[HN Gopher] Boston Dynamics: Do You Love Me?
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Boston Dynamics: Do You Love Me?
Author : modeless
Score : 552 points
Date : 2020-12-29 18:52 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.youtube.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.youtube.com)
| Priem19 wrote:
| http://www.theytookourjobs.com
| rglover wrote:
| It's a joke now but there is going to be a sizable amount of
| property damage to these things once this shift occurs.
| ddevault wrote:
| Only if we can't shift society to accomodate the changing job
| market and take care of people who have been made obsolete.
| Ideally by enjoying the fruits of our collective labor and
| ditching the "everyone must spend more than half their lives
| working" obsession. Call your senator before it's your head
| on the guillotine, rich HN readers.
| imtringued wrote:
| Actually, that's not how it works. Consumer inflation is
| the go to mechanism for keeping unemployment low. It will
| keep working even with automation. The government merely
| has to enact effective policies that keep consumer
| inflation on track.
|
| There is no meaningful distinction between robots and
| foreign labor when it comes to low employment rates. Both
| are "not Americans" if your definition of Americans only
| includes humans that are citizens of the US. Any inequality
| that would be caused by robots already exists in the form
| of inequality caused by globalization.
|
| You can solve inequality quite easily with the right
| policies. Change tax policy for the wealthy or create
| demand for labor through economic stimulus.
| whywhywhywhy wrote:
| It's so freaky looking at this my brain feels like it's CG, spot
| in particular. Even though being familiar with Boston Dynamics I
| know its not.
|
| Not sure if its just so unreal, or maybe there's something
| unnatural in the movement or if some scenes were sped up.
| [deleted]
| riffraff wrote:
| Spot was the least surprising to me, having seen it dance in
| the past, except the tip toeing bit felt incredibly.. ballet-
| ish.
| kordlessagain wrote:
| This is cute, but I still hope they fired that asshole who was
| pushing bots over with a hockey stick.
| [deleted]
| thomaslkjeldsen wrote:
| Looking forward to their next video being recorded on a
| smartphone by a robot.
| Gregam3 wrote:
| Not super pleased to acknowledge robots can now dance better than
| me
| carlsborg wrote:
| This is the future they foretold.
| HeXetic wrote:
| I wonder if the guys behind the previous "Bosstown Dynamics"
| videos will spoof this as they did with
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKjCWfuvYxQ
| o21je182 wrote:
| Either this is a stop-motion film or there is a cripple reunion
| in the second floor (https://youtu.be/fn3KWM1kuAw?t=57).
| GhostVII wrote:
| It's interesting how in manufacturing (and other industries with
| lots of automation) we are trying to move away from humans as
| much as possible, while Boston Dynamics is trying to replicate
| humans as much as possible.
|
| Of course there will always be cases where we want to send a
| robot into an environment designed for humans (ex. firefighting)
| so there is value in humanoid robots, but it's interesting to me
| that we are going in two completely opposite directions with
| robotics. Imo humanoid robots will have some limited uses, but
| ultimately not be as useful as robots built for specific tasks.
| andi999 wrote:
| I believe any company with the word 'dynamics' in the name
| wants to sell military equipment. So maybe for crowd control
| armed humanized robots work better (psychologically) than tank
| shaped.
| epicureanideal wrote:
| I was going to ask how long these robots can move without a power
| cord, but then I found this article from 2015
| (https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30919098) that says it's
| about an hour. If that was in 2015, I'm guessing they're above 2
| hours now. Very interesting. If they could rapid-charge, and
| could just "take a break" for 15 minutes every 2 hours, they
| could be used alongside humans doing various manual tasks...
| chucky_z wrote:
| In some of their older videos they have Diesel engines powering
| them, so they definitely have the capability to make some
| longer ranges. I was unable to find any articles but if you
| watch the older videos their engines are extremely loud.
| Definitely not fully electric.
| dnate wrote:
| or "take a break" 30 seconds to switch battery packs
| peterthehacker wrote:
| Such a fun video! I wonder what the process was like to
| choreograph this dance. I wonder. Were the bots trained this
| dance (via ML style train/test) or was there a lot of custom code
| required? Perhaps they'll have a follow blog post on that.
| intrasight wrote:
| As someone who worked in robotics at CMU in the mid 80s with
| Whittaker, & Raibert, and Crowley this was definitely super
| exciting to watch. You've come a long way baby. I remember
| watching you great, great grandfather hopping around in Raibert's
| lab in 1984. Yeah, and sort of scary.
| kazinator wrote:
| Alternative version: I remember watching your great
| grandmother's legs cavorting around in Herbie Hancock's "Rock
| It" video ... in 1984.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHhD4PD75zY
| SubGenius wrote:
| Ah, thanks for sharing the song. Haven't heard it in a while.
| I was listening to Chick Corea's 80s material earlier today
| though. That era had a lot of cheesy sounding jazz fusion
| that I can't get enough of!
| kazinator wrote:
| I'm mostly a rock and roll and metal head, but I listened
| to a lot of Chick Corea in the 80's, like the _Where Have I
| Known You Before_ album from his Return to Forever band.
|
| These days, I use a Canadian streaming service called
| Stingray Music. There, I just discovered a channel called
| "For the fans of Weather Report". It streams all that sort
| of stuff nonstop. Mahavishnu, Hancock, ...
| SubGenius wrote:
| Nice. Weather Report is great (Jaco!), and Zawinul's
| other band too, Syndicate.
|
| I'm happy John Mclaughlin is still playing. Here's a song
| from a couple weeks ago you might like!
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ1Jx1hf0I8
| isjamesalive wrote:
| Really scary. Whenever I see the latest Boston Dynamics video,
| I'm always thinking 'and now imagine it's hunting you'.
| SkidanovAlex wrote:
| Watch Black Mirror episode called Metalhead.
| SV_BubbleTime wrote:
| One of the best episodes!
|
| It's like a totally different series to that last season
| with vr-gay/not-gay falcon man and Miley Cyrus signing a
| bad NiN cover.
|
| But yea. The mean robot dogs, just good short form story
| telling with so little dialog.
| cogman10 wrote:
| That was my first thoughts watching this video "Shit, these
| things are going to be on the battle field any day now".
|
| I mean, I guess better a robot than a person.. but still..
| pretty terrifying to think we are soon to have people hunting
| robots.
| krisoft wrote:
| Meh. If someone wants to "hunt" you with a robot they can
| already do so with a UAV (think MQ-1 Predator, not an off-
| the-shelf quadrocopter). It is an already existing true and
| tested technology. Large governments around the world already
| maintain literal armies to maintain them and efficiently
| employ them to kill people. The fact that that weapon is not
| aimed at you or me is merely a political decision. With
| legged robots a lot more development is needed before they
| can do the same. I guess what I want to say: These robots are
| not deadly yet. The kind of people who can turn them deadly
| can already kill you if they want. I don't see why you should
| worry marginally more.
| bengale wrote:
| If someone with the resources to hunt me with a robot wants
| me dead I'm sure they could also afford some terrifying
| merc to do it too.
| blackrock wrote:
| It was all fun and games at first.
|
| Then the second robot came into the picture. I went LOL.
|
| Then Spot came into the picture, and my heart skipped a beat.
|
| Then the velociraptor on wheels came into the picture, and I just
| lost it. I think my brain just melted down.
