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Colin Angle: iRobot CEO | Lex Fridman Podcast #39


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The following is a conversation with Colin Angle.
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He's the CEO and co founder of iRobot,
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a robotics company that for 29 years
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has been creating robots that operate successfully
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in the real world.
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Not as a demo or on a scale of dozens,
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but on a scale of thousands and millions.
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As of this year, iRobot has sold more than
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25 million robots to consumers,
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including the Roomba vacuum cleaning robot,
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the Bravo floor mopping robot,
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and soon the Terra lawn mowing robot.
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29 million robots successfully operating autonomously
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in real people's homes,
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to me is an incredible accomplishment
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of science, engineering, logistics,
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and all kinds of general entrepreneurial innovation.
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Most robotics companies fail.
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iRobot has survived and succeeded for 29 years.
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I spent all day at iRobot,
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including a long tour and conversation with Colin
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about the history of iRobot,
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and then sat down for this podcast conversation
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that would have been much longer
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if I didn't spend all day learning about
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and playing with the various robots
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and the company's history.
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I'll release the video of the tour separately.
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Colin, iRobot, its founding team, its current team,
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and its mission has been and continues to be
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an inspiration to me and thousands of engineers
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who are working hard to create AI systems
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that help real people.
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This is the Artificial Intelligence Podcast.
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If you enjoy it, subscribe on YouTube,
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give it five stars on iTunes,
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support it on Patreon,
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or simply connect with me on Twitter
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at Lex Friedman, spelled F R I D M A N.
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And now, here's my conversation with Colin Angle.
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In his 1942 short story, Runaround,
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from his iRobot collection, Asimov proposed
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the three laws of robotics in order,
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don't harm humans, obey orders, protect yourself.
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So two questions.
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First, does the Roomba follow these three laws?
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And also, more seriously,
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what role do you hope to see robots take
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in modern society and in the future world?
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So the three laws are very thought provoking
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and require such a profound understanding
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of the world a robot lives in,
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the ramifications of its action and its own sense of self
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that it's not a relevant bar,
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at least it won't be a relevant bar for decades to come.
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And so if Roomba follows the three laws,
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and I believe it does,
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it is designed to help humans, not hurt them,
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it's designed to be inherently safe,
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and we designed it to last a long time.
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It's not through any AI or intent on the robot's part.
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It's because following the three laws
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is aligned with being a good robot product.
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So I guess it does,
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but not by explicit design.
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So then the bigger picture,
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what role do you hope to see robotics, robots take
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in what's currently mostly a world of humans?
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We need robots to help us continue
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to improve our standard of living.
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We need robots because the average age
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of humanity is increasing very quickly,
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and simply the number of people young enough
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and spry enough to care
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for the elder growing demographic is inadequate.
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And so what is the role of robots?
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Today, the role is to make our lives a little easier,
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a little cleaner, maybe a little healthier.
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But in time, robots are going to be the difference
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between real gut wrenching declines
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in our ability to live independently
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and maintain our standard of living,
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and a future that is the bright one
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where we have more control over our lives,
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can spend more of our time focused
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on activities we choose.
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And I'm so honored and excited
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to be playing a role in that journey.
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So you've given me a tour.
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It showed me some of the long histories,
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now 29 years that iRobot has been at it,
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creating some incredible robots.
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You showed me Pacbot.
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You showed me a bunch of other stuff that led up to Roomba,
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that led to Braava and Terra.
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So let's skip that incredible history
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in the interest of time,
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cause we already talked about it.
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I'll show this incredible footage.
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You mentioned elderly and robotics in society.
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I think the home is a fascinating place for robots to be.
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So where do you see robots in the home?
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Currently, I would say, once again,
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probably most homes in the world don't have a robot.
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So how do you see that changing?
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What do you think is the big initial value add
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that robots can do?
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So iRobot has sort of, over the years,
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narrowed in on the home, the consumer's home,
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as the place where we want to innovate
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and deliver tools that will help a home
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be a more automatically maintained place,
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a healthier place, a safer place,
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and perhaps even a more efficient place to be.
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And today, we vacuum, we mop,
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soon we'll be mowing your lawn.
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But where things are going is,
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when do we get to the point where the home,
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not just the robots that live in your home,
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but the home itself becomes part of a system
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that maintains itself and plays an active role
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in caring for and helping the people live in that home.
