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Yeah, I’m not sure I buy their explanation about special development roombas since they offered zero proof. I have an ancient Roomba that’s still going and drea

Yeah, I’m not sure I buy their explanation about special development roombas since they offered zero proof. I have an ancient Roomba that’s still going and dread having to replace it one day.

Someone1234 4y ago
You could buy a lidar based robot vacuum instead of visible-light camera. The only benefit I know of that visible-light provides is so-called "poop detection" and avoidance, but that's somewhat unreliable anyway. Lidar, in theory, could create a photo-like image, but that resolution costs money and none of these robot vacuums are anywhere near that. Plus they map depth, not texture, so anything it does create is somewhat abstract.
- operator-name 4y ago
  Apart from the most recent top of the line models, lidar sensors are mounted at the top of the device and cannot detect short items (slippers, cables). They are not much more capable with obsticalr avoidance than the front bumper system on roombas. The few robot vacuums that have only a front lidar sensors perform poorly compared to the camera only or lidar augmented camera in the latest Roomba and Roborocks.
butlerm 4y ago
There is no possible way they could prove anything about this in a form adequate for a short article. You either trust that the writers are responsible journalists representing the truth of the matter to the best of their ability or you don't. That goes for the device manufacturer as well. They couldn't possibly prove the fidelity of their statements except on a witness stand under the penalty of perjury. So unless you think they are conducting the type of conspiracy that could see some of them sent to prison, we might just have to trust that they don't defraud the public on a regular basis.
rocket_surgeron 4y ago
>Yeah, I’m not sure I buy their explanation about special development roombas since they offered zero proof. It is simple for any person with even basic knowledge of networking to independently come to the conclusion that Roombas are not uploading video streams (or photographs) to the internet. I know the IP (10.0.0.11) and MAC (50:14:79:1E:AB:6B) address of my Roomba and using the Insight Netflow Analyzer for OPNsense I can see how much data it has sent to the internet. In the last six months it has sent approximately 72MB of data outside my network. That's about 600KB per day. It has received much more, presumably firmware downloads. This is consistent with firmware update checks, notification traffic, and me periodically adjusting its schedule remotely. That's just me clicking on some tabs in my router's web UI. Hundreds if not thousands of people globally are constantly reviewing and monitoring Roomba network traffic in fine detail in order to understand and/or reverse engineer it for research and other purposes. So one of three things is happening: 1. All Roombas send photo and video streams to iRobot and they have thus far managed to hide this from the public and the thousands of eyeballs constantly monitoring the network traffic of their products, or 2. A subset of Roombas send photo and video streams to iRobot and they have thus far managed to hide this from the public and the subset of eyeballs monitoring the network traffic of their products 3. These are development devices like they claim. Based on my own experience we can eliminate 1, based on the images accompanying the article option 3 is highly likely.
- hobbitstan 4y ago
  You really think Roomba owners know how to do any of that, or even would?
  - rocket_surgeron 4y ago
    Yes. A non-trivial number of them. Thousands, out of millions, at least.
Karunamon 4y ago
You're operating in a framework where you already think they are lying. What proof would you even deem acceptable?
- hobbitstan 4y ago
  ‘iRobot declined to let MIT Technology Review view the consent agreements and did not make any of its paid collectors or employees available to discuss their understanding of the terms.’ The reporters tried to validate and were blocked. That’s where my suspicion lies.
  - Karunamon 4y ago
    If it were my company I would not let journalists anywhere near it or my employees either. All downside.
quantified 4y ago
You don't need to replace it, really.
operator-name 4y ago
Their policy (https://homesupport.irobot.com/s/article/964 https://homesupport.irobot.com/s/article/964) seems pretty clear, and from what I've seen of the app it explicitly asks before uploading photos. If you're concerned you can turn the recognition feature off, or block it from the Internet and trigger it manually.
- operator-name 4y ago
  > In iRobot’s case, over 95% of its image data set comes from real homes, whose residents are either iRobot employees or volunteers recruited by third-party data vendors (which iRobot declined to identify). People using development devices agree to allow iRobot to collect data, including video streams, as the devices are running, often in exchange for “incentives for participation,” according to a statement from iRobot. The company declined to specify what these incentives were, saying only that they varied “based on the length and complexity of the data collection.” > The remaining training data comes from what iRobot calls “staged data collection,” in which the company builds models that it then records. > iRobot has also begun offering regular consumers the opportunity to opt in to contributing training data through its app, where people can choose to send specific images of obstacles to company servers to improve its algorithms. iRobot says that if a customer participates in this “user-in-the-loop” training, as it is known, the company receives only these specific images, and no others. Baussmann, the company representative, said in an email that such images have not yet been used to train any algorithms.
hedora 4y ago
There are some cheap Chinese ones that can be spoofed into talking to a local, open source clone of the official cloud service. As a bonus, they seem to be far ahead of iRobot at vacuuming/mopping. It's not a great option, but might be the best if you are looking for something that will map out a house and clean designated rooms, and that will function when not connected to the internet.