|
| Next stop: Guns. Lots of guns.
|
| Time to be afraid. Very afraid.
| ionwake wrote:
| The velociraptor on wheels is a good name.
|
| I shudder to think what war variant machines will resort to
| when they are running low on ammo.
|
| Do robots need to follow the Geneva convention?
| LeifCarrotson wrote:
| The important question is who's to blame when they don't.
|
| Right now there's civil liability for the end customer,
| integrator, and manufacturer (depending on who failed to
| follow ANSI/ISO robotic safety guidelines) in industrial
| automation accidents, and criminal liability if the failure
| rises to the level of negligence. It honestly works pretty
| well, every site I've ever worked at has been happy to put
| safety first and throughput second, to a degree that my
| ordinarily cynical outlook is pleasantly surprised.
|
| But I don't trust the justice system to correctly follow
| logical reasoning when these things are used for violence.
| Who's at fault when a desperate soldier straps something to
| one of these things and sends it off to commit war crimes -
| the soldier? The brass who put the soldier in that position
| with those tools and got that entirely expected result?
| Boston Dynamics engineers and others who built the tools and
| shipped them with fine print that says "by clicking OK you
| agree not to violate the Geneva convention with this"? The
| robot itself, sentenced to run with worn out bearings and low
| hydraulic fluid in a long prison sentence?
|
| It brings to mind the Nathaniel Borenstein quote [1]:
|
| > _It should be noted that no ethically-trained software
| engineer would ever consent to write a DestroyBaghdad
| procedure. Basic professional ethics would instead require
| him to write a DestroyCity procedure, to which Baghdad could
| be given as a parameter._
|
| [1] http://www.guppylake.com/~nsb/CSCW-ATOMICMAIL.txt
| anigbrowl wrote:
| Just look at the history of landmines. 164 countries have
| voted to ban them, 33 have not. surprisingly (or not), at
| least one of these countries professes to be horrified when
| low-tech versions of the same technology are deployed against
| it and considers that to be appalling moral cowardice.
| PeterisP wrote:
| The "number of countries" is a misleading metric for
| landmine treaty - as it includes all the many countries who
| expect no wars at all and so they're not actually giving up
| anything. The 33 include almost all countries who actually
| expect to fight any wars and/or have serious militaries.
| Okay, UK, France and Turkey have banned landmines, but USA,
| Russia, China, India, Pakistan, Israel and Iran haven't
| banned them, and those 7 matter far more than the 164
| signatories of the Ottawa convention for actual banning of
| landmines in practical use.
|
| And of course, the roadside IEDs that USA saw in Iraq and
| Afghanistan would still be legal under the Ottawa
| convention (it does not ban anti-vehicle mines and remotely
| detonated devices) so you can't really assert that USA is
| complaining about something they won't ratify themselves.
|
| If we look at the history of landmines, then it's fairly
| certain that countries are not going to give up a
| capability that they expect to use, all the universally
| accepted treaties only ban things that we consider
| impractical, which do not give a serious advantage (e.g.
| chemical weapons, which aren't competitive with
| conventional weapons if you're fighting against a proper
| military and not just gassing civilians and/or guerillas).
|
| So combat robots will be banned only if (and while) they
| turn out to be useless and impractical compared to
| alternatives, or perhaps selectively banned by the
| countries who weren't going to use them anyway because they
| can't afford them. If they are actually good for their
| role, then they will be legal for all the major militaries.
| rstupek wrote:
| The reason 1 of the countries did not sign on is they use a
| bunch of them to prevent North Korea from invading South
| Korea
| renewiltord wrote:
| So what's the deal with these guys? Obviously their tech is
| pretty cool since I remember the control and feedback problem for
| bipedal bots being described as really hard when I was growing
| up. Obviously their consumer marketing is great since everyone
| looks at these things and loves them.
|
| But they don't have a product. What's the problem? My guesses:
|
| * No one really needs this shit
|
| * They have a control/feedback problem in interaction with moving
| objects i.e. this thing can't high-five you without breaking your
| hand or open a can
|
| We usually handwave this shit with "But The Military" but like
| what's the use-case for the military? This fucker doesn't know
| how to react to anything so it's a bipedal trolley. But it's too
| expensive a trolley. If you take this guy with you, your mission
| is going to end up being to protect this guy. Take an extra human
| and he's way cheaper, way more versatile, and all that.
|
| Not trying to be the usual HN negative because I actually think
| this is like the Newton or something. The tech is freaking cool,
| and it excites me as a glimpse to the future, but the product
| part is going to come some time in the future and it's going to
| be awesome and in hindsight we'll be like "Damn! _That_ was the
| missing part. It 's so obvious". Right now, though? I just hope
| someone will keep buying them and selling them like a hot potato
| so they live.
| manbash wrote:
| One actual use-case of DARPA ("The Military") is to deploy such
| robots in disaster-stricken areas instead of risking human. For
| example, emergency maintenance in a power plant that has
| suffered a nuclear meltdown accident.
| hmottestad wrote:
| They are still trying to figure out their market. They are
| essentially selling a product the world isn't quite ready for.
|
| If it was dirt cheap I would buy one, attach a vacuum to it and
| have it clean my place. But they are super expensive, so fat
| chance of that.
|
| Spot, the yellow dog, seems to be targeted at the notion of
| human safety. Think something like a building demo job gone
| wrong, send in the robot to pull out the dynamite.
|
| In Norway they are being tested on oil platforms. If this robot
| can be used to fix one single problem on a platform that would
| otherwise have required a production shutdown...it'll pay for
| itself several (hundred?) times over. This is especially the
| case for older platforms where you need to be more hand on and
| less can be done remotely.
|
| We had a mountain side in Norway that was near collapsing and
| all the residents below it were evacuated every two weeks. The
| geologists wanted to use dynamite to dislodge it, but it was
| too dangerous for humans. In the future we might send a
| versatile robot like Spot up in a drone and have him plant the
| explosives. If he blows up in the process that would obviously
| suck, but still fairly cheap for what he would have
| accomplished.
| hmottestad wrote:
| Found a relevant link: https://akerbp.com/exploring-the-
| potential-of-robotics-in-th...
| petters wrote:
| They do have a product you can buy -- Spot (the dog).
| balls187 wrote:
| > But they don't have a product.
|
| The yellow robot, Spot, is available for purchase.
| renewiltord wrote:
| Right, I know they run it in Singapore, but it's a product
| the way Juicero is a product: it's kinda useless.
| ve55 wrote:
| It's hard to believe that they were acquired for 'only' 1.1B,
| given the valuations we have seen of many other companies
| recently.
| Element_ wrote:
| I totally agree, tech valuations this year are staggering, yet
| this company is only valued at 1.1bn even as they have started
| commercializing their spot robot. It seems like their robots
| could automate the truck-to-door problem with automated home
| deliveries. I guess we must be missing something...
| ThouYS wrote:
| hear hear
| fartcannon wrote:
| Bipedal robots will replace human labour and the first person
| to make them inexpensive will become unfathomably wealthy.
|
| How much did slack go for? 30 billion? For a shiny chat client
| with fewer features than the 25 year old tech they ape.
| Andrex wrote:
| > Bipedal robots will replace human labour and the first
| person to make them inexpensive will become unfathomably
| wealthy.