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And I see everything that we're doing
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as steps along the path toward that future.
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So what are the steps?
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So if we can summarize some of the history of Roomba,
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you've mentioned, and maybe you can elaborate on it,
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but you mentioned that the early days
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were really taking a robot from something that works
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either in the lab or something that works in the field
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that helps soldiers do the difficult work they do
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to actually be in the hands of consumers
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and tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of robots
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that don't break down over how much people love them
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over months of very extensive use.
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So that was the big first step.
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And then the second big step was the ability
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to sense the environment, to build a map, to localize,
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to be able to build a picture of the home
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that the human can then attach labels to
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in terms of giving some semantic knowledge
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to the robot about its environment.
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Okay, so that's like a huge, two big, huge steps.
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Maybe you can comment on them,
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but also what is the next step
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of making a robot part of the home?
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Sure, so the goal is to make a home
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that takes care of itself,
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takes care of the people in the home,
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and gives the user an experience of just living their life
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and the home is somehow doing the right thing,
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turning on and off lights when you leave,
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cleaning up the environment.
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And we went from robots that were great in the lab,
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but were both too expensive
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and not sufficiently capable to ever do an acceptable job
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of anything other than being a toy or a curio in your home
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to something that was both affordable
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and sufficiently effective to drive,
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be above threshold and drive purchase intent.
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Now we've disrupted the entire vacuuming industry.
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The number one selling vacuums, for example, in the US
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are Roombas, so not robot vacuums, but vacuums,
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and that's really crazy and weird.
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We need to pause that. I mean, that's incredible.
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That's incredible that a robot
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is the number one selling thing that does something.
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Yep. Something as essential as vacuuming.
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Yep. Congratulations.
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Thank you. It's still kind of fun to say,
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but just because this was a crazy idea
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that just started, you know, in a room here,
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we're like, do you think we can do this?
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So, hey, let's give it a try.
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But now the robots are starting to understand their environment.
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And if you think about the next step,
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there's two dimensions.
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I've been working so hard since the beginning of iRobot
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to make robots are autonomous,
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that, you know, they're smart enough
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and understand their task enough,
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they can just go do it without human involvement.
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Now what I'm really excited and working on
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is how do I make them less autonomous?
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Meaning that the robot is supposed to be your partner,
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not this automaton that just goes and does what a robot does.
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And so that if you tell it,
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hey, I just dropped some flour by the fridge in the kitchen,
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can you deal with it?
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Wouldn't it be awesome if the right thing just happened
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based on that utterance?
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And to some extent, that's less autonomous
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because it's actually listening to you,
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understanding the context and intent of the sentence,
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mapping it against its understanding
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of the home it lives in and knowing what to do.
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And so that's an area of research.
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It's an area where we're starting to roll out features.
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You can now tell your robot to clean up the kitchen
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and it knows what the kitchen is and can do that.
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And that's sort of 1.0 of where we're going.
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The other cool thing is that we're starting
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to know where stuff is.
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And why is that important?
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Well, robots are supposed to have arms, right?
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Data had an arm, Rosie had an arm, Robbie the robot had an arm.
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I mean, robots are, you know, they are physical things
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that move around in an environment
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and they're supposed to like do work.
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And if you think about it,
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if a robot doesn't know where anything is,
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why should it have an arm?
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But with this new dawn of home understanding
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that we're starting to go enjoy,
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I know where the kitchen is.
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I might in the future know where the refrigerator is.
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I might, if I had an arm, be able to find the handle,
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open it and even get myself a beer.
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Obviously, that's one of the true dreams of robotics
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is to have robots bringing us a beer
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while we watch television.
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But, you know, I think that that new category of tasks
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where physical manipulation, robot arms,
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is just a potpourri of new opportunity and excitement.
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And you see humans as a crucial part of that.
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So you kind of mentioned that.
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And I personally find that a really compelling idea.
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I think full autonomy can only take us so far,
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especially in the home.
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So you see humans as helping the robot understand
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or give deeper meaning to the spatial information.
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Right. It's a partnership.
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The robot is supposed to operate according to descriptors
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that you would use to describe your own home.
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The robot is supposed to, in lieu of better direction,
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kind of go about its routine,
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which ought to be basically right,
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and lead to a home maintained in a way
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that it's learned you like,
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but also be perpetually ready to take direction
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that would activate a different set of behaviors
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or actions to meet a current need
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to the extent it could actually perform that task.
