Robots Are Hard To Make, Apparently, But That's Probably Fine.

Where Are All the Robots?

It feels like in every sci-fi movie, by now, we should all have a robot. Maybe not a giant robot, necessarily, but… something, right? A helper? A friend? Something that does the dishes?

Well, it turns out building robots isn’t as easy as the movies make it look. I was talking to a few people down at the tech expo last week, and honestly, it’s… complicated.

Everyone thought robots would be everywhere by now. The idea was they’d take over jobs, make everything cheaper, more efficient. But a lot of companies trying to make those robots are finding it tough to actually make a profit. It's not enough to just save on wages, apparently. Businesses want to see a clear improvement to their overall earnings, and that's proving tricky with robots.

And it’s not just about money. These robots need to learn, and that takes a lot of information. Like, a lot. Especially if they’re going to be moving around in the real world, not just on an assembly line. Apparently, most robots are trained using videos – which are two-dimensional – and then expected to navigate a three-dimensional space. That’s… confusing for them. They need to understand the world like we do, and that’s a big hurdle.

What I gathered is that trying to make a robot that can do everything is just… really, really hard. So, instead of trying to build a do-it-all bot, a lot of companies are focusing on one specific task. Something repetitive, something they can really nail in a controlled environment. That seems to be working better.

There are still some pretty big technological problems, too. Even with all the improvements in computers and artificial intelligence, building a robot that can handle unexpected situations is still a huge challenge.

It sounds like there are two main paths forward. Some folks are taking a “pragmatic” approach, focusing on solving specific problems with robots right now that can actually make money. Others are still aiming for the really advanced, general-purpose robots, but they admit that’s probably still 5 to 10 years – or even longer – away.

So, no, we don't have robots doing our laundry yet. It’s not that it’s impossible, just… a work in progress. And honestly? That’s probably okay. I'm still a little relieved. I mean, who would fix them when they break?