|
| Yeah, until there's a B1-66ER incident...
| avaldeso wrote:
| Animatrix: Second Renaissance. Sick reference bro.
| staplers wrote:
| C-level business executives generally never pay attention to
| the frontiers of technology. It seems to be a common theme in
| entropy-stage corporations. It does help churn the larger
| corporate oligarchy though.
| briantakita wrote:
| Human augmentation such as exoskeletons will likely find
| broad commercial appeal as well.
|
| https://www.army-technology.com/features/us-army-
| exoskeleton...
| jonas21 wrote:
| It's all fun and games until they install the guns on these
| things.
| f6v wrote:
| You can already see how tech armies absolutely own the
| battlefield thanks to drones even without AI. Lagging behind
| has devastating consequences.
| yawnxyz wrote:
| idk I'm kind of thinking you could play real-life fortnite with
| human-controlled robots like these... but then that reminds me
| of this scifi short movie:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AvyUWUKCw8
| rhn_mk1 wrote:
| Not to spoil, this reminds me of a certain Card's Game.
| RGamma wrote:
| Mind controlling the people via the internet seems more urgent
| thatguy0900 wrote:
| It's a shame I can't look at this amazing tech without thinking
| the same thing. I suspect in reality future soldiers will wish
| they were fighting these instead of what I assume is more
| likely in a swarm of flying grenades, though.
| balaam wrote:
| I don't really want robot weapons but I would love to see a
| firing range demonstration with one, just to see what's
| possible when you get super-human aiming.
|
| I don't see a future for humanoid bots in war. Missiles and
| drones seems to render anything else redundant. Policing in a
| few more generations seems possible, at least at a technical
| level.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| If you can't tell who the mark is, it's you.
| high_byte wrote:
| You could say the same about cars, bicycles and babies. Still
| you don't see many of those just running around.
| GhostVII wrote:
| A predator drone can fire a hellfire missile from kilometers
| away and hit a car windshield, killing the passengers with a
| set of pop-out blades. I don't think humanoid robots are going
| to be a tipping point.
| duxup wrote:
| I think there is a very real difference in air power vs
| ground power that seems to have played out through history.
| FpUser wrote:
| This is so cool. High five and deepest respect to people at
| Boston Dynamics.
| y04nn wrote:
| What amaze me, is how fast Boston Dynamic is progressing,
| specially comparing to Honda's ASIMO that is in development since
| 20 years.
| faeyanpiraat wrote:
| Okay so they now can dance over you after they fragged you on the
| battlefield.
| sxp wrote:
| If I didn't know who Boston Dynamics was, I would have said that
| this is just CGI. The animations look so fake. I think the issue
| is that they're aggressively smoothing the motion since
| mechanical systems don't have the ability to accelerate & jerk as
| fast as biological systems. Cheap mocap animation has the same
| problem because the frame rate of the capture system is too low.
| They interpolate between captured keyframes which results in the
| wrong velocities in the end.
| roughly wrote:
| Agree that if anyone except BD put out this video I'd bin it as
| fake immediately. I still have a hard time saying I believe it
| - it feels like such a jump from where my mental model of their
| robots was and CGI is so good at this point that it feels
| easier for this to be a fake than real.
| imglorp wrote:
| It might help to compare against video with less editing and
| effects. Several youtubers are playing with Spots and you can
| get a better idea of what they're really like.
|
| Adam Savage: https://youtu.be/-R8wUybrspo?t=2374
|
| Marques Brownlee: https://youtu.be/s6_azdBnAlU?t=249
| LeifCarrotson wrote:
| Same, and I've been working with some of the latest and
| greatest collaborative and industrial six-axis and SCARA
| robots. There's definitely a back and forth between
| innovation and legacy in this industry. For example, FANUC
| famously refuses to deprecate or drop service for any of its
| equipment, you'll pay through the nose for some of it but
| they're willing to keep you supplied with parts, service, and
| bug fixes for 40-year-old equipment if you've got it. Also, a
| lot of it is clearly designed for "what's the most we can get
| an average maintenance tech to understand after a 40-hour
| certification class", not for programmers and engineers. But
| with a demo like this, it's obvious that BD is working on a
| level that the industrial automation competition won't reach
| for decades.
| CommieBobDole wrote:
| I would go further than that and say that it's obviously CGI,
| though I don't know if that actually means it is CGI - it could
| be, as you mentioned, some sort of post-processing. Or maybe
| it's greenscreened and composited together?
|
| More than the smoothness, there just seems to be something off
| about the weight and momentum that you tend to see in high-end,
| big-budget-movie CGI, but it's hard to put a definite finger on
| it.
| dvirsky wrote:
| You can see the vibrations of the plexiglass walls and the
| camera crew reflected in them vibrating in amazing detail.
| You can also see people walking around in the background in
| normal speed. It doesn't look like it's accelerated, or I
| would say no more than 10%. Also given the visible but subtle
| marks the robots leave on the mat, this is either next level
| CGI and compositing or next level robotics, and BD are not a
| next level CGI company.
| gamegoblin wrote:
| There's a similar effect in old movies when a super-strong
| character picks up a massive boulder that is actually made of
| styrofoam or something. You can tell that the mass is wrong
| based on the way it moves.
|
| I think this is a similar effect but in reverse -- we know
| the limbs _are_ heavy and aren 't made of styrofoam, so the
| fact that they are moving like they are is uncanny. Our
| brains aren't used to motorized and hydraulic limbs.
|
| You can get a little bit of this effect watching assembly
| line arms sometimes, but it's less jarring because they are
| clearly disembodied, whereas this thing is fairly humanoid.
| Gravityloss wrote:
| Could it be slightly sped up? The robots do make jumps so
| one could calculate it from that.
| gamegoblin wrote:
| I was curious so I just timed the jump at the beginning
| of the song about 15 seconds in.
|
| Assuming the jump is about 30cm, and I stopwatched it at
| 0.3 seconds from the apex to the ground, you arrive at an
| acceleration of 9.6m/s^2 which is basically spot on the
| acceleration due to gravity.
| modeless wrote:
| I think what happened is they used a fancy camera with a big
| lens and a 30 FPS frame rate, giving a very high quality
| image reminiscent of Hollywood films, but they set a faster
| shutter speed than Hollywood generally uses, giving less
| motion blur than is normal in high quality footage like this.
| The relative lack of motion blur despite the low frame rate
| gives it a jerky appearance similar to sped up or timelapse
| video, or animation. Combined with the slightly odd motion of
| the robots, it has an uncanny look.
|
| It's kinda funny because most robot demo videos _are_ sped up
| and /or CGI, but this one isn't.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| Change playback speed to 50% and it looks more realistic.
| That's probably realtime and they sped up the video.
| kbaker wrote:
| I don't know... watch the people walking in around 1:00 in
| the top left. Looks pretty much real time.
|
| https://youtu.be/fn3KWM1kuAw?t=58
| trickstra wrote:
| 75% looks most similar to the previous Atlas videos. Also
| the movement of the people upstairs behind the glass or the
| reflections of the cameraman confirm that it has been sped
| up.
| lkbm wrote:
| I don't know how fast you walk, but at 75% those people
| are definitely in slow-motion. I could see maybe 90%, but
| 100% looks completely natural to me as far as their
| movements are concerned. (Personally, I want to see a
| jump at 90% to judge, not someone walking.)
