doesnt amazon have already have like 200k of those roomba like robots in their warehouses already working by moving packages and stuff? Its not like we are far off as some people are making it out to be here (when speaking of an automated future)
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I actually think figuring out a way for them to give these robots two of those arms would go a really long way to making them effective at dealing with a lot of different kinds of packages.
Actually, we get to find out if unionization is happening... literally today:
Contentious Union Vote at Amazon Heads to a Count (Published 2021)
The outcome of a vote at a warehouse in Alabama could have far-ranging implications for both the company and the labor movement.
Actually, we get to find out if unionization is happening... literally today:
Contentious Union Vote at Amazon Heads to a Count (Published 2021)
The outcome of a vote at a warehouse in Alabama could have far-ranging implications for both the company and the labor movement.www.nytimes.com
But will Amazon recognize it? They're so petty that I bet they'll shut down the warehouse before accepting the union.
I agree this feels like an attempt to replicate how a human would do the work and not really optimize the process.
We're a very long way away from being able to do that. The picking process has been fully automated, but unloading, loading, and boxing are still a long ways off from being perfected. These look like a big step towards addressing unloading material and even then there are still a lot of big caveats involved and that's just one step.
I mean, even if they do, there will be fewer jobs, and those becoming the jobs doesn't do much for people who aren't highly enough skilled to do them.
Just wait until the robots are doing the stacking!
Seriously though, we're almost at a point where autonomous vehicles are able to drive in real world conditions. That's hard mode. After that, teaching what is ultimately an autonomous forklift to move around a controlled warehouse is not nearly as challenging.
As someone who's had to unload trucks for the past 10 or so years I'm pumped for this. Human loaded trucks at my company are often so poorly stacked it's dangerous to unload them, having a robot do it would massively boost morale (and we can't find enough people to do truck shifts anyways, so it's not like people on our end would lose jobs over it).
I've seen too many injuries due to poor truck stacking, I welcome our new robot overlords.
I've seen too many injuries due to poor truck stacking, I welcome our new robot overlords.
Great solution:
So for you the future of humanity lies on corporations making enough profit to pay for UBI. So a corporatocracy.
Yes, let's create an incentive to favor human labor. Let's go back to the beginning of the industrial revolution where humans were cogs.
Just imagine if it just randomly grabs a person's head and snaps their neck, or slings them into a wall, or drops them off a ledge. Thing looks dangerous.
Indeed. The Ocado (UK online supermarket) system looked more impressive to me. This still feels very inefficient.
You don't really have a lot of options for taking products that ride on conveyors out of a trailer.
Those boxes are floor stacked, meaning they aren't on pallets in the trailers. So as you can see this bot doesn't cover a lot of conditions, and there are more conditions to think about.
That sounds like a problem of standard sizes and packaging techniques (even at the truck level). I'm sure Amazon can force their suppliers to comply via incentives or whatever. Or get rid of boxing as a whole at some points in the chain.
That looks cool.Indeed. The Ocado (UK online supermarket) system looked more impressive to me. This still feels very inefficient.
Haha. You think rich people will allow that? We will probably just wind up having massive unemployment / underemployment / poverty on a scale never seen before and governance will trend towards cyberpunk techno-fascist police/surveillance State.
My hope is eventually this problem when it arrives leads society towards the government using tax dollars for more government jobs instead of outsourcing them for for profit corporations and fill sectors that are undermanned, guaranteed income and other benefits.
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These are addressing completely different parts of the process. Amazon largely already has this part covered with their Kiva robots that carry shelves to their pickers. Loading the robots with all of the products in Ocado's system is still done by hand which robots like Stretch could address.Indeed. The Ocado (UK online supermarket) system looked more impressive to me. This still feels very inefficient.
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Most every piece of warehouse box/pallet moving equipment could easily maim or kill you in a split second. I've seen a forklift leave a 6 inch deep gouge in a solid concrete wall after the driver lost control for less than a second. Just imagine that was a human torso.
Seems to me like reacting to knocking stuff over would be like the first eventuality they would program their AI for (and the first thing Amazon would test them for before buying).
Anyway, as others have said in this thread, the one thing we should worry about is pressing for UBI before all menial jobs are eliminated through automation.
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Indeed. The Ocado (UK online supermarket) system looked more impressive to me. This still feels very inefficient.
Except the robot is handling a very different aspect of the logistics chain than what's depicted in this gif.
Technology always advances, though, and a proof of concept is likely to draw in a lot of investors. We probably aren't that far off fully automated warehouses and how long after that will we have fully automated cars?
Might not be that long before Amazon literally has a van drive to your house, ask for your details and unlock your package without a single human involved in packing, moving or delivering your order.
Those types of suction lifts can pick up hundreds of pounds without a sweat. They are already being used in other industrial platforms. Now they are attached to autonomous robots.
Imagine going back in time and telling the first humans that eventually they will be replaced by robots....made by humans.
That is a cool robot, since it's a prototype I would imagine it gets smarter and can do so much more as BD develops it more over time. I would trust that thing with lighter boxes. Still gonna need humans when unexpected stuff happens in the factory but nevertheless that is good thing.
You act like we don't already live in a corporatocracy lol.
And I fail to see how taxing corporations and using that money for public social safety nets is giving these companies any sort of political power. This is nonsensical.
Make these corporations pay their fair share. And use that to fund UBI. It's what needs to happen.
Sure you can do that, but don't expect that to cover all needed costs. Otherwise, this just becomes an excuse to limit UBI and cut spending under the lie that "we don't have enough money to pay for it".
The robots bring the conveyor to the edge of the truck. Why not have the conveyor with a picker on it. Drive the conveyor onto the truck and pluck and dump in one move. They didn't rethink anything just move like a person would.
Don't get me wrong it is impressive and these would be easier to adapt to more places, but it is inefficient automation at best.
That's one of the problems with receiving out of trailers, there aren't a lot of options for what you can do if it means a human/robot entering the trailer from the dock like that. The best processes I've seen have an automated conveyor that can go very deep into the trailer, and people sling product on it. If there are pallets the human handles them, and if there is product that can't go on the conveyor they get it out the trailer with equipment. Product doesn't come so perfectly that you can grab whole surfaces at a time, and it's not like you can just dump trailers where the robot sorts the product to make the process faster.
Cool.
It would be hard for Amazon to sell people stuff if no-one can afford to buy anything.
I think in the newest warehouse they eliminated the need for people to walk and carry items.
Now the box arrives at the operator carried by some automation. The human performs only the picking.
Define no one? They'd probably be fine with selling an increasing amount of stuff to just half the population of the US.