A robot balancing on a ball R1.1 / 玉乗りロボット

Hello,
I like the clean design of your robot and the stability you were able to achieve. My question is: what about the rotation of the robot? If it needs to turn around? Wouldn't a balancing bot on 2 wheels be mechanically sturdier, simpler, cheaper AND permit rotation?

It's due to application of the robot. I think it's more interesting to turn and we didn't consider a designed that cannot turn when we planed our project.
In another question, yes of course two wheeled balancing is more stable, simple, easy to develop (so we also have severals), but it cannot move to side direction without turning. Imagine when you kick a rider of a Segway from the side:-)
Our robot, and of course pioneer 'ballbot', have advantage that it can escape to any direction at once.

Why does the video act like this is type of robot is original and came from some Japanese forum? Ralph Hollis was the first to conceive of and create the Ballbot.

Of course, ballbot is the first one that realized balance using a ball. Did you read description "like 'ballbot'" and date this movie appeared (which is later than ballbot) ? :-)
This one also balance on ball developed in Japan but is based on another type, without knowing ballbot.
In addition, I'm now visiting his laboratory to collaborate on these kind of works.

This sort of technology will have an extremely large number of uses in the future. What we have here is a device that can move an item (sitting at the top) with 3 degrees of freedom (translation in a plane parallel to the ground, and rotation about the central axis). It is compact and able to perform this motion with a single point of contact to the ground. One use I can think of is at a bar: the robot could be used to distribute drinks or receive empty glasses for transport back behind the bar.

the web name is "Cosas de Mecatrónica"

I was to search videos in Youtube about robotic and I found this video so interesting, I decided to write a article in Spanish for a mecatronics web, the title is "Robot equilibrista" and I hope you like

Unfortunately, I cannot understand Spanish (though I have learned French a little 15 years ago), so I will not be able to read your articles.

But, yes, you can write your article and can introduce this youtube movie , as some blogs do.

That is butifull!!
What kind of controll did you apply?
Where can I find your paper of it?

Simple PD feedback control on inclination and position.
You can find one of our paper on IEEE explore.
Please search 'balancing on a ball' there.
(ICCAS 2008)