R.U.R. is a 1920 science fiction play in the Czech language by Karel Capek. It quickly became famous and was influential early in the history of its publication. The play begins in a factory that makes artificial people, called roboti, out of synthetic organic matter. They are not exactly robots by the current definition of the term; these creatures are closer to the modern idea of cyborgs or even clones, as they may be mistaken for humans and can think for themselves. They seem happy to work for humans at first, but that changes, and a hostile robot rebellion leads to the extinction of the human race.