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So I got to ask you, I think this is a fundamental
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and a fascinating question,
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because iRobot has been a successful company
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and a rare successful robotics company.
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So Anki, Jibo, Mayfield Robotics with their robot curry,
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SciFi Works, Rethink Robotics, these are robotics companies
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that were founded and run by brilliant people.
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But all, very unfortunately, at least for us roboticists,
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all went out of business recently.
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So why do you think they didn't last longer?
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Why do you think it is so hard to keep a robotics company alive?
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You know, I say this only partially in jest
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that back in the day before Roomba,
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you know, I was a high tech entrepreneur building robots.
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But it wasn't until I became a vacuum cleaner salesman
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that we had any success.
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So, I mean, the point is technology alone
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doesn't equal a successful business.
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We need to go and find the compelling need
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where the robot that we're creating
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can deliver clearly more value to the end user
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than it costs.
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And this is not a marginal thing
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where you're looking at the scale and you're like,
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yeah, it's close.
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Maybe we can hold our breath and make it work.
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It's clearly more value than the cost of the robot
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to bring, you know, in the store.
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And I think that the challenge has been finding
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those businesses where that's true
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in a sustainable fashion.
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You know, when you get into entertainment style things,
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you could be the cat's meow one year,
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but 85% of toys, regardless of their merit,
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fail to make it to their second season.
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It's just super hard to do so.
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And so that's just a tough business.
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And there has been a lot of experimentation
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around what is the right type of social companion,
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what is the right robot in the home
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that is doing something other than tasks people do every week
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that they'd rather not do.
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And I'm not sure we've got it all figured out right.
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And so that you get brilliant roboticists
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with super interesting robots
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that ultimately don't quite have that magical user experience
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and thus that value benefit equation remains ambiguous.
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So you as somebody who dreams of robots changing the world,
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what's your estimate?
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How big is the space of applications
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that fit the criteria that you just described
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where you can really demonstrate an obvious significant value
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over the alternative non robotic solution?
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Well, I think that we're just about none of the way
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to achieving the potential of robotics at home.
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But we have to do it in a really eyes wide open,
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honest fashion.
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And so another way to put that is the potential is infinite
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because we did take a few steps,
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but you're saying those steps are just very initial steps.
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So the Roomba is a hugely successful product,
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but you're saying that's just the very, very beginning.
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That's just the very, very beginning.
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It's the foot in the door.
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And I think I was lucky that in the early days of robotics,
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people would ask me, when are you going to clean my floor?
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It was something that I grew up saying,
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I got all these really good ideas,
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but everyone seems to want their floor clean.
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And so maybe we should do that.
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Yeah, your good ideas.
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Earn the right to do the next thing after that.
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So the good ideas have to match with the desire of the people
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and then the actual cost has to like the business,
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the financial aspect has to all match together.
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Yeah, during our partnership back a number of years ago
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with Johnson Wax, they would explain to me
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that they would go into homes and just watch how people lived
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and try to figure out what were they doing
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that they really didn't really like to do,
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but they had to do it frequently enough
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that it was top of mind and understood as a burden.
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Hey, let's make a product or come up with a solution
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to make that pain point less challenging.
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And sometimes we do certain burdens so often as a society
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that we actually don't even realize,
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like it's actually hard to see that that burden
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is something that could be removed.
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So it does require just going into the home and staring at,
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wait, how do I actually live life?
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What are the pain points?
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Yeah, and getting those insights is a lot harder
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than it would seem it should be in retrospect.
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So how hard on that point?
link |
00:19:33.120
I mean, one of the big challenges of robotics
link |
00:19:37.440
is driving the cost down to something
link |
00:19:42.200
that consumers, people would afford.
link |
00:19:45.680
So people would be less likely to buy a Roomba
link |
00:19:48.840
if it cost $500,000, which is probably
link |
00:19:53.320
sort of what a Roomba would cost several decades ago.
link |
00:19:58.040
So how do you drive, which I mentioned is very difficult,
link |
00:20:02.200
how do you drive the cost of a Roomba or a robot down
link |
00:20:05.320
such that people would want to buy it?
link |
00:20:07.920
When I started building robots, the cost of the robot
link |
00:20:11.600
had a lot to do with the amount of time it took to build it.
link |
00:20:15.480
And so that we build our robots out of aluminum,
link |
00:20:18.400
I would go spend my time in the machine shop
link |
00:20:21.400
on the milling machine, cutting out the parts and so forth.
