLM started to hit the mainstream, it was a game changer.
- 27:05
That's right. It's got to be a big deal. It's a huge deal. And it's so incredible how little things like humor and knowledge about X, Y or Z can be woven into this personality. And then on top of it, the voices now are just incredible. Right. You know, the synthesized voices that are available. Oh, I see. Especially because you guys want to change personality. Yeah. So you've got this unparalleled degree of, you know, I can change the personality to be witty.
- 27:34
I can try different voices. Excellent. I can put different faces on the robot. I can change the way she's dressed. And like you really give people an unbelievable amount of flexibility on customizing post-purchase. Yeah, right. And we've also been able to tackle things like memory. And so while I listen to sort of what, again, some of our peers are doing, they're working on how do we create AI with a memory that learns about you?
- 27:58
So one day you say, hey, I don't like apples. And it remembers that and it carries that forward into your conversations. So we've developed an ability for our AI to also have a memory when it's interacting with people. So it learns about you, remembers what it learns, and incorporates that into the AI. So because you guys have your own model. I mean, I can use Chatsubut or Gemini or whatever if I want, but you guys have your own.
- 28:20
The idea is you'll just go to the app and select what you want. And so we get approached by a lot of AI companies that say, hey, can we integrate our AI into your app so that it is part of something that a user or a client can select? Okay. All right. I know this is not your favorite topic. I just want to do some of the background on some of this.