I’m in a park. The grass is being mown by a robot.

Fun fact: The Luddites weren’t opposed to technology. In many cases, they built the machines they would later destroy.

What they opposed was the ownership structure. The fact that they could be 30x more productive, yet be paid less than before because the required skill level was lower, and the working conditions were now dangerous and demeaning.

Yet when someone says “luddite” now, what do you think? A dummy who’s afraid of having cool stuff?

Good points, but I have one thing to add. You shouldn't tax automation. You should increase corporate taxes for all companies. If you funded a UBI with that, it would solve lots of unemployment related problems: crime, poverty, etc. But it's hard, simple but hard.

Put the corporate tax rate back up to 40% or more and implement a 10% robot tax on top of that. Then after that, implement a UBI starting at $1000 a month for US citizens with no strings attached, increasing with inflation over time. Solved for the next decade.

Now do AI!

It's too bad that the first things to be automated are the tasks that people don't mind doing, leaving the real shitty tasks to be done by people. Riding around on a lawnmower has to be one of the most enjoyable forms of manual labour. Now the robots get the good jobs and we're left with the backbreaking monotonous bullshit.

This is what people should be fearing. Studies have shown that when immigrants come in and “take jobs”, they pay taxes, and buy goods to create a life here, effectively replacing the job they took (since we need people who make beds for them to sleep in, food for them to eat, etc).

This is automation that’s ACTUALLY taking our jobs. This automation doesn’t pay taxes, and doesn’t replace the job it takes.

They took our jerbs!

Damn, $45k. Though I guess for something like a park it probably has a pretty quick ROI.

I built an autosteer called AgOpenGPS for our tractors that pretty much does this. Cost about $1000 per unit. We still sit in the tractor because there's a hell of a lot going on besides steering the tractor, but it will drive the entire field without intervention.

At a quick glance on that site I didn't see any information about safety. Did you come across anything?

I guess there is the line about object sensors, but would like to know a little more before deploying something with rotating blades (which is still pretty cool, don't get me wrong)

Okay somehow the words rock solid wireless emergency stop seem oxymoronic. I don't care how it was programmed what wireless communication system uses or anything else. I have a hard time believing wireless emergency stops can be foolproof.

This is the size of a huge riding mower you only see used by parks departments and the like.

I saw this for the first time in Brussels! Our Airbnb host got a kick over how enthralled 3 American women were over the idea of a lawn roomba 😂.

I am in the U.S., yes.

GPS are very fancy ones, unless that's changed since I last looked into it. A buried wire, "invisible fence", has been the norm for all consumer grade ones I've seen.

Probably don't use them here in the US because they're afraid people will use them for target practice.

Cricket‽

Probably one. I would imagine they have some kind of GPS on these.

I don't know that I could fit it in my car.

Contributors that don't post like bots stick out

Him and the Picard maneuver

He's got some personal issues.

Or hacking it to mow a symbol of "I thought what I'd do was I'd become one of those deaf mutes".

Seeing this picture, my first instinct was to tell op to stand in front of it. Worst that happens is an easy paycheck.

Run and grab a package of hotdogs and we can finally get the answer to an age old question.

Put a pile of sticks halfway between a mowed area and an area that hasn't been cut.

Draw a line right in the middle of the camera lense? If that doesn't do anything then a stick person?

I imagine they would make excellent fertilizer.

Plays Circle of Life from Lion King

Hopefully a major lawsuit at the very least.

I feel like things like this should have their safety system as public review of sorts, like a safety system public domain. Assuming this is on public property, but also if you sell to the general public too? It's a pipe dream anway. It's just interesting.

Mowing over a tennis ball isn't harmful, I don't see what this would prove.

My crazy dog has always wanted to bite the push mower whenever it moves. I suspect he thinks it growls at him. He's fine until it starts moving, then he goes crazy. Naturally he's contained for his safety when mowing takes place.

My Landroid is cool. AMA I guess?

I spent a few days working at a house with 4 of the Husqvarna versions. I had a really good time watching them all take off and do a route and dock all minding their own business. The really cool part is you never even see your grass grow because it's always being maintained.

I've seen the small ones, but I totally didn't expect that.

If it uses actual blades and is not a glorified string trimmer a simple piece of guy wire will jam it

"This machine just called me an asshole."

"You sure make love like a hero."

I didn't want to get close enough to find out.

From another reply:

https://www.wrightmfg.com/products/mowers/commercial/stand-on/robotic-zk/

Seems it's fully Self-driving (at least, following a map/defined boundaries)

There was a guy who brought it over, but he was not using a remote control. It was automated.

I don't get it, don't you guys have a lawn bot at home? Who in their right mind would mow their lawn by hand these days? Sure, this is scaled up by a considerate amount, but its the same technology (though I imagine this boy uses beacons for navigation as opposed to gps or wire).

Here is an alternative Piped link(s):

https://piped.video/t1__h7vnnKY?si=K-RBu5beMPJYNNMn

Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.

I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.

Starts of nice and calmly, then the editor goes full on with the metal music thrashing for the title sequence. What a trip!

That's the jobs that robots should be replacing people with.

Nah, the guy was still there. He had to bring the robot to the place where it had to mow the lawn and he was observing it to make sure it didn't fuck up. Plus, I'm sure he still had to do stuff like weed whacking, so his job is safe for the time being.

Somebody gained a job programming and servicing that mow-bot; maybe even a whole team. Maybe the original driver wrote the path and manages it now.

I get the sentiment, and agree that there's value in keeping labor jobs reserved for people who need them, but using automation isn't inherently evil.

When my company moved our production operations to automatic lines and robots, they promoted everyone to machine operators, taught new skills, and paid out more. It may not be the way every company handles the change, but it can be done, and it's a better path forward than forcing people to accept a life of hard labor.

I remember placing some large equipment in China some decades ago. There was a crane onsite but instead of using it the Chinese insisted on using many men with bamboo poles. We thought it was odd and hilarious that they had to do such make-work. Now here we are. This is why I litter and don't put my shopping cart away. People need jobs.

Oh no, instead of someone doing mindless busy work, they can now live their own lives all day with no loss in productivity what so ever!

Whatever shall we dooooo!

Why?

It is a combustion engine for sure.

This better not have put someone out of the job

I mowed the lawn, the lawn was mowed, has already been mowed... a freshly-mowed lawn. I'm not sure if I'd ever actually use "mown" as a conjugation of "to mow".

"Mowed" and "mown" are both correct, but I would never use "mown", myself.

It's a past participle.

e.g. "The park or meadow having been newly mown, had an air at once ornamented and natural."

"An 82-year-old great-grandad survived being mown down by a car"

non-native speakers develop a keen intuition for to be able to spot it just to be blind-sided by native speakers not giving a fuck

Yes, that happens.
But does not seem to be, in this case.

Anti Commercial-AI license

The lack of seat is why they fell off!

I was there with a group of parents and kids for a teen meetup. We did think he fell off at first. Then it turned by itself and we were all like "wtf?"

Happy Wheels?

It's mildly interesting if you're from a country that doesn't use these, i.e. the US.

I suppose that's why it's posted in mildly interesting?

Mowing lawns are boring and you look at it the wrong way. In a better future less people have to work their ass off, enjoying more free time to do whatever they want to do. Maybe spend time with your kids, go out fishing, hiking, do whatever. This is a future I want to see and the more jobs "lost" to robots, the better.

Now for this to be true there have to be large changes in how everything works. Basic income is one thing for example. Nobody should be suffering over not working their ass off but we are not there yet and today exactly as you say, there is probably someone who doesn't need more money just getting more cash in their account instead, sadly.