The simple wooden house sits in an unremarkable old neighborhood in an Osaka suburb, the kind of place people forget still exists in modern Japan. There are no pachinko parlors or cyber cafes—no shops of any kind, really. Its an unlikely place to encounter the next version of Japans technological evolution. But listen to what happens when a gray-haired septuagenarian named Kazuko Komiyama returns after visiting friends, 'Welcome home,' a voice chirps. 'Isnt it a nice day?' The high-pitched greeting belongs to a robot. Its a simple machine, to be sure. This isnt a thoughtful robotic character like those found in a Star Wars movie, or like Japans own popular creation Astro Boy. But its a robot nonetheless: a chocolate-brown wombat that eventually will be able to flutter its eyes when Komiyama, 77, enters the room and giggle when she scratches its fuzzy little head. It tells her what the weather is like. It reminds her when its time to take her medicine. It sings sweet songs to her. For Komiyama, a mechanical companion is a guard against the dreadful loneliness many elderly Japanese must endure. She saw one such tragic story on a TV news show recently. 'An old mans death went unnoticed because he lived alone,' she says. 'Day after day, his diary read, I didnt meet anybody today. Again. I dont want to end up like that. ' So when welfare workers from the Osaka suburb of Ikeda asked for volunteers to test the prototype of Matsushita Electric Industrial Co.s pet robot, she jumped at the chance. She keeps the robot sitting in her living room. After a month, shes starting to warm up to the thing, despite one irritating habit. 'It speaks with a childish voice,' she complains. 'That makes me feel like Im treated as an old person. I would rather have an equal relationship with a robot. ' This is modern Japan, a Gizmo Nation where even grandmothers make friends with their gadgets. For half a century, the Japanese have made it a cultural mission to turn out a succession of cool, elegant and increasingly human machines. And what machines they have become: robotic geishas; headgear that projects computer screens in midair in front of wearers eyes; toilets that measure a persons weight, body fat and urine sugar levels. The country that gave the world transistor radios, the Walkman and hand-held videogames is now positioned to turn its love of gadgetry into a profitable national enterprise once again. We can learn from the first paragraph that______.