In a blog post outlining the process in detail, the team members report that they pulled this off using the open-source prototyping platform Arduino and the design-oriented programming language Processing. They set out to give the lamp the power to simulate at least three types of emotionally evocative gestures: scrunching up to inspect an object, stretching out in pursuit of something in the distance, and rearing back to avoid conflict. It's amazing to watch how the three add up to something that feels like a sympathetic personality. Then they gave the lamp a friend: a book that it guards jealously, and upon which it shines lovingly. Finally, as is clear from the video, they gave it the power to turn itself back on.

See: http://jddubdesign.tumblr.com/tagged/MDDN_251

I keep thinking about how far we've come since SIGGRAPH in the 1990s.