In San Francisco, the startup Dimensional is offering to pay people to escort robot dogs through the streets. The job pays $20 an hour and is meant to gather data to improve how artificial intelligence controls the robots.
A job listing posted in a San Francisco Bay Area Facebook group has drawn attention for its unusual title: robot dog walker. Behind the ad is Dimensional, a robotics software startup based in the Dogpatch neighbourhood. The company is looking for people to accompany its quadruped robots on urban routes so it can continue testing them in real-world conditions.
What the robot dog walker job involves: four- to six-hour walks with a 15 kg robot
The job consists of walking alongside a quadruped robot on a set outdoor route in central San Francisco. Each shift lasts between four and six hours and pays $20 an hour, or about 27,000 won according to the listing. Payment is made as soon as the shift ends.
The work is done alone and requires no prior robotics experience. Applicants only need a smartphone. Dimensional provides paid training covering safety instructions and the procedures to follow.
The main physical demand comes when something goes wrong. If the robot dog freezes or malfunctions, the walker may have to pick it up and carry it back to the office by hand. The machine weighs about 15 kg (33 lb), according to reports on the job.
How Dimensional uses city streets to train its robot operating system
Dimensional is developing an open-source robot operating system designed to let machines carry out physical tasks in the real world, including moving heavy loads.
The startup says it has already tested robot dogs moving through urban environments. According to the company, these trials exposed major limitations in current artificial intelligence agents when they have to directly control robotic hardware on complex streets.
Hiring human walkers is about collecting data. By running more trips along real city routes, Dimensional aims to measure the situations its robots encounter and gather information to improve its operating system and its artificial intelligence models.
Dimensional’s founder and CEO, Stash Formicter, acknowledges that human intervention is still needed in these situations. He nonetheless argues for automating physical work, saying that having humans do it remains an archaic practice.
Planned uses for quadruped and humanoid robots
The San Francisco walks are a software development experiment, not a demonstration of fully autonomous movement. The walkers are there precisely to handle the difficulties that current systems run into in the field.
Using the data it collects, Dimensional hopes to improve its software’s performance so that robot dogs and humanoid robots can eventually be deployed safely in several professional settings:
- Factories and industrial facilities.
- Data centres.
- Construction sites.
- Security and surveillance work.
These applications reflect the development goals Dimensional has announced. The San Francisco experiment currently focuses on escorting quadruped robots in an urban setting.
How San Francisco residents are reacting to the robot dogs
The tests have not gone unnoticed by residents. According to the New York Times, as cited by SBS, some passers-by have likened the machines to the dystopian worlds of films such as Terminator.
One resident opposed to the robot dogs even went to Dimensional’s offices and made inappropriate remarks to an employee. Stash Formicter acknowledged that incidents of this kind could become more frequent as robots appear more often in public spaces.
The CEO also joked that the company might have to deploy more patrol robot dogs if such reactions keep happening.