| lemonspat wrote:
| A simple test shows this isn't more realistic. Gravity
| during the jumps are off, and people walking upstairs is
| odd. It looks like it was filmed in realtime.
| berkut wrote:
| I think it's clearly recorded in-camera, and I think real
| camera footage - the reflections in the (plexi?)glass screens
| show the robots and people holding cameras. I'm not even
| seeing any obvious indications it's been denoised.
|
| As someone who works in the VFX industry, faking reflections
| on wobbling/flexing glass screens (static ones are easy) is
| actually pretty difficult to do right, and I doubt they would
| have added the camera operators if they were faking it.
|
| Some of the aspects making people think this is CG are the
| diffuse lighting (no obvious hard shadows or occlusion), very
| clean robots, "weird" (i.e. not normal, but I believe it's
| honest for the robots) motion, and lack of sound.
| wbobeirne wrote:
| I'm inclined to agree with this after bumping the video up to
| max quality. I do believe that this is real, and you can see
| from 0:51-1:05 that there's some reflections going on that
| would be a lot trickier to fake. But this footage has a
| similar quality to what I see in a lot of heavily processed
| drone footage, where it just doesn't look like the same way I
| see the world.
| vhold wrote:
| Also watch their feet very closely at max resolution.
|
| There's a lot of shock rattling and wobbling I've never
| seen in any CGI robot animation, not to mention they are
| leaving visible indentations in the foam floor. If it was
| CG they really went all out.
| tie_ wrote:
| Mandatory XKCD reference: https://xkcd.com/331/
| modzu wrote:
| sound would help, and maybe someone can dig up the real audio
| version if it is available. because hearing those engines roar
| and servos buzz, you appreciate there is indeed more going on
| than meets the eye
| espadrine wrote:
| > _The animations look so fake._
|
| Let's talk about why it looks fake.
|
| I _think_ it comes from the use of hydraulics. Biological
| muscle is way less linear (it works more like a second-order
| control system, where things often overshoot their target
| before dampening).
|
| But one part of it may also be algorithmic: the robot's Kalman
| filter (?) may correct for errors from sensor fusion much
| faster than a human would.
|
| I would love a more informed opinion than mine though.
| modeless wrote:
| This video has very little motion blur compared to what you
| normally see in high quality 4K 24/30 FPS footage (e.g.
| Hollywood movies). That contributes to the uncanny look,
| giving it an "animated" or "sped up" feel. Which is funny
| because most robot demo videos _are_ sped up, but not this
| one.
| oconnor663 wrote:
| To me it looks like claymation. But of course I can't really
| explain what it means for something to "look like claymation"
| to me. Is it that the movement is too isolated? Not isolated
| enough? Both of those things at the same time in different
| ways?
| jcims wrote:
| I agree but I chalked that up to motion of extremely rigid
| bodies under large torque.
|
| Watch the reflections on the plexiglass while they are
| moving. Obviously they could have been composited in but
| there's definitely a live portion of the shot.
| rusk wrote:
| Subliminally jerky - you can't directly perceive it but you
| are aware of it.
| im_down_w_otp wrote:
| "Subliminally jerky" - When you're certain it's
| dehydrated meat, but you don't know why.
| platelets2020 wrote:
| Hydraulics make robot motion look fake? Have you watched real
| robots move before? I've never once watched a robot move and
| thought to myself "that looks fake".
|
| This is how the robot moves IN REALITY:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhND7Mvp3f4
| espadrine wrote:
| It can look real with hydraulics, but it can look fake.
|
| In that video you linked, look at second 21/22, when it
| raises the arms in the air: the way the arms stop instantly
| is very inhuman.
| faeyanpiraat wrote:
| I had the same feeling, and I assume they evoked this feeling
| intentionally trough the lighting, camera movement, etc...
| daenz wrote:
| I felt the same way, but I think it might be because of the
| context that we're used to seeing advanced robots. Currently,
| that context is video games and movies, where we know they're
| fake. In a sense, we're conditioned to see this kind of tech
| and expect that it is done with CGI, so it makes unbelievable
| when we see it done for real.
| [deleted]
| djohnston wrote:
| This is really really impressive. I remember being blown away a
| few years ago watching one of these things jump over some
| obstacles while plugged into a wall for power. Remarkable
| progress.
| elsonrodriguez wrote:
| This is a great commercial for basic income.
| meowster wrote:
| It's a mashup of clips taken at different times (engineer in the
| background, no engineer, engineer in the same apot again, etc).
|
| The balancing of the first bipedal robot doesn't seem right to my
| _human_ eyes, but I think it 's conceivable that computers
| controling a robot could manage it. Also, the dual bipedal robots
| aren't perfectly in-sync which is either very good cgi, or it's
| real.
| indigochill wrote:
| Although I believe it's real (this is Boston Dynamics, after
| all), CGI characters dancing slightly out-of-sync could be
| achieved naturally if you motion-captured actors performing the
| dance.
| JshWright wrote:
| Are you talking about the cuts that start around 1:50? I think
| it's pretty obvious those are different takes (there are
| different robots in different positions instantaneously, I
| don't think anyone would expect that to be physically
| possible). The same thing is frequently done with human
| performers as well.
|
| There's no way Boston Dynamics would publish a hyper-realistic
| fake (setting aside how much effort that would be). It would be
| very damaging to their brand.
| [deleted]
| unwoundmouse wrote:
| Jesus y'all are so cynical, commenting on how these are war bots
| and gonna automate everything away, I just think it's an
| engineering marvel that these insanely complex robotic maneuvers
| can be done so fluidly now
| jnurmine wrote:
| I was born cynical and I'm proud of it, so apologies to Boston
| Dynamics and others, but these things will absolutely be used
| as war bots and automation surrogates once the time is ripe.
|
| Even so, yes, these robots are truly engineering marvels and I
| wholeheartedly applaud the team for their hard work!
|
| I just think that squinting the eyes slightly past the "search
| and rescue", the war applications of this kind of technology
| are obvious: the Atlas could do perimeter guard duty even in a
| muddy, slightly sloped or otherwise difficult terrain, but it
| could also form hunt and kill squads who need no rest, whereas
| the hunted person or persons presumably would.
|
| As for automation, it will certainly happen too: the Atlas is
| humanoid-shaped and once it matures to be more independent and
| capable with environmental manipulation, it could easily
| function as plug-and-play automation for many tasks currently
| requiring a human. Pick berries or fruits, do gardening,
| deliver things like mail/pizza, and so on.
| miraculixx wrote:
| Yea, it's very impressive engineering. However there is no
| intelligence in these machines. It's a clever combination of
| hard- and software. Takes human intelligence to build it.
|
| Bottom line. Machines. Not Intelligent.
| djohnston wrote:
| Yeah I think that's always been the appeal of BD, they are
| bleeding edge in terms of mechanics / robotics. The brains
| are being developed by entirely different companies, but
| eventually they'll meet one another.
| nxc18 wrote:
| Yeah, nothing to be afraid of, for sure.
|
| https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GM3GM299orc
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Yeah, that was our first thought as well.
|
| And then....
|
| ;-)
| lkbm wrote:
| Automating everything away isn't cynicism. It's what some of us
| want.
