Every year, just for a few days in a large city, a small team of robotics makes their dream come true: they order from their own robotic waiters and butlers. In carefully constructed replicas of a restaurant scene or home setting, these robots perform many simple algorithmic tasks. “Take a can of beans from the shelf. Greet museum visitors. Help people with shopping. Serve customers in the restaurant. This is Robocup @ Home, an annual tournament where robotics teams put their autonomous service robots to the test in practical home applications.
The tasks seem simple and routine, but in reality it turns out that this is far from the case.
Competition among robotic waiters
Let's say you want a robot to buy groceries at a supermarket. In a crowded, noisy environment, the robot must understand your commands, ask for clarification, map and navigate in an unfamiliar environment, while avoiding obstacles and people. It should then recognize the product you requested, perhaps in a turmoil or unfamiliar orientation. He needs to get the product right - remember that there are millions of dollars worth of contests dedicated to developing robots that can grab a range of objects - and then hand it over to you.
This job seems easy because even a child can do it. But for smart robotics this is a daunting task, over which they struggle for weeks, programming and designing, and still cannot come up with even simple execution algorithms. The child has the advantage of millions of years of evolutionary research and development, and the first robots to take on these tasks did not appear until the 1970s.
That said, Robocup @ Home can be a place where futurists 'expectations clash with technologists' reality. People dream of the funny, soft-spoken JARVIS that has already prepared your favorite dinner when you come back, and in which you scream “don't forget about the cookies” as this clumsy droid drives to the fifth checkout.
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Caring for the elderly
It is known that Japan is one of the most robot-friendly countries in the world; this is the country that surprised everyone with ASIMO in the 2000s. Several studies have been conducted on Japan's love of robots. Unsurprisingly, humanoid robotics is being seriously seen as a solution to the aging crisis. The Japanese government has already invested $ 44 million in developing such.
The Human Support Robot (HSR-2) from Toyota is a simple yet programmable one-arm robot. It can be remotely controlled, picking up objects and observing patients. The HSR-2 has become the default robot for use in Robocup @ Home tournaments, at least for object manipulation tasks.
Along with this, Toyota is working on exoskeletons to help people walk after strokes. You might be surprised to learn that nurses suffer more back injuries than people in any other profession, about three times more likely than construction workers, due to the daily work of lifting patients. Toyota has a Care Assist robot / exoskeleton designed to tackle exactly this problem and help workers lift heavy loads.
House of the Future
The enthusiasm for home robots is easy to understand. In fact, many startups already sell robots as home assistants in one form or another. Overall, though, they have avoided the daunting task of building a fully capable humanoid robot for now - a task that even Google has given up.
It's understandable why: a lot more research and development is needed to ensure that these home robots can be used reliably and at a reasonable cost. Consumers with exaggerated expectations from years of saturation with science fiction may find themselves frustrated if robots are unable to perform basic tasks.
Instead, attempts to create domestic robots fall into one of two categories. There are robots that specialize in household tasks, such as iRobot's Roomba, which became a vacuum cleaner and remains the most successful household robot to this day.
These tasks don't have to be simple: the funky and expensive automatic kitchen uses the world's most nimble hands to prepare the food, provided it can recognize the ingredients. Other robots focus on human-robot interaction, like Jibo: they essentially combine the capabilities of a voice assistant like Siri, Cortana, or Alexa, answer simple questions and complete online tasks in a friendly, dynamic robot environment.
Thus, the future of home automation is starting to look more like smart homes than robots or servants. General robotics is as complex as general artificial intelligence; competing with humans, the greatest station wagons, is very difficult. However, achieving superhuman performance in private assignments is quite possible.
Individual startups without the financial power of Google or Amazon might develop specialized robots like the Seven Dreamers Laundry Robot, and hope that one day they will become part of a network of autonomous robots, each of which will play a role in the household.
Home paradise
Smart home has become a cliché of futurists' expectations for a relatively long time, as films featuring smart homes have gone out of control and created a cliché. But critics of the smart home idea - and the Internet of Things in general - tend to build on the idea that, more often than not, software imposes an extra layer on things that can break in exchange for minimal convenience. A toaster that can short-circuit is bad enough, but a toaster that refuses to make you a toast because its software is being updated is something.
And that's not talking about security issues and vulnerabilities, which are especially important if the devices are included in the network of your home and can work with it. A smartwatch that monitors your kids might seem like a smart parenting idea. A smartwatch that can be hacked to spy on children, listen to what they are talking about, and even fool them - this scenario is like a parent's nightmare.
The key to many of these problems is the lack of standardization of security protocols and even the products themselves. The idea that dozens of startups will develop highly specialized robotics to complete a single household task sounds great in theory until you understand the potential dangers and pitfalls of dozens of incompatible devices working together on the same system.
It seems obvious that there are many layers of hard homework that could be automated. Especially after having had the opportunity to enjoy economical dishwashers and vacuum cleaners for decades. The upcoming market for automated home appliances (which in a sense is represented by robots) promises a billion and trillion dollar valuation.
Ilya Khel
