We didn't learn much new at Tesla's Robotaxi event last night, but one piece of information we were looking forward to was a little information on Optimus, Tesla's humanoid robot. And we have some, but maybe a little less Tesla than some might like.
After opening the Robotaxi / Cybercab and Robovan, Tesla CEO Elon Musk continued to give us a little information about the Optimus humanoid robot that the company was working on.
Musk said that “we first met a person in a robot suit, and then we improved dramatically every year” as several robots appeared in front of the crowd.
He called this “your own R2D2 C3-PO,” and that in time, these robots will cost less than a car – typically, ~$20k-$30k. The video also described them as “an autonomous assistant, a humanoid companion” that can be used for basically any task imaginable.
Musk said Optimus would be “the biggest product of any kind, ever” and thought everyone on Earth would want one or two of them, which is language he's used before (never mind that most of the world's 8 billion people don't have the wealth to buy new car, at least two). He also said that it will result in an “age of plenty” where the cost of everything will drop dramatically.
But above all that, Tesla took the event as an opportunity to showcase Optimus in front of – and among – a live audience. Musk says:
One of the things we wanted to show tonight is that Optimus is not a canned video, it's not walled off. Optimus robots will walk between you. Please treat the Optimus robots well. So you'll be able to walk right up to them… and they'll serve drinks at the bar, and you'll go straight up… I mean, it's a bad game to have human robots and they're there, right before that. you.
He then ended his talk by throwing in a group of humanoid robots dancing in the gazebo (not unlike the video Honda made ten years ago…), and the attendees were able to interact with these robots in person.
The coverage of Tesla's event continued by showing videos of the party, including some videos of guests talking to robots. Robots walk around, hand out goodie bags, serve drinks, pose for pictures, walk through the crowd, and even play rock paper scissors (though, again, not like this robot with a 100% winrate from 12 years ago).
The robots all had Tesla's job “hunter” watching them, but appeared to be carrying some sort of signaling device in their hand. In the video, you can see one of the workers using this device.
Tesla's official video (which had no sound, as the music was playing over it) also showed a couple of robots serving drinks, though these weren't custom-mixed drinks, just two pre-mixed drink options served from beer taps. The robots seemed to do so effectively enough, although they wobbled when handing out the drinks (see here), which seemed odd – as if the robots weren't very good at balancing themselves, or their movements weren't very fluid or something.
However, attendees started posting videos of the event, and something seemed… off.
There's one widely shared video of an employee appearing to wake up Musk's Robotaxi on the phone — but that's understandable enough, given the way Waymo's Level 4 taxis interact with the passenger's phone to unlock the car and start the ride, and it makes sense from the stage management's perspective to keep the event moving in a predictable (albeit minutes-long) way. -40+ late).
But the anonymous videos were of direct interactions with the Optimus robots “walking among us” in the crowd.
It turns out that each of the robots has a voice and can be spoken to. So, you can order a drink, or just have a conversation with the robots that are walking with the crowd.
What Tesla is doing with Optimus is insane. It's actually a robot from iRobot starring Will Smith. #WeRobot pic.twitter.com/zM9pkkyOCu
— Austin (@AustinPlanet) October 11, 2024
In conversation, the robots were incredibly realistic, responding quickly and with natural speech. We've seen an interesting improvement in this from ChatGPT 4o, with a natural tone, but you can still tell there's something robotic going on there.
But maybe they were again which is impressive, because these conversations certainly seem to have someone on the other side of them.
He didn't even ask for a tip!@Tesla_Optimus #teslabot #werobot pic.twitter.com/4r0ONZSk11
— Kim Java (@ItsKimJava) October 11, 2024
Each robot we've seen has a different voice, and a different approach – although most of the names are from California or Texas, two places where Tesla has a significant presence. One reportedly spoke Spanish, which impressed one attendee, although conversational Spanish is a rarity especially in places where Tesla works, so the employee behind the curtain may just be bilingual.
This video, in particular, of a robot talking about the Bay Area, is fantastic. The robot doesn't just make a human error when it asks if the attendee lives in “Santa Clarita” near San Jose (Santa Clara – Santa Clarita it's in Southern California, not the Bay Area), and hears the unusual pronunciation of “Los Gatos” and responds with a normal one.
Another tech evangelist in attendance, Robert Scoble, says he spoke to an engineer at the event who told him that Optimus was running on AI while moving through the crowd, but otherwise there was remote human assistance.
I spoke to the engineer.
If it goes that's the AI running Optimus.
It's really amazing that they took out so many people in droves @teslaevent. https://t.co/CtmCKPrL4T
— Robert Scoble (@Scobleizer) October 11, 2024
Indeed, most of the viewers seem to think that this was some level of remote work that took place during the event. Even Adam Jonas, a Morgan Stanley analyst who covers Tesla and is generally very active in everything Tesla announces, said in the paper this morning that: “It is our understanding that these robots were not fully autonomous – but relied on tele-ops (human intervention) so it was a reflection of degrees of freedom and efficiency..”
The upshot of all this is that Tesla, as is often the case, seems to be playing fast and loose with the truth.
While it can be reasonably impressive art, and remote robots can have some real uses (for example, putting remote robots in dangerous situations where human-like limbs and manipulation would help), Tesla instead decided to hide the real thing. information about the technology they were showing off, suggesting that AI-driven robots would move through the crowd while actually relying on some measure of telework.
And that leaves a bitter taste in everyone's mouth – or at least, in the mouths of those whose information comes from somewhere other than the highly-chosen twitter algorithm.
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