| viraptor wrote:
| It can be an engineering marvel and practically useless in the
| industry at the same time. I do love the dancing though. And
| the fact they actually went for boogie-like steps and a
| choreography rather than a more technical presentation.
| dougmwne wrote:
| Yeah, but can you really blame us? As incredible as this is
| from a technical perspective, it rings immediate alarm bells
| about the future of war. These have speed and agility and can
| reasonably go anywhere a person could go. And YouTube
| entertainment aside, what really is the use case of athletic
| robots outside of warfare? It's not much of a leap to attach a
| gun and connect to a remote human operator. Now you can wage
| both air wars and ground wars without domestic political
| consequences.
| [deleted]
| at_a_remove wrote:
| Ah, so now when someone suggests "Can't we just drone this guy?"
| I can at least look forward to a bunch of robots performing the
| (admittedly great) synchronized dance scene from Michael C.
| Hall's _Gamer_ before executing me.
|
| I suppose it isn't a bad way to go.
| 6gvONxR4sf7o wrote:
| So what's the main barrier to using these industrially?
|
| Is it reliability? Did this video a zillion takes?
|
| Is it manufacturing? Maybe it's hard to scale them up?
|
| Is it battery life? Maybe it can power itself for just a few
| minutes?
|
| Is it object manipulation or sensing/world understanding? Maybe
| it can't apply the right forces to a soft thing or a flexible
| thing or know what it can step on vs over or what will move or
| stay still?
|
| Is it just that anything worth automating is worth specializing,
| and there are better robots for different specific tasks?
|
| We've seen industrial robots for a while now, and these more
| general robots have gotten really good, so where are they?
| spelunker wrote:
| Isn't the big wheeled robot used in some warehouses today?
| Maybe I just remember watching another BD marketing video about
| it...
| andi999 wrote:
| Who needs dancing robots? What I mean this video does not show
| that useful work has been implemented. Probably flexibility of
| tasks might be a problem. Or there is no problem and we see
| rollout in the next few years.
| dbcurtis wrote:
| It shows that they can fuse IMU and other sensor data and
| feed it to a trajectory-optimization system and get actuation
| torques meeting realtime contraints sufficiently quickly to
| not fall over. Bonus points for smooth motion.
|
| Check out MIT's Underactuated Robotics class taught by
| Tedrake. Spring 2018 is all on Youtube, I believe. A Raibert
| Hopper simulation is one of the first homework sets. Post a
| link to tbe video of your solution.
| twelve40 wrote:
| as with many things, probably the cost
| kordlessagain wrote:
| > So what's the main barrier to using these industrially?
|
| Battery technology.
| lucideer wrote:
| Is it cost?
| [deleted]
| mabbo wrote:
| > So what's the main barrier to using these industrially?
|
| In an industrial setting, a purpose-built robot will outdo
| these robots, or a human, at nearly all tasks. And whatever
| these things are doing, likely a human can do it better with a
| little bit of training- that's low capital cost compared to
| these robots.
|
| Carrying things around? Conveyor belts. Picking things up?
| Robot arms. Going up and down stairs? Elevators and/or conveyor
| belts. If your aim is to make money, a general purpose robot is
| rarely the best choice.
|
| The only real purpose I can see for these things is being able
| to travel quickly in rough terrain. Military applications,
| basically. Just picture a small army of these robots, armed
| with tasers, chasing you through the woods. While dancing.
| viraptor wrote:
| And a new edition of robot wars. We deserve to see the human-
| like robots doing realistic sword fights.
| bengale wrote:
| I can imagine one of these hopping out the back of the self
| driving Amazon van to drop my parcel off when the price makes
| sense.
| thewarrior wrote:
| A human in India or China can be had for a couple of hundred
| dollars a month. These robots probably cost hundreds of
| thousands of dollars to buy and maintain. And they aren't as
| adaptable.
| RivieraKid wrote:
| Repetitive physical tasks can usually be done with existing
| machinery and industrial robots. To do anything more complex
| than that, i.e. non-repetitive tasks, even if they could do it
| physically, they lack the required brain power. They don't
| follow verbal instructions except very basic ones.
| thysultan wrote:
| battery
| joe_the_user wrote:
| I'm not sure what you mean by "industrially".
|
| In actual factories, which are highly controlled environments,
| the things called robots are much simpler and more specialized.
| So you're _" Is it just that anything worth automating is worth
| specializing, and there are better robots for different
| specific tasks?"_ point is more or less it.
|
| But also consider, while these bipedal, quadrupedal and wheeled
| robots can do all sorts of these in isolation, their ability to
| accomplish things autonomously in the chaotic, unstructured
| world outside the factory is little-to-none, accent on none.
| The Darpa Robitics challenge was essentially considered a
| failure, all entrant _failed_. Most could not do the "walk to
| a door and open it" challenge.
|
| Similarly, Boston Dynamics sells their "big dog" walking robot
| to the military but it is seldom if ever deployed. It's strong
| and faster than a horse with basically the use case as a pack
| horse. But well trained pack horse won't injure if you get in
| front of it and will walk along with the troops on it's own
| without a guy with joy stick directing it. And the Big Dog
| needs constant direction.
|
| Basically, robots don't have even the "animal intelligence"
| needed for real world activity.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_Robotics_Challenge
| drannex wrote:
| > And the Big Dog needs constant direction.
|
| And the Big Dog requires a lot of technical experts
| surrounding it at all times, an energy production system, and
| if it falls over or gets stuck it will be harder for one or
| two people to get it back to orientation.
| bumby wrote:
| Have they made a useful quiet version of Big Dog? I know
| that's one reason it was initial not very pragmatic for the
| military
| aazaa wrote:
| This is awesome in the older, atomic bomb sense of the word. It
| could turn out wonderful or horrible.
|
| The way this breaks has everything to do with the lessons people
| have drawn from past mistakes with technology. It's an unsettling
| thought.
| f6v wrote:
| It's hard to shake of the feeling that those aren't rendered.
| However, it's also kind of sad that this amazing technology goes
| from one owner to another without a clear push into the real
| world.
| whoisjuan wrote:
| Seems to be a capital intensive business with no clear path to
| commercialization.
|
| The robots developed by ABB, KUKA, Mitsubishi and similars are
| very different to what Boston Dynamics is trying to build.
|
| These are impressive robots but their utilitarian value is too
| low. An industrial robot by ABB with a clear use case in a
| manufacturing process costs like $80k. An impressive toy robot
| with no clear use case like Boston Dynamics' Spot also costs
| $80k.
|
| If these robots had a clear use case besides carrying heavy
| stuff, BD valuation would be 5X or 10X their current valuation.
|
| Of course the real value would be to use their research and
| know-how on these type of high-mobility/low foot-footprint
| robotics into actual industrial settings and use cases.
|
| Google didn't have any internal use case for this tech and
| commercializing the technology as a vendor is way out of their
| competence and probably not enough value there to justify extra
| investment in sales, supply chain, etc.
|
| SoftBank was just doing what it has been doing for the last
| decade which is investing in shiny things.
|
| Hyundai may be the first owner to actually have a clear use
| case for this tech.
| abootstrapper wrote:
| Oof. I don't know how sad it is. Slap some guns on them and
| they'll start selling. I kind of hope they stick to dancing and
| novelty tricks.
