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SF startup is testing robots in Airbnbs, and trashing them, lawsuit claims

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Re: SF startup is testing robots in Airbnbs, and trashing them, lawsuit claims

#151

Post by kjs3 »

kortilla wrote: post #57
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's exactly this ethos, the "move fast and break things", and oh, we don't give a fuck about who/what we damage in the process - careless people indeed. I am someone who came of age during an incredibly hopeful time about how technology could be a force for good. The silicon valley ethos at present is totally morally bankrupt and rotten to the core.

Cups and plates in the wrong places, the horror!! This generation is cooked. /s I wonder why that was on the same level of complaints about broken things.

If I'm supposed to buy a robot to clean my house, I personally don't want to have to go looking for where the stupid thing has put my cups and plates or whatever whenever it straightens up. I expect there to be a place for all the things and all the things to be put back in place. That's not "er mah gerd the world is ending because millennials am I right!"; that's "your idiot robot can't do the one job I bought it for".

Re: SF startup is testing robots in Airbnbs, and trashing them, lawsuit claims

#153

Post by gamblor956 »

chatmasta wrote: post #11
fidotron wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Human only "safe spaces" will be a thing. Where they draw the line will be the question.

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…

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.

Re: SF startup is testing robots in Airbnbs, and trashing them, lawsuit claims

#154

Post by gamblor956 »

pjc50 wrote: post #135
kibwen wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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…

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.

Re: SF startup is testing robots in Airbnbs, and trashing them, lawsuit claims

#155

Post by gamblor956 »

Borealid wrote: post #50
TZubiri wrote: post #14

Can any lawyer clear this up for me? If the company ends up having no commercial success and the lawsuits for damages rack up, can they just close the company file for bankruptcy and face no consequences? Or is there some civil or criminal risk to this behaviour?

As a slight hint, one of the more common types of corporation is an "LLC". LLC stands for Limited Liability Company. If the company's owners had unlimited liability for problems the company caused, that wouldn't be much of an LLC, would it? The primary purpose of an LLC is to make it so that the owners (often the founders) cannot personally be held responsible for debts the company incurs, even debts incurred through…

LLCs are the limited liability form also most easily subject to veil-piercing (meaning, the courts ignore the limited liability shield to go after the assets of the owners) as most LLCs fail to properly maintain all the technical minutae necessary to actually keep the liability shield in place.

Insufficient capitalization is the #1 reason for piercing the veil (and also works well against corporations). This involves not putting enough investment into a company to pay the foreseeable debts it would incur from its activities. This means: if your LLC incurs debts knowing it lacks the ability to pay them off, the courts can pierce the LLC and go after you.

Re: SF startup is testing robots in Airbnbs, and trashing them, lawsuit claims

#157

Post by yw3410 »

RobotToaster wrote: post #133
Rebuff5007 wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Moving fast and breaking things is fine, as long as you fix the stuff you break... What? No its not. Breaking things can cause harm that is not always "fixable", particularly if its not your thing to break.

Well, that statement kinda implied what was broken has to be fixable, at least I thought it did. And what is going to be impossible to fix or replace in a budget !hotel room?

Fixing scratched hardwood furniture is an absolute pain.

Re: SF startup is testing robots in Airbnbs, and trashing them, lawsuit claims

#159

Post by chatmasta »

gamblor956 wrote: post #154
pjc50 wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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.

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.

Re: SF startup is testing robots in Airbnbs, and trashing them, lawsuit claims

#160

Post by chatmasta »

gamblor956 wrote: post #153
chatmasta wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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.

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.

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