[nostromo]

I'm shocked by your comment. Everyone that doesn't enjoy cleaning, cooking, doing laundry, mowing the lawn, or taking out the trash would LOVE a home robot that really works.

Of course, these are very hard problems to take on -- much harder than a "smart" light switch -- but the market is absolutely there.

[CharlieDigital]

    > Everyone that doesn't enjoy cleaning, cooking, doing laundry, mowing the lawn, or taking out the trash would LOVE a home robot that really works.

We are far, far away from any of the remaining tedious parts of those things being done competently by a robot.

- Dishes: dishwashers already do the majority of the labor intensive part.

- Laundry: the washer already does the labor intensive part.

- Mowing: if you don't trust robot cars, you shouldn't trust a moving robot with blades attached.

- Taking out the trash: I don't see buying a multi-thousand dollar robot to save me the 20 seconds it takes to walk the garbage out.

Even robot vacuums are kinda terrible.

[V99]

Traversing a rectangle of grass at 2mph in a backyard is absurdly simpler than self-driving cars on open roads, and the absolute worst-case is something like a foot or pet injury.

There are multiple companies that already sell automatic lawn mowers in the $1000+ range. Some you bury a boundary wire around the target area, others figure it out with cameras.

[TheLoafOfBread]

Unless it is not a rectangle and there trees randomly in the way and wife's flowers on the sides.

[Clamchop]

Robot vacuums are great! They have limitations but they work really well within that envelope in my experience.

[fragmede]

How far is "far far away" to you? The recent robot demos (linked below) make me thing it's not that far off. I think within my lifetime, certainly. Within the decade, at most. I expect someone to announce something concrete within a couple of years.

https://www.figure.ai/

https://wholebody-b1.github.io/

https://ok-robot.github.io/

https://mobile-aloha.github.io/

[CharlieDigital]

Are those supposed to convince me that spending thousands on a robot will make my life measurably better?

Because they're not; the exact opposite in fact. That Spot missing the shoe on the first grab, being loud, and taking up more space than a German Shepard (without the floofy companionship) is case in point how far away we are.

[fragmede]

I not sure why you think I'm trying to convince you that you should spend any of your money on something you don't want.

[LightBug1]

Upvote for robot vaccums - even value ones are pretty good these days (imo)

[KerrAvon]

If they were invented today, dishwashers would be the same product but be called dish-washing robots. It's essentially what they are. Being mobile isn't essential to robotness.

[LightBug1]

AI Powered Robotic Cleansing Assistants ...

Breakthrough technology.

[7thaccount]

Thank you for being the voice of reason:)

Sure I'd like a personal robot butler to walk the dog and a dozen other annoying tasks, but apple isn't going to figure that out short of AGI or a quantum leap forward in more traditional approaches. What we're going to get is something like the Roomba, which was already useless in my tight house. I can't imagine too many things that would be relatively achievable that I would care about.

I guess I wasn't very clear above lol.

[ikekkdcjkfke]

Everything that can be automated, should be automated