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Tesla Optimus Bots Were Remotely Operated at Cybercab Event

bloomberg.com

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Re: Tesla Optimus Bots Were Remotely Operated at Cybercab Event

#11

Post by XorNot »

ethagknight wrote: post #4

To be honest, the autonomous control of the robot seems like the easier part of the equation. (doing it safely in a room with guests, unguided... thats another matter). The physical limitations and packaging are a big challenge, and I dont think I saw Optimus lift anything remotely heavy.. just pull a beer tap.. a decision that probably speaks volumes about current limits of the technology. To apply my first point to…

What stood out to me is that the speed of the movements makes it clear the autonomous balance control just isn't there. You can simulate this: try to move your upper body while standing up without changing the balance or stance of your legs and hips - unless you move slowly you can't do it, whereas if you put any force or momentum behind it you'll feel yourself straining pretty hard to stay upright.

When you see the bits and pieces of behind the scenes for Boston Dynamics it's clear that's where a lot of the magic actually is (and also if you look at how say, Atlas moves) - by necessity it looks much more "natural" because to get any power or speed behind the motions the whole robot needs to actively compensate the movements (obviously having enough power behind the drive system to actually do it is also critical).

Re: Tesla Optimus Bots Were Remotely Operated at Cybercab Event

#12

Post by mysteria »

ethagknight wrote: post #4

To be honest, the autonomous control of the robot seems like the easier part of the equation. (doing it safely in a room with guests, unguided... thats another matter). The physical limitations and packaging are a big challenge, and I dont think I saw Optimus lift anything remotely heavy.. just pull a beer tap.. a decision that probably speaks volumes about current limits of the technology. To apply my first point to…

I would imagine latency would be an issue if companies were considering teleoperation using staff in a country with cheaper labor. For example I work with people in India and China and they regularly complain about the several hundred ms of latency they get when using their American VDIs. That off the shelf lawn mower is going to be hard to control safely with all that delay, and there's also the risk of connection drops and the like. You would need a specialized mower with collision detection/etc. to handle this, and at this point you might as well discard the robot and just have a remotely operated mower instead.

However there are cases where this can work well, say in a factory handling dangerous chemicals with the teleoperator in an adjacent room. Or maybe it's doing some sort of task where delays and connectivity loss are acceptable.

Re: Tesla Optimus Bots Were Remotely Operated at Cybercab Event

#14

Post by m463 »

...

"This is awful! This is nothing like the Hell I visited two weeks ago!" Bill Gates responded. "I can't believe this! What happened to that other place, with the beautiful beaches, the beautiful women playing in the water!?"

"That was a demo," replied St. Peter.

also ED-209 from robocop, "You have 20 seconds to comply."

Re: Tesla Optimus Bots Were Remotely Operated at Cybercab Event

#15

Post by Terr_ »

rekttrader wrote: post #6
bdjsiqoocwk wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's AI - Actually an Indian

As I I see the delivery robot do it’s job... a game being played by remote workers doing the Enders game.

The terrifying secret of all those European truck simulator games.

Re: Tesla Optimus Bots Were Remotely Operated at Cybercab Event

#16

Post by hi-v-rocknroll »

quantified wrote: post #2

Surprising absolutely no one, I hope. Credibility seems difficult to generate for Tesla events. Maybe the secret sauce for Robotaxis is a human driver somewhere watching the cameras. Like driving Uber but from the comfort of home, and it's easy to hit the fridge or bathroom between rides.

Reminds me of a plot of device of the 90's movie Shooting Fish where they were scamming businesses selling an AGI computer but were actually controlling responses with a human in another room.

Re: Tesla Optimus Bots Were Remotely Operated at Cybercab Event

#19

Post by Terr_ »

mysteria wrote: post #12
ethagknight wrote: post #4

To be honest, the autonomous control of the robot seems like the easier part of the equation. (doing it safely in a room with guests, unguided... thats another matter). The physical limitations and packaging are a big challenge, and I dont think I saw Optimus lift anything remotely heavy.. just pull a beer tap.. a decision that probably speaks volumes about current limits of the technology. To apply my first point to…

I would imagine latency would be an issue if companies were considering teleoperation using staff in a country with cheaper labor. For example I work with people in India and China and they regularly complain about the several hundred ms of latency they get when using their American VDIs. That off the shelf lawn mower is going to be hard to control safely with all that delay, and there's also the risk of connection d…

Let's see, New York to Mumbai over the Earth's surface is maybe 12,500 km, assume a direct fiber optic cable where light travels noticeably slower than in a vacuum at 200,000 km per second... So a minimum of 62.5 ms one way with the best terrestrial equipment.

While one can play network games at 125 ping, it relies rather heavily on tricks that only work in a virtual environment. (Back in the '90s I used to play with 300 ping, no latency compensation, uphill both ways.)

Re: Tesla Optimus Bots Were Remotely Operated at Cybercab Event

#20

Post by stackghost »

mandevil wrote: post #3
quantified wrote: post #2

Surprising absolutely no one, I hope. Credibility seems difficult to generate for Tesla events. Maybe the secret sauce for Robotaxis is a human driver somewhere watching the cameras. Like driving Uber but from the comfort of home, and it's easy to hit the fridge or bathroom between rides.

I mean, you definitely need people available to intervene even for a L4 or L5 autonomy, because they will get stuck (Tesla is not serious about robotaxis until they start staffing up a team to do that on a full-time basis). But actual driving? This link is way too high latency for that to be safe. The robot needs to be maintaining its own SA, and just calling the human when it doesn't know what to do.

It's amazing to me just how far people will move the goalposts for Elon's perpetual grift.

We've gone from "you'll be able to nap on your morning commute in your self driving car within 18 months" to "they will always need a human to intervene".

Incredible

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