iPet Companion Lets You Play with Pets by Proxy

This is a pet-lovers dream come true and a trap for anyone looking to waste some time at work.

God bless technology. We have Google in our pockets, virtual reality headsets and the ability to play with adorable furry animals from the comfort of our computers.

iPetCompanion has webcams set up at animal shelters across the country and devices set up that literally let you play with the animals from your computer. The rooms are equipped with various toys, laser pointers and other moving contraptions.

You get two minutes to play with the pets and you can even take screenshots of the action. The camera can be zoomed in/out and adjusted to get that perfect shot. Here is a picture of my time with a very sleepy cat at the Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals:

This guy wasn't into it today, but I've found some other kittens who were more than happy to play.

Playing with shelter pets remotely through the web came from an engineer trying to get the attention of one of the cats. Here is the history from iPetCompanion:

The concept for iPet Companion was sparked by a cat named Spot. His owner, one of our engineers, was testing a remotely controlled robot arm when it attracted Spot’s attention. This gave birth to the idea of building a pet play system that combines live web viewing with remotely controlled pet toys.

Soon after we reached out to our local humane society and asked if they would like to pilot a new web-based realtime cat toy for us. Idaho Humane Society became the first shelter to install our system of toys. The project quickly grew to shelters across the United States!

The iPet Companion can be installed in more shelters, and I think this would be great fro some shelters in our state. Any animal shelters that are interested can apply here.