Image via Amazon
Amazon is reportedly working on developing new humanoid delivery robots to drop packages off on your front porch. This revelation is shocking many, but with what we’ve seen from drone warfare innovations in Ukraine, not to mention robot police dogs, we’re just not surprised.
Amazon Studios’ new car show hosts are doomed to fail.
While anyone could’ve guessed Amazon was cooking up something like this, a report from The Information has details about what the online retail giant is doing to develop the robot delivery program.
Apparently, Amazon has constructed a “humanoid park” or an indoor obstacle course at its San Francisco complex. The plan is to test robot designs there before trying any in the field.
Instead of creating its own humanoid robots, Amazon will buy the hardware from other companies. However, it is working the develop the AI software which will tell the robots where to go and how to navigate environments, like walking up your front steps.
We wonder if part of the attraction in using robot delivery personnel is they can work around the clock and don’t need to take breaks in the middle of a delivery route.
Anyone who’s been waiting for a package that’s less than ten stops away and realized the driver has stopped to have a snack or a nap can understand why that might be.
But the public might be a little apprehensive to a robot their size walking up to their door and dropping off packages. On the flip side, some human delivery drivers pull up with music blaring as they fling packages like they don’t care whatsoever about their job.
In addition, Amazon has a drone delivery service, Prime Air, which is in the early stages of serving the public. So far, that program only is available in a small section of two cities, with plans to expand it later this year.
But Prime Air has run into some issues. The program was temporarily suspended thanks to an incident at the testing facility in Oregon. More recently, an Amazon delivery drone crash landed at a Phoenix apartment complex.
If anyone thinks their job is safe from AI competition because they do something physical, like roofing homes, repairing plumbing, or delivering packages, this should help clear up that misunderstanding.
After all, physical AI, or using artificial intelligence to direct robots, self-driving cars, etc. is a rapidly growing field. In other words, no job is entirely “safe.”
Image via Amazon
