Lost robot asks for directions to find its way.

A team from the Technical University of Munich programmed their robot to ask people for directions then set it loose it in the real world. This was no carefully constructed laboratory maze, but real streets with real people, and real obstacles. They told it to get to a destination 1.5 km away. The robot had no pre-made map or GPS. It had to ask for help, look at the direction that people pointed, say "thank you" and try to use their input to get to its goal without running into anything. This experiment really shows the progress that is being made in taking robots into normal environments.

More info here at New Scientist magazine.