link |
00:20:28.000
And then when we got into the toy industry,
link |
00:20:29.680
I realized that if we were building at scale,
link |
00:20:34.280
I could determine the cost of the Roomba
link |
00:20:35.920
instead of adding up all the hours to mill out the parts,
link |
00:20:38.880
but by weighing it.
link |
00:20:42.080
And that's liberating.
link |
00:20:44.200
You can say, wow, the world has just
link |
00:20:48.600
changed as I think about construction
link |
00:20:51.560
in a different way.
link |
00:20:53.160
The 3D CAD tools that are available to us today,
link |
00:20:56.920
the operating at scale where I can do tooling and injection
link |
00:21:02.920
mold, an arbitrarily complicated part,
link |
00:21:07.120
and the cost is going to be basically
link |
00:21:09.840
the weight of the plastic in that part,
link |
00:21:13.960
is incredibly exciting and liberating
link |
00:21:16.360
and opens up all sorts of opportunities.
link |
00:21:18.560
And for the sensing part of it, where we are today is instead
link |
00:21:26.760
of trying to build skin, which is really hard.
link |
00:21:30.640
For a long time, I spent creating strategies and ideas
link |
00:21:38.240
around how could we duplicate the skin on the human body
link |
00:21:42.720
because it's such an amazing sensor.
link |
00:21:47.880
Instead of going down that path, why don't we focus on vision?
link |
00:21:53.920
And how many of the problems that
link |
00:21:57.280
face a robot trying to do real work
link |
00:22:02.880
could be solved with a cheap camera and a big ass computer?
link |
00:22:09.680
Moore's law continues to work.
link |
00:22:12.360
The cell phone industry, the mobile industry
link |
00:22:16.440
is giving us better and better tools that can run
link |
00:22:19.360
on these embedded computers.
link |
00:22:21.000
And I think we passed an important moment maybe
link |
00:22:27.880
two years ago where you could put machine vision
link |
00:22:33.640
capable processors on robots at consumer price points.
link |
00:22:39.520
And I was waiting for it to happen.
link |
00:22:42.960
We avoided putting lasers on our robots to do navigation
link |
00:22:49.480
and instead spent years researching
link |
00:22:51.800
how to do vision based navigation
link |
00:22:54.600
because you could just see where these technology
link |
00:23:00.400
trends were going.
link |
00:23:01.520
And between injection molded plastic and a camera
link |
00:23:06.680
with a computer capable of running machine learning
link |
00:23:10.800
and visual object recognition, I could
link |
00:23:12.920
build an incredibly affordable, incredibly capable robot.
link |
00:23:18.640
And that's going to be the future.
link |
00:23:21.160
So on that point with a small tangent,
link |
00:23:23.400
but I think an important one, another industry in which I
link |
00:23:27.000
would say the only other industry in which there
link |
00:23:30.760
is automation actually touching people's lives today
link |
00:23:34.760
is autonomous vehicles.
link |
00:23:37.560
What the vision you just described
link |
00:23:40.160
of using computer vision and using cheap camera sensors,
link |
00:23:44.400
there's a debate on that of LIDAR versus computer vision.
link |
00:23:48.160
And the Elon Musk famously said that LIDAR
link |
00:23:54.360
is a crutch that really in the long term,
link |
00:23:58.360
camera only is the right solution, which echoes some
link |
00:24:02.000
of the ideas you're expressing.
link |
00:24:03.480
Of course, the domain in terms of its safety criticality
link |
00:24:06.760
is different.
link |
00:24:07.600
But what do you think about that approach
link |
00:24:10.640
in the autonomous vehicle space?
link |
00:24:13.360
And in general, do you see a connection
link |
00:24:15.160
between the incredible real world challenges
link |
00:24:18.480
you have to solve in the home with Roomba?
link |
00:24:20.680
And I saw a demonstration of some of them, corner cases
link |
00:24:24.000
literally, and autonomous vehicles.
link |
00:24:27.800
So there's absolutely a tremendous overlap
link |
00:24:31.600
between both the problems a robot vacuum
link |
00:24:36.560
and an autonomous vehicle are trying to solve
link |
00:24:38.560
and the tools and the types of sensors
link |
00:24:41.840
that are being applied in the pursuit of the solutions.
