7. What's Next, WALL-E?

Entertaining as they are, what’s the point of these household robot hacks? What makes someone sit down and pull apart a perfectly good Roomba or WowWee toy? The hackers themselves say it’s the joy of figuring things out.

For its part, iRobot has done a great service for inquiring minds interested in robotics, says Kurt. “Not only did they open up hacking to those who otherwise shy away for fear of damaging expensive gadgets, but the company now gets many more people experimenting with their products as developers. Treating the customers as part of the product design process is a great way to engender customer loyalty and maybe get some good ideas.”

For Kurt, the trend in consumer robot hacking goes behind iRobot and Roombas, though. “I’ve always had an interest [in hacking] and don’t fear taking apart any device I own. It helps that I’ve been doing electronics since I was 9,” he says. For others, Kurt thinks the shift has been more recent. “As evidenced by this surging of interest in things like Make Magazine and ReadyMade, I think people enjoy figuring out new things to do with the stuff they own, and discovering the internal workings of what were previously mysterious black boxes.”

More companies will see the enthusiasm that consumer bots produce. As more manufacturers bring "domestic bots" to the market, who can say what wacky mods enthusiasts will produce. Disney Pixar just launched a WALL-E remote controlled robot toy. Let’s see which enterprising hacker can make a trash-compacter out of it first. Have better ideas for a WALL-E hack? Let us know in the comments below.