Following a fight between the influencer Frankie LaPenna and a remotely operated EngineAI T800 humanoid, the California Athletic Commission demanded that these events be halted on the grounds that they lacked authorisation.
In mid-September, the young company Robot Entertainment Kombat (REK) organized in California what it presented as the first cage fight between a human and a humanoid robot. In front of the content creator Frankie LaPenna stood an EngineAI T800 of about 1.80 m. The robot had nothing to do with its autonomy: an operator was piloting it behind the scenes, its on-board systems only taking care of the balance, and the confrontation was largely a performance.
The California State Athletic Commission responded with a formal notice of 23 September urging the organizers to immediately cease organizing and promoting the fighting under penalty of criminal prosecution. The regulator does not oppose the principle of a duel between human and machine: he blames the absence of the prior authorization that the Californian code requires for any event of martial arts in full contact involving a human.
The founder of REK, Cix Liv, published the letter on social media and welcomed the publicity obtained. He argues that the Combat Sports Act, which targets confrontations "between two or more people", does not apply to a robot, and that new legislation would be needed to regulate this type of performance. Whether it is the operator, machine or format of the event that triggers the regulation remains an issue.
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