| [deleted]
| belval wrote:
| Bipedal robots aren't a great match for battlefield
| situations because they lack the ability to do proper
| decision making and are very expensive.
|
| The dogs might be more usable, but even then modern conflicts
| are not really based on ground war. I don't think those have
| any significant value over a an actual drone.
|
| Now a fleet of tiny quad-motor drones with a few bullets?
| That could work in high-density urban environment an quickly
| render guerilla warfare impossible. This project comes to
| mind: https://www.darpa.mil/program/offensive-swarm-enabled-
| tactic...
| imtringued wrote:
| It would be far more effective to just add machine guns to
| UAVs like they do on the Apache [0]. It's simple, proven
| and effective. There is absolutely zero need for the
| bullets to be delivered by a crappy quadrocopter. You can
| send out quadrocopters for face detection and then just
| shoot people with the machine gun. This reminds me of that
| stupid missile that shoots blades. It's completely over
| engineered.
|
| [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=629&v=vMylpfX7_S0
| rolph wrote:
| highly surgical strikes such as selecting one individual
| primary target in a room full of collateral, secondary
| targets
| lostlogin wrote:
| > Bipedal robots aren't a great match for battlefield
| situations because they lack the ability to do proper
| decision making and are very expensive.
|
| Depressingly accurate. Poor kids are far cheaper.
| imtringued wrote:
| Is this supposed to be some kind of joke? Humans have guns
| too and they are far faster and better marksmen than a
| bipedal robot.
| 29athrowaway wrote:
| Powerful people of the wrong kind will love robots. Robots are
| loyal and will never say no, will never question orders, they can
| forget anything at anytime. And they can be implemented in a way
| so that they cannot feel pain or remorse, they cannot be
| interrogated, cannot serve as reliable witnesses, etc. Shit will
| happen and it will be noone's fault.
|
| They do not have a DNA, they do not have a face or an accent,
| they can technically come from anywhere in the world and be owned
| by anyone or noone.
|
| Will we be ruled by tyrants backed by robotic armed forces? will
| people be harassed by throwaway robotic private investigators or
| hitmen? I can see many ways in which this can end up poorly.
|
| There are many potential constructive uses for robots too, of
| course... but people in power love control, and I would expect
| robots to be used to implement control related stuff first,
| before they get put to work to the service of society. Just like
| everything else...
| jdkee wrote:
| https://twitter.com/GreatDismal/status/751475650439966722/ph...
| [deleted]
| gene-h wrote:
| Looks like Atlas may have had an accident during filming, there's
| a hydraulic fluid stain on the floor:
| https://youtu.be/fn3KWM1kuAw?t=163
|
| And it must also be said that these are preprogrammed maneuvers
| on a closed course...
| tinco wrote:
| The poses are programmed, but the balance can't be. At least..
| if they would be that would be a significant achievement as
| well I think. So the robots have target poses they should
| approximate, but how to get there, and without falling over,
| that's seriously impressive.
| dbcurtis wrote:
| Exactly right. SOTA is to continuously solve a trajectory
| optimization problem in realtime. Probably at a rate of a
| fews 10's of milliseconds per solution.
| AareyBaba wrote:
| What is SOTA ?
| legolas2412 wrote:
| State of the art
| PeterisP wrote:
| state of the art
| [deleted]
| rhn_mk1 wrote:
| I just wonder to what extent this is pre-programmed. Surely the
| engineers gave some sort of high level description, and let the
| robots figure out the rest. Also, it's probably not possible to
| acount for all the variability of the environment beforehand,
| so the "recording" played back does not contain every move to
| the last detail.
| dbcurtis wrote:
| They would have specified target trajectories. Then a solver
| tries to make that happen.
| dbcurtis wrote:
| Now that I think about it, all the robots have
| _synchronized_ trajectories. There has to be some kind of
| time sync among the robots also.
| kasperni wrote:
| > there's a hydraulic fluid stain on the floor:
|
| The robot equivalent of performance anxiety.
| high_byte wrote:
| luckily it doesn't wear pants, that could've been
| embarrassing
| dvirsky wrote:
| There's a point where you can actually see the robot dripping
| fluid.
| ruslan wrote:
| It's the right time to leave this planet.
|
| PS: One of the robots seems leaking hydraulic fluid.
| maddyboo wrote:
| This gave me the warm fuzzies and I'm not sure how I feel about
| that.
|
| If I already feel a twinge of empathy for some soulless robots,
| where are we going to be a few years down the road when this
| phenomenon is more actively exploited?
| poteznykrolik wrote:
| this would be the year i see the machines that will be deployed
| (time, please prove me wrong) to killing people doing a dance to
| a favored boomer hit.
| poteznykrolik wrote:
| *and this would be the place to listen to you hapless nerds
| speculate about animation and the varied aspects of video
| fakery involved. These things just mean doom to me.
| 11thEarlOfMar wrote:
| First reaction: It's official. I am very afraid.
|
| Second reaction: When's the OK Go video released?
|
| Third reaction: They paid Boston Dynamics engineers to do _this_?
| beambot wrote:
| Up until recently with the sale of Spot robots, YouTube videos
| were Boston Dynamics' main product.
| f6v wrote:
| I kind of wish there was a reason to be afraid, but I don't
| think AI is anywhere near that.
| cameronh90 wrote:
| We don't need to have full AI to have "death bots".
| f6v wrote:
| Do you have a source for that? I'm genuinely interested
| what kind of AI can act 100% autonomously on the
| battlefield.
| serf wrote:
| > Do you have a source for that? I'm genuinely interested
| what kind of AI can act 100% autonomously on the
| battlefield.
|
| The various military groups around the world have been
| using semi-autonomy in warfare for decades; you don't
| need 100% generalizable autonomy.
|
| Plenty of missiles in the past worked just fine with
| little more than silhouette matching and 1 bit cameras.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| Why limit to the battlefield? NYPD deployed a BD robot in
| the field 2 months ago:
| https://nypost.com/2020/10/29/nypd-deploys-robot-dog-
| after-b...
|
| So far they have only bee used to look rather than touch,
| but I predict that will change quickly, within the next
| year or two.
| hnaccy wrote:
| The Dallas police used a police robot to blow up a
| suspect with C4.
| high_byte wrote:
| I think he meant something of the sort of exploding
| drones are deadly and don't require that level of AI. and
| I guess if one of these bots ran towards you, you
| wouldn't be reluctant to dance with it, while it
| inconspicuously arms it's self-destruct mechanism. the
| future is here! STILL NO FLYING CARS.
| agency wrote:
| Why would these things need to be fully autonomous to be
| scary? The fact that there might be a human operator in
| the loop would be cold comfort with one of these things
| hauling ass towards me...
| arrosenberg wrote:
| Wouldn't you be able to stop it with a foil blanket in
| that case? A lack of autonomy would mean any kind of
| faraday cage would make it a paperweight.
| imtringued wrote:
| That makes no sense. I would be more worried about it
| failing like a self driving car would. A malfunctioning
| robot could set your house on fire through an electrical
| short even if it is 100% trustworthy and harmless to
| humans.
|
| Once I am scared of humans wanting to kill me why would I
| care if a robot with human like intelligence wants to
| kill me? It's the same thing at that point.
