[chatmasta]

These bots are going to arrive suddenly and in huge volume. I’m not sure when it will happen, but when it does, it will be extremely fast. The software is basically ready, and the hardware isn’t too far off. The processing latency will be problematic but with local inference improving quickly, this will all come together into the perfect storm for the arrival of the bot army. I don’t think any of us are prepared for it.

[kibwen]

No, neither the hardware nor software is anywhere even remotely ready, where by "ready" we mean "safe to share living spaces with unsupervised children and pets without EVER accidentally reducing your toddler to a fine paste, literally a 0% chance". That's the minimum that people will accept, and that's more than ten years away, if it ever happens.

[Animats]

Both of the preceding comments are true. These things are about to arrive in vast volume, because the factories to build them are already starting to run. And they're nowhere near ready for that.

It took over a decade for Waymo to get from "able to drive around SF for demos" to "3x safer than humans, with thousands of vehicles on the roads".

A lot of these things may end up in closets, next to the VR headset and the 3D TV.

[fragmede]

Meanwhile, there's a tired mom of triplets who's wondering "how fine? (a paste)"

[pjc50]

You'd be surprised. I think Waymo have already proven this; not perfectly safe, but below the care threshold. And the demand for childcare is huge. Of course, what then happens is how the ensuing child neglect case falls out.

We're probably going to end up with the situation where the burden "it is considered criminal child endangerment to leave your child alone with the robot" falls on the parents, not on the robot manufacturers.

[gamblor956]

That's not how product liability laws work in the U.S. or in the E.U.

The first time a child gets harmed by a robot, the company making that robot will go spectacularly bankrupt. If a child gets killed by a robot, it would likely end the consumer robotics industry for a decade or more.

[pjc50]

People tried to hold gun manufacturers liable for dead children, and the law was simply changed to exempt them.

Robots and AI have too much money to be held liable.

[ben_w]

Perhaps, but also the US has the 2nd amendment and it seems (from the outside) to be a big part of their culture.

I don't think AI in general has that benefit despite people occasionally trying to criticise AI companies who restrict the output of LLMs by reference to the 1st amendment; robotics in particular definitely doesn't have that benefit.

[chatmasta]

Teslas have killed probably hundreds of people at this point and the only changes to self-driving laws have been to allow more of it.

[gamblor956]

Tesla sales have cratered in all but 2 countries.

[egypturnash]

Good news, the current apocalyptic memory prices will mean that only apocalyptically rich people will be able to afford them at the toddler-pasting stage if they come out any time soon!

[gamblor956]

Robot vacuums have been around for a decade now. Some are apparently decent.

Nobody really cares. Robot vacuums are still a single digit % of the vacuum market.

It turns out that saving a few minutes on housework isn't something people are willing to spend thousands, or even hundreds, of dollars on when the cheaper options are more versatile and more robust.

[chatmasta]

I would pay $10k for a robot that wakes up when I leave for work, does all the household chores, then goes to sleep before I return home to a house with dishes cleaned and put away, clothes washed and folded, clutter organized, surfaces cleaned, floors vacuumed and climate exactly how I want it…

I absolutely hate doing these chores to the point I rarely do them and go through cycles of two weeks of gradually disorganized living space until I finally crack and spend two hours gritting my teeth to poorly execute the chores.

I should hire a cleaner to come every two weeks, but that’s a chore too. I’d rather order a robot from Amazon, take it out of the box and have my problems solved.

[gamblor956]

Most people don't have thousands of dollars lying around to purchase a robot. The market of people who have that sort of money to spend on a discretionary purchase of that magnitude is in the low 6 figures globally.

That tech bros glibly assume that a freakishly expensive appliance is everybody's must-buy is part of why most people now have extremely strong negative feelings toward tech.

[robotresearcher]

The software is not basically ready. You’ll see actually good demos long before it’s really ready, and we haven’t seen them yet.