link |
00:24:47.960
In my world, my environment is actually
link |
00:24:53.880
much harder than the environment an automobile travels.
link |
00:24:57.320
We don't have roads.
link |
00:24:58.800
We have t shirts.
link |
00:25:01.280
We have steps.
link |
00:25:02.680
We have a near infinite number of patterns and colors
link |
00:25:07.120
and surface textures on the floor.
link |
00:25:10.160
Especially from a visual perspective.
link |
00:25:11.960
So the way the world looks is an infinitely variable.
link |
00:25:18.840
On the other hand, safety is way easier on the inside.
link |
00:25:22.520
My robots, they're not very heavy.
link |
00:25:26.480
They're not very fast.
link |
00:25:28.280
If they bump into your foot, you think it's funny.
link |
00:25:32.680
And autonomous vehicles kind of have the inverse problem.
link |
00:25:39.400
And so that for me saying vision is the future,
link |
00:25:45.920
I can say that without reservation.
link |
00:25:49.440
For autonomous vehicles, I think I
link |
00:25:51.720
believe what Elon's saying about the future
link |
00:25:56.840
is ultimately going to be vision.
link |
00:25:59.040
Maybe if we put a cheap lighter on there as a backup sensor,
link |
00:26:02.000
it might not be the worst idea in the world.
link |
00:26:03.800
So the stakes are much higher.
link |
00:26:05.000
The stakes are much higher.
link |
00:26:05.840
You have to be much more careful thinking through how far away
link |
00:26:09.080
that future is.
link |
00:26:10.720
Right.
link |
00:26:11.520
But I think that the primary environmental understanding
link |
00:26:17.880
sensor is going to be a visual system.
link |
00:26:21.800
Visual system.
link |
00:26:23.000
So on that point, well, let me ask,
link |
00:26:25.560
do you hope there's an iRobot robot in every home
link |
00:26:29.440
in the world one day?
link |
00:26:31.880
I expect there to be at least one iRobot robot in every home.
link |
00:26:38.120
We've sold 25 million robots.
link |
00:26:41.160
So we're in about 10% of US homes, which is a great start.
link |
00:26:47.080
But I think that when we think about the numbers of things
link |
00:26:52.240
that robots can do, today I can vacuum your floor,
link |
00:26:57.520
mop your floor, cut your lawn, or soon
link |
00:27:00.040
we'll be able to cut your lawn.
link |
00:27:02.880
But there are more things that we could do in the home.
link |
00:27:06.640
And I hope that we continue using the techniques I described
link |
00:27:12.240
around exploiting computer vision and low cost
link |
00:27:16.240
manufacturing that we'll be able to create these solutions
link |
00:27:20.960
at affordable price points.
link |
00:27:22.640
So let me ask on that point of a robot in every home,
link |
00:27:25.600
that's my dream as well.
link |
00:27:26.880
I'd love to see that.
link |
00:27:29.960
I think the possibilities there are indeed
link |
00:27:31.880
infinite positive possibilities.
link |
00:27:34.520
But in our current culture, no thanks to science fiction
link |
00:27:39.760
and so on, there's a serious kind of hesitation, anxiety,
link |
00:27:45.320
concern about robots, and also a concern about privacy.
link |
00:27:51.480
And it's a fascinating question to me
link |
00:27:55.040
why that concern is amongst a certain group of people
link |
00:27:59.560
is as intense as it is.
link |
00:28:02.840
So you have to think about it because it's a serious concern.
link |
00:28:05.480
But I wonder how you address it best.
link |
00:28:08.000
So from a perspective of vision sensors,
link |
00:28:09.840
so robots that move about the home and sense the world,
link |
00:28:14.320
how do you alleviate people's privacy concerns?
link |
00:28:19.720
How do you make sure that they can
link |
00:28:21.080
trust iRobot and the robots that they share their home with?
link |
00:28:26.680
I think that's a great question.
link |
00:28:28.200
And we've really leaned way forward on this
link |
00:28:33.760
because given our vision as to the role the company intends
link |
00:28:39.440
to play in the home, really for us,
link |
00:28:43.720
make or break is can our approach
link |
00:28:48.160
be trusted to protecting the data
link |
00:28:50.920
and the privacy of the people who have our robots?
link |
00:28:53.520
And so we've gone out publicly with a privacy
link |
00:28:57.600
manifesto stating we'll never sell your data.