| sterlind wrote:
| It pushes the ultimate decision higher up the chain of
| command, for one.
|
| If a general orders a platoon of soldiers to commit a war
| crime, the soldiers still ultimately have to decide
| whether to pull the trigger. There's conscience and self-
| preservation at play. The robots don't have second
| thoughts.
| [deleted]
| rement wrote:
| Relevant https://xkcd.com/1968/
| blackrock wrote:
| You don't need true AI to make this thing deadly or
| oppressive.
|
| You don't need an AI that ponders the meaning of life for
| you.
|
| You just need a smart Decision and Control System (DCS).
|
| Paired with additional technology for facial and gait
| recognition, obstacle avoidance, path planning, and you have
| all the hallmarks of a rudimentary hunter-killer bot.
|
| What Boston Dynamics cracked here, is the physical control
| mechanism to allow these robots to live in our world.
|
| Next, they need to build the brains, to allow this machine to
| move independently and autonomously.
| rolph wrote:
| right here:
|
| https://www.healthline.com/health-news/doctors-reanimated-
| pi...
| [deleted]
| one2know wrote:
| Why would anyone be afraid of these? You should be afraid of
| stealth drones three miles up with air to ground missiles. They
| are unstoppable without electronic countermeasures.
| meowkit wrote:
| Its a bit harder to control how much collateral damage occurs
| with A2G missiles. Put a rifle on a humanoid robot or small
| explosive on a drone like in Slaughterbots and that's much
| more terrifying.
| bozzcl wrote:
| I love how there were people in the upper floor just walking by
| without even looking. "Oh, the robots are dancing again."
|
| In between the advances in "holographic" displays (not quite as
| sci-fi as we would want, but they are progressing), commercial
| space flight, cybernetic prosthetics, CRISPR and this... we are
| living in the future. It's amazing.
|
| It makes me a little sad more people are not aware of the
| ridiculously cool technical advancements going on lately. Many of
| my relatives and friends in my home country haven't even heard
| about any of these. They're not mentioned in the news or
| magazines whatsoever. Granted, they probably don't have any use
| for this information for their daily lives... but I do believe
| learning about this keeps alive my sense of childlike wonder, and
| it's sad to know others are missing out.
| phcordner wrote:
| I think it's more the fact that these robots were not developed
| using billions of dollars from the DoD to do a cute dance and
| inspire wonder.
| joe_the_user wrote:
| My sister used live next to the Boston Dynamics facility in
| Waltham. She'd walk her on the nearby river path and generally
| disliked the way Boston Dynamics would periodically take over
| the path and keep her from using.
|
| Part of the reason the robots evoke little excitement is
| because after a short look, you can realize they're just large
| puppets. We've had dancing puppets like Walt Disney's Small
| World. The reason Boston Dynamics takes over paths and shows
| robots dancing with each other is their robots still generally
| can't interact with humans or the environment in an
| unstructured way. Unstructured, "soft" interaction seem pretty
| easy to us but might actually close to "AI complete" in their
| potential complexity.
|
| _In between the advances in "holographic" displays (not quite
| as sci-fi as we would want, but they are progressing),
| commercial space flight, cybernetic prosthetics, CRISPR and
| this... we are living in the future. It's amazing._
|
| I think your list illustrates how there's a wide variation
| among technologies in the time from demonstration to
| implementation. I watched radio controlled boats go around
| lakes in 1970s. Hobby drones are just now becoming useful,
| forty years later. Jet packs have been around for a long time
| but you still can't use them without serious safety precautions
| and they still aren't a way people would commute.
| serf wrote:
| >Part of the reason the robots evoke little excitement is
| because after a short look, you can realize they're just
| large puppets.
|
| I think it's more like the Feynman example of how a scientist
| may look at a flower.
|
| A person may see a full-size puppet when they see a
| choreographed robot, but all I can think about is how
| complicated the mechanisms -- software and hardware -- must
| be in order to dynamically balance a robot while maintaining
| whatever timing is called out for the choreography work; and
| the person-hours that such work must have consumed.
| tachyonbeam wrote:
| It could also just be that it took 100 takes to shoot this
| little video. You might stop to watch the first 10 times, but
| the third day, it's become routine.
| reportingsjr wrote:
| > you can realize they're just large puppets. We've had
| dancing puppets like Walt Disney's Small World.
|
| This is hugely understating just how difficult it is for a
| biped/quadruped robot to move around in the world without
| continuously falling, getting stuck, etc. Like seriously,
| seriously underestimates it.
|
| Watch this video to see spot walk over some terrain that even
| people struggle with:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7s1sr4JdlI
|
| Doing it without a tether for a reasonable timeframe (30+
| minutes) is insane! Disney animatronics don't even come close
| to the complexity of these robots (even though what Disney
| has done is for sure impressive).
|
| > robots still generally can't interact with humans or the
| environment in an unstructured way.
|
| I think this is pretty short sighted, and you're going to
| have your mind changed quite rapidly in the next couple of
| years. This style of robot has definitely hit a threshold of
| price and usefulness, not unlike what happened for drones
| just ten years ago.
|
| I could be wrong, but I hope I'm not! It really feels like
| things are moving at a crazy speed in the robotics field
| right now.
| gfodor wrote:
| A perfect puppet is a necessary but insufficient condition
| for creating the magical robots we were promised as kids. So
| it's progress.
| [deleted]
| spir wrote:
| The humanoid robots are so agile. It's incredible. Going to start
| saving up for my Google Deep Mind Boston Dynamics personal home
| assistant.
| zeristor wrote:
| What happened to units HDI-1, and HDI-2?
|
| Have they escaped and gone rogue, or are they just sat on the
| naughty step?
| neilpanchal wrote:
| I am a huge fan of spartan-like no-bullshit brutalist approach
| towards their marketing/PR: - No studio setup,
| just their lab - No artificial lighting - No fucks
| given about hiding the mess - Robots going through surgery
| in the background - Song is classy af IMO - Can see
| the camera man - Can see the engineers/employees -
| Framing/cinematography isn't as polished (this is a feature, not
| a bug) - Chipped paint, beaten up fairings
|
| Generally, I love BD Branding/Marketing/PR: -
| Logo is on point. It's Da Vinci level stuff. Humanist It
| is totally opposite of what they build, such an amazing contrast
| and deeply thought out [1] - One or two videos per year
| - No twitter drama like a lot of SV companies (Hey, Elon) -
| No excessive trying to get their word out. Their products speak
| for themselves - No purple/gradient bullshit and design
| trends - Their job descriptions actually make sense of what
| they need from you - Their CEO, Marc Raibert, exudes
| wisdom, calm and has a persona of composure (seriously, watch his
| interviews) [2] - No AI hype
|
| Literally the opposite of Silicon Valley. May be I've had too
| much coffee and making lofty generalizations, but this is what I
| see! I also see the DNA of East coast/MIT/Boston rigor vs Silicon
| Valley cowboys - thoughts? :-) I live and work in SV btw.
|
| I can't get over how amazing this video is. I hope it takes over
| the top spot on Youtube. It's got everything - music/tech/memes.
| The people behind BD marketing are geniuses IMO, although
| building an explosively-cool tech that appeals to all humans
| helps a lot. Outstanding.