Yeah, I’m not sure I buy their explanation about special development roombas since they offered zero proof. I have an ancient Roomba that’s still going and dread having to replace it one day.

Someone1234 4y ago

You could buy a lidar based robot vacuum instead of visible-light camera. The only benefit I know of that visible-light provides is so-called "poop detection" and avoidance, but that's somewhat unreliable anyway. Lidar, in theory, could create a photo-like image, but that resolution costs money and none of these robot vacuums are anywhere near that. Plus they map depth, not texture, so anything it does create is somewhat abstract.

operator-name 4y ago
Apart from the most recent top of the line models, lidar sensors are mounted at the top of the device and cannot detect short items (slippers, cables). They are not much more capable with obsticalr avoidance than the front bumper system on roombas. The few robot vacuums that have only a front lidar sensors perform poorly compared to the camera only or lidar augmented camera in the latest Roomba and Roborocks.

butlerm 4y ago

There is no possible way they could prove anything about this in a form adequate for a short article. You either trust that the writers are responsible journalists representing the truth of the matter to the best of their ability or you don't. That goes for the device manufacturer as well. They couldn't possibly prove the fidelity of their statements except on a witness stand under the penalty of perjury. So unless you think they are conducting the type of conspiracy that could see some of them sent to prison, we might just have to trust that they don't defraud the public on a regular basis.

rocket_surgeron 4y ago

>Yeah, I’m not sure I buy their explanation about special development roombas since they offered zero proof. It is simple for any person with even basic knowledge of networking to independently come to the conclusion that Roombas are not uploading video streams (or photographs) to the internet. I know the IP (10.0.0.11) and MAC (50:14:79:1E:AB:6B) address of my Roomba and using the Insight Netflow Analyzer for OPNsense I can see how much data it has sent to the internet. In the last six months it has sent approximately 72MB of data outside my network. That's about 600KB per day. It has received much more, presumably firmware downloads. This is consistent with firmware update checks, notification traffic, and me periodically adjusting its schedule remotely. That's just me clicking on some tabs in my router's web UI. Hundreds if not thousands of people globally are constantly reviewing and monitoring Roomba network traffic in fine detail in order to understand and/or reverse engineer it for research and other purposes. So one of three things is happening: 1. All Roombas send photo and video streams to iRobot and they have thus far managed to hide this from the public and the thousands of eyeballs constantly monitoring the network traffic of their products, or 2. A subset of Roombas send photo and video streams to iRobot and they have thus far managed to hide this from the public and the subset of eyeballs monitoring the network traffic of their products 3. These are development devices like they claim. Based on my own experience we can eliminate 1, based on the images accompanying the article option 3 is highly likely.

hobbitstan 4y ago
You really think Roomba owners know how to do any of that, or even would?
- rocket_surgeron 4y ago
  Yes. A non-trivial number of them. Thousands, out of millions, at least.

Karunamon 4y ago

You're operating in a framework where you already think they are lying. What proof would you even deem acceptable?

hobbitstan 4y ago
‘iRobot declined to let MIT Technology Review view the consent agreements and did not make any of its paid collectors or employees available to discuss their understanding of the terms.’ The reporters tried to validate and were blocked. That’s where my suspicion lies.
- Karunamon 4y ago
  If it were my company I would not let journalists anywhere near it or my employees either. All downside.

quantified 4y ago

You don't need to replace it, really.

operator-name 4y ago

Their policy (https://homesupport.irobot.com/s/article/964 https://homesupport.irobot.com/s/article/964) seems pretty clear, and from what I've seen of the app it explicitly asks before uploading photos. If you're concerned you can turn the recognition feature off, or block it from the Internet and trigger it manually.

operator-name 4y ago
> In iRobot’s case, over 95% of its image data set comes from real homes, whose residents are either iRobot employees or volunteers recruited by third-party data vendors (which iRobot declined to identify). People using development devices agree to allow iRobot to collect data, including video streams, as the devices are running, often in exchange for “incentives for participation,” according to a statement from iRobot. The company declined to specify what these incentives were, saying only that they varied “based on the length and complexity of the data collection.” > The remaining training data comes from what iRobot calls “staged data collection,” in which the company builds models that it then records. > iRobot has also begun offering regular consumers the opportunity to opt in to contributing training data through its app, where people can choose to send specific images of obstacles to company servers to improve its algorithms. iRobot says that if a customer participates in this “user-in-the-loop” training, as it is known, the company receives only these specific images, and no others. Baussmann, the company representative, said in an email that such images have not yet been used to train any algorithms.

hedora 4y ago

There are some cheap Chinese ones that can be spoofed into talking to a local, open source clone of the official cloud service. As a bonus, they seem to be far ahead of iRobot at vacuuming/mopping. It's not a great option, but might be the best if you are looking for something that will map out a house and clean designated rooms, and that will function when not connected to the internet.