link |
00:29:00.360
We've adopted GDPR not just where GDPR is required,
link |
00:29:05.480
but globally.
link |
00:29:09.120
We have ensured that images don't leave the robot.
link |
00:29:18.000
So processing data from the visual sensors
link |
00:29:22.080
happens locally on the robot.
link |
00:29:23.680
And only semantic knowledge of the home with the consumer's
link |
00:29:30.720
consent is sent up.
link |
00:29:32.720
We show you what we know and are trying
link |
00:29:35.400
to go use data as an enabler for the performance of the robots
link |
00:29:45.000
with the informed consent and understanding of the people who
link |
00:29:50.720
own those robots.
link |
00:29:55.720
We take it very seriously.
link |
00:29:56.840
And ultimately, we think that by showing a customer that
link |
00:30:03.840
if you let us build a semantic map of your home
link |
00:30:07.320
and know where the rooms are, well, then
link |
00:30:09.240
you can say clean the kitchen.
link |
00:30:11.720
If you don't want the robot to do that, don't make the map.
link |
00:30:14.480
It'll do its best job cleaning your home.
link |
00:30:16.960
But it won't be able to do that.
link |
00:30:18.720
And if you ever want us to forget that we know that it's
link |
00:30:21.120
your kitchen, you can have confidence
link |
00:30:24.400
that we will do that for you.
link |
00:30:26.800
So we're trying to go and be a data 2.0 perspective company
link |
00:30:35.800
where we treat the data that the robots have
link |
00:30:39.200
of the consumer's home as if it were the consumer's data
link |
00:30:43.200
and that they have rights to it.
link |
00:30:47.360
So we think by being the good guys on this front,
link |
00:30:50.880
we can build the trust and thus be entrusted
link |
00:30:55.080
to enable robots to do more things that are thoughtful.
link |
00:31:00.160
You think people's worries will diminish over time?
link |
00:31:04.760
As a society, broadly speaking, do you
link |
00:31:07.040
think you can win over trust not just for the company,
link |
00:31:10.600
but just the comfort that people have with AI in their home
link |
00:31:14.920
enriching their lives in some way?
link |
00:31:17.040
I think we're in an interesting place today
link |
00:31:19.560
where it's less about winning them over
link |
00:31:22.360
and more about finding a way to talk about privacy in a way
link |
00:31:26.720
that more people can understand.
link |
00:31:28.880
I would tell you that today, when there's a privacy breach,
link |
00:31:33.320
people get very upset and then go to the store
link |
00:31:37.000
and buy the cheapest thing, paying no attention
link |
00:31:39.320
to whether or not the products that they're buying
link |
00:31:42.080
honor privacy standards or not.
link |
00:31:44.600
In fact, if I put on the package of my Roomba,
link |
00:31:50.040
the privacy commitments that we have,
link |
00:31:53.560
I would sell less than I would if I did nothing at all.
link |
00:31:58.680
And that needs to change.
link |
00:32:00.360
So it's not a question about earning trust.
link |
00:32:02.880
I think that's necessary but not sufficient.
link |
00:32:04.920
We need to figure out how to have
link |
00:32:06.520
a comfortable set of what is the grade A meat
link |
00:32:10.800
standard applied to privacy that customers can trust
link |
00:32:17.640
and understand and then use in their buying decisions.
link |
00:32:23.040
That will reward companies for good behavior
link |
00:32:25.520
and that will ultimately be how this moves forward.
link |
00:32:29.880
And maybe be part of the conversation
link |
00:32:32.640
between regular people about what it means,
link |
00:32:34.800
what privacy means.
link |
00:32:36.280
If you have some standards, you can say,
link |
00:32:38.440
you can start talking about who's following them,
link |
00:32:41.080
who does not have more.
link |
00:32:42.640
Because most people are actually quite clueless
link |
00:32:45.440
about all aspects of artificial intelligence,
link |
00:32:47.320
the data collection, and so on.
link |
00:32:48.440
It would be nice to change that for people
link |
00:32:50.560
to understand the good that AI can do.
link |
00:32:52.800
And it's not some system that's trying to steal
link |
00:32:56.560
all the most sensitive data.
link |
00:32:58.760
Do you think, do you dream of a Roomba
link |
00:33:02.640
with human level intelligence one day?
link |
00:33:05.280
So you've mentioned a very successful localization
link |
00:33:10.520
and mapping of the environment, being
link |
00:33:12.160
able to do some basic communication to say,
link |
00:33:14.680
go clean the kitchen.
