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Restroom cleaners will earn much more than they do today. While many jobs will get automated, it turns out that building a robot that can clean arbitrary restr

by ls15 4y ago

Restroom cleaners will earn much more than they do today. While many jobs will get automated, it turns out that building a robot that can clean arbitrary restrooms is as hard as building a self-driving car or harder, while the market incentives are missing. Restroom cleaners first need to be paid well enough (or the smell intensifies), before Elon Musk can become interested in toilet cleaning.

rahimnathwani 4y ago
"building a robot that can clean arbitrary restrooms" Why wouldn't we just start building standardized restrooms that can be easily cleaned by robots?
- ls15 4y ago
  That's just as hard, I think. We don't have standardized homes. Buying a cleaning robot that requires retrofitting your home first doesn't seem compelling to me.
davidhyde 4y ago
Building cleaning robots that can be remotely controlled by a fleet of human operators working from home or in a call centre would be cheaper and safer than fully autonomous ones. I mean, gamers already pull off pretty amazing feats of control on the avatars they walk or drive around with.
- ls15 4y ago
  That seems like a better idea. I guess the CleanBot operators would earn more than local restroom cleaners.
  - davidhyde 4y ago
    That depends on where they can operate from. I would imagine that local Swiss restroom cleaners would be paid more than remote workers operating from another country. Still, I don’t think that people would be happy with a camera operated robot sniffing around their restrooms. ;)
    - ls15 4y ago
      Maybe a robot operater can clean multiple restrooms at once. > Still, I don’t think that people would be happy with a camera operated robot sniffing around their restrooms. ;) I wouldn't probably, but if it means not having to clean their toilet, I think that many people would be happy with the tradeoff. Restrooms in public spaces wouldn't be an issue too.

by ls15 4y ago

rahimnathwani 4y ago

"building a robot that can clean arbitrary restrooms" Why wouldn't we just start building standardized restrooms that can be easily cleaned by robots?

ls15 4y ago
That's just as hard, I think. We don't have standardized homes. Buying a cleaning robot that requires retrofitting your home first doesn't seem compelling to me.

davidhyde 4y ago

Building cleaning robots that can be remotely controlled by a fleet of human operators working from home or in a call centre would be cheaper and safer than fully autonomous ones. I mean, gamers already pull off pretty amazing feats of control on the avatars they walk or drive around with.

ls15 4y ago
That seems like a better idea. I guess the CleanBot operators would earn more than local restroom cleaners.
- davidhyde 4y ago
  That depends on where they can operate from. I would imagine that local Swiss restroom cleaners would be paid more than remote workers operating from another country. Still, I don’t think that people would be happy with a camera operated robot sniffing around their restrooms. ;)
  - ls15 4y ago
    Maybe a robot operater can clean multiple restrooms at once. > Still, I don’t think that people would be happy with a camera operated robot sniffing around their restrooms. ;) I wouldn't probably, but if it means not having to clean their toilet, I think that many people would be happy with the tradeoff. Restrooms in public spaces wouldn't be an issue too.