|
| [1] https://www.bostondynamics.com/
|
| [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiNSPRKHyvo
| lacker wrote:
| It's a cool ad, but it doesn't seem to be "spartan / brutalist"
| marketing to me. The point of the ad is to show you how their
| technology makes robots dance. But, clearly their real product
| isn't just dancing robots. They put a lot of work into making
| this functionality, and all that work is just for marketing!
|
| To me, a real spartan approach to marketing is spending very
| little money on marketing, and just focusing on your product.
| That seems like the opposite of what Boston Dynamic is doing,
| because they put so much work specifically into creating these
| PR/marketing videos. Many of their robot models don't seem to
| exist for actual products, they just exist for marketing.
| cududa wrote:
| I don't think you properly understand "spartan"/ brutalist.
| The video is using the materials in their most outrageous but
| possible form to demonstrate their flexibility, and executed
| in an imposing way. How's that not brutalist?
| neilpanchal wrote:
| One thing that's different is that BD doesn't have the
| pressure to sell to the masses, and they've been traded off
| from one giant to another (Google, Softbank and now Hyundai).
| I think they can afford to be spartan and truthful, I suspect
| a lot of big-corp marketing is based on metrics and data
| which drives you to doing unspartan things. My guess anyways,
| perhaps others can shed light.
| avmich wrote:
| > Many of their robot models don't seem to exist for actual
| products, they just exist for marketing.
|
| Wow :) I was under impression that, while Atlas is a flagship
| model with broad purposes, the other two are rather optimized
| transporting (and some other miscellaneous functions) robots,
| for specific applications.
|
| Why do you think they couldn't find use as products?
| high_byte wrote:
| I think most of their robots are more research than
| product, except maybe most recent models like spot. It's
| first and foremost an amazing engineering for the sake of
| engineering.
| 2muchcoffeeman wrote:
| BD is basic research. Figuring out what can be done and
| what the potential applications are. I'm surprised BD has
| gone through so many sales. Whoever owns them in the end
| is going to make a ton of money I reckon.
| Kiro wrote:
| > I hope it takes over the top spot on Youtube.
|
| It won't because for non-techies it's just a random video
| without any significance. I tried showing it to my girlfriend
| twice and she was extremely unimpressed and uninterested.
| high_byte wrote:
| Sorry for your failed relationship and also I disagree
| because their backflip video was a hit.
| skinkestek wrote:
| Just forwarded it to my wife, my daughters, my brothers and
| brothers in law.
|
| My guess is a few of them will like it.
| Nicksil wrote:
| > It won't because for non-techies it's just a random video
| without any significance.
|
| What a bizarre thing to say. Surely "non-techies" are able to
| extract some value from the video.
|
| > I tried showing it to my girlfriend twice and she was
| extremely unimpressed and uninterested.
|
| Oh, well, if your girlfriend was unimpressed and
| uninterested, we'll just extrapolate from that and presume
| the same for everyone else (at least everyone else's
| girlfriend).
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| It's all very cool looking.
|
| However when I watched this video my first thought was "my god
| they're going to bring the drone wars to the ground." I am a
| robotics engineer and have been focused on robotics my whole
| life. I worked at Google X on a robotics team with some great
| ex-Boston Dynamics people, and some of my friends have since
| gone to work for them.
|
| So I do understand what they have achieved. It's fantastic from
| a technological perspective. And I know they have non military
| funders now. There's a great many labor applications for
| machines like this if they can sell them for under half a
| million dollars and get them to do real work. I understand all
| that.
|
| But I fear that if the US military orders some, the company
| would happily oblige. Maybe they've committed to only peaceful
| non military use. But these extremely agile and capable
| machines to me seem like some military strategists dream come
| true. So when I watch all of this achievement from a company
| that for so long survived off of military funding, I am deeply
| saddened by the implications.
|
| Delivery robots and warehouse workers would be great. But these
| seem like in ten or 20 years time they'll be another extension
| of the US global killing machine. I dream of a world where we
| can use robotics to make the world better, and the potential
| military use here leaves me uneasy. I cannot celebrate what I
| fear will be the dawn of ever more inhuman military conflict.
| fermienrico wrote:
| It's weird to pick one point in the abstraction chain of
| human technological progress and create a threshold of
| unethical behavior.
|
| Technological progress will gaurantee this scenario of
| military use. If not BD, it will be another company. If not
| now, it will. If not the US, it will be someone else - China,
| Russia, etc.
|
| I don't see anypoint in feeling sad about just some geeks
| making robots as much as we didn't become sad when we saw the
| transistor being invented. The future is in our hands and
| tech has always been at the center of military warfare. Focus
| should be on government policy, electing good leaders and
| engaging in diplomacy over warfare.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| I think it's important to talk about the concerns related
| to military robots well before they reach deployment so the
| public is primed to criticize leaders who would claim their
| use will be justified. When should we talk about it if not
| on the release of amazing new capabilities sure to catch
| the eye of military officials?
| newsbinator wrote:
| This was my first thought as well. Watching them dance, I was
| thinking, non-jokingly "if they can do this now, what happens
| when these robots are dancing faster than the human eye can
| see?"
| kostarelo wrote:
| It doesn't look like they're marketing their brand to me, more
| like they're having fun.
| [deleted]
| high_byte wrote:
| Thank you very much, love this comment. Watching Marc right
| now!
| platelets2020 wrote:
| Impressive rant, but you realize this ad is CGI right? The
| opposite of everything you're praising.
|
| Or do you believe the cars in car ads are real too?
|
| [0] https://www.businessinsider.com/cinematographer-reveals-
| one-...
| neilpanchal wrote:
| This is the best compliment for BD.
| avmich wrote:
| Yeah, flattering and also annoying and sad. Marvin (HHGG)
| definitely had a point, we might see that rather soon.
| gamblor956 wrote:
| You understand that CGI is only used for the very high end
| cars?
|
| That comes from the article you cited...
| cma wrote:
| They had pretty heavy studio lighting in this:
|
| https://youtu.be/wlkCQXHEgjA
| platelets2020 wrote:
| Heavy study lighting? That's very clearly CGI.
|
| I bet you believe all the vehicles racing around in
| automobile TV ads are real too.
| gamblor956 wrote:
| They are real cars. You can watch them filming those
| commercials all the time in LA.
| [deleted]
| kortilla wrote:
| All of this is trivially explained by the fact that they are
| not a consumer oriented company so they don't have to sell
| hype. Their customers aren't average people chasing trends and
| reading Twitter. Nearly every b2b business markets in a similar
| way.
|
| When you're competing in a vicious field for consumer mindshare
| it leads to the marketing and self aggrandizing because you're
| literally trying to capture the attention of stupid people.
| neilpanchal wrote:
| 100%. Metrics/data driven marketing for the masses leads to a
| lot of unspartan marketing. I can think of few brutalist
| marketing/branding - Berkshire Hathaway
| (https://www.berkshirehathaway.com/) is one, although their
| product is abstract - financial services. Any others you can
| cite?
|
| Edit: MIT branding is pretty cool too: https://web.mit.edu/
| and always have been, although this is B2C.
| high_byte wrote:
| And maybe even more because they didn't even have customers
| at all until recently. In fact nobody wanted to even buy
| their business. Who's laughing now? (probably the robots)
| abraxas wrote:
| Modeled after every drunk uncle at a Polish wedding.
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