link |
00:33:16.600
Do you see in your maybe more bored moments,
link |
00:33:22.880
once you get the beer, to sit back with that beer
link |
00:33:27.080
and have a chat on a Friday night with a Roomba
link |
00:33:30.840
about how your day went?
link |
00:33:34.160
So to your latter question, absolutely.
link |
00:33:38.640
To your former question as to whether a Roomba
link |
00:33:40.760
can have human level intelligence, not in my lifetime.
link |
00:33:45.280
You can have you.
link |
00:33:46.440
I think you can have a great conversation,
link |
00:33:49.720
a meaningful conversation with a Roomba
link |
00:33:54.000
without it having anything that resembles
link |
00:33:56.320
human level intelligence.
link |
00:33:59.200
And I think that as long as you realize that conversation
link |
00:34:04.000
is not about the robot and making the robot feel good.
link |
00:34:08.600
That conversation is about you learning interesting things
link |
00:34:14.880
that make you feel like the conversation that you
link |
00:34:18.720
had with the robot is a pretty awesome way
link |
00:34:24.840
of learning something.
link |
00:34:27.400
And it could be about what kind of day your pet had.
link |
00:34:30.920
It could be about how can I make my home more energy efficient.
link |
00:34:36.240
It could be about if I'm thinking about climbing
link |
00:34:40.000
Mount Everest, what should I know?
link |
00:34:44.440
And that's a very doable thing.
link |
00:34:48.640
But if I think that that conversation
link |
00:34:51.480
I'm going to have with the robot is
link |
00:34:53.760
I'm going to be rewarded by making the robot happy,
link |
00:34:56.840
well, I could just put a button on the robot
link |
00:34:58.720
that you could push and the robot would smile.
link |
00:35:00.600
And that sort of thing.
link |
00:35:02.200
So I think you need to think about the question
link |
00:35:04.200
in the right way.
link |
00:35:06.720
And robots can be awesomely effective at helping people
link |
00:35:12.680
feel less isolated, learn more about the home
link |
00:35:16.320
that they live in, and fill some of those lonely gaps
link |
00:35:21.960
that we wish we were engaged learning
link |
00:35:24.320
cool stuff about our world.
link |
00:35:26.640
Last question.
link |
00:35:28.800
If you could hang out for a day with a robot
link |
00:35:32.280
from science fiction, movies, books,
link |
00:35:35.760
and safely pick its brain for that day, who would you pick?
link |
00:35:42.080
Data.
link |
00:35:43.320
Data.
link |
00:35:43.880
From Star Trek.
link |
00:35:45.280
I think that A, data is really smart.
link |
00:35:49.600
Data has been through a lot trying
link |
00:35:51.440
to go and save the galaxy.
link |
00:35:53.520
And I'm really interested actually in emotion
link |
00:35:59.600
and robotics.
link |
00:36:01.200
And I think you'd have a lot to say about that.
link |
00:36:03.120
Because I believe actually that emotion
link |
00:36:08.120
plays an incredibly useful role in doing reasonable things
link |
00:36:14.280
in situations where we have imperfect understanding of
link |
00:36:16.920
what's going on.
link |
00:36:18.000
In social situations when there's imperfect information.
link |
00:36:20.760
In social situations, also in competitive or dangerous
link |
00:36:26.320
situations that we have emotion for a reason.
link |
00:36:32.880
And so that ultimately, my theory
link |
00:36:36.320
is that as robots get smarter and smarter,
link |
00:36:38.520
they're actually going to get more emotional.
link |
00:36:41.400
Because you can't actually survive on pure logic.
link |
00:36:49.120
Because only a very tiny fraction of the situations
link |
00:36:53.800
we find ourselves in can be resolved reasonably with logic.
link |
00:36:57.320
And so I think Data would have a lot to say about that.
link |
00:36:59.600
And so I could find out whether he agrees.
link |
00:37:02.360
If you could ask Data one question,
link |
00:37:04.840
you would get a deep, honest answer to what would you ask.
link |
00:37:08.560
What's Captain Picard really like?
link |
00:37:12.520
OK, I think that's the perfect way to end it.
link |
00:37:14.320
Colin, thank you so much for talking today.
link |
00:37:16.040
I really appreciate it.
link |
00:37:16.960
My pleasure.