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Comment by monero-xmr | Hacker News Reader

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_predictions_for_auto...

It wasn’t just Elon. The hype train on self driving cars was extreme only a few years ago, pre-LLM. Self driving cars exist sort of, in a few cities. Quibble all you want but it appears to me that “uber driver” is still a popular widespread job, let alone truck driver, bus driver, and “car owner” itself.

I really wish the AI ceos would actually make my life useful. For example, why am I still doing the dishes, laundry, cleaning my house, paying for landscaping, painters, and on and on? In terms of white collar work I’m paying my fucking lawyers more than ever. Why don’t they solve an actual problem

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Because textual data is plentiful and easy to model, and physical data is not. This will change - there are now several companies working on humanoid robots and the models to power them - but it is a fundamentally different set of problems with different constraints.

> I really wish the AI ceos would actually make my life useful.

TBH, I do think that AI can deliver on the hype of making tools with genuinely novel functionality. I can think of a dozen ideas off the top of my head just for the most-used apps on my phone (photos, music, messages, email, browsing). It's just going to take a few years to identify how to best integrate them into products without just chucking a text prompt at people and generating stuff.

Bureaucracy and regulation is the main issue there though.

Like in Europe where you're forced to pay a notary to start a business - it's not really even necessary, nevermind something that couldn't be automated, but it's just but of the establishment propping up bureaucrats.

Whereas LLMs and generative models in art and coding for example, help to avoid loads of bureaucracy in having to sort out contracts, or even hire someone full-time with payroll, etc.

We are going to have an ever-increasing supply of stories along the lines of "used a LLM to write a contract; contract gave away the company to the counterparty; now trying to get a court to dissolve the contract".

Sure you'll have destroyed the company, but at least you'll have avoided bureaucracy.

> Like in Europe

Like in the US you have a choice of which jurisdiction you want to start your company. Not all require a notary

>Like in Europe where you're forced to pay a notary to start a business

Do you have a specific country in mind, as the statement is not true for quite a lot of EU member states... and likely untrue for most of the European countries.

Buy a dishwasher - they're cheap, work really well, and don't use much energy / water.

Same as a washing machine / drier. Chuck the clothes in, press a button, done.

There are Roomba style lawnmowers for your grass cutting.

I'll grant you painting a house and plumbing a toilet aren't there yet!

With the laundry machine and dishwasher, it still requires effort. A human needs to collect the dirty stuff, put it into the machine properly, decide when it should run, load the soap, select a cycle type, start it, monitor the machine to know when it’s done, empty the machine, and put the stuff away properly, thus starting the human side of the process again.

It’s less work than it used to be, but remove the human who does all that and the dirty dishes and clothes will still pile up. It’s not like we have Rosie, from The Jetsons, handling all those things (yet). How long before the average person has robot servants at home? Until that day, we are effectively project managers for all the machines in our homes.

> A human needs to collect the dirty stuff, put it into the machine properly, decide when it should run, load the soap, select a cycle type, start it, monitor the machine to know when it’s done, empty the machine, and put the stuff away properly, thus starting the human side of the process again.

The really modern stuff is pretty much as simple as “load, start, unload” - you can buy combo washing machines that wash and dry your clothes, auto dispense detergent, etc. It’s not folding or putting away your clothes, and you still need to maintain it (clean the filter, add detergent occasionally, etc)… but you’re chipping away at what is left for a human to do. Who cares when it’s done? You unload it when you feel like it, just like every dishwasher.

My understanding is combo machines aren't ideal. But running a load of laundry in a couple separate machines is pretty low effort.

Unload timing on the washer/dryer matters.

Leave things wet in the washer too long and they smell like mold and you have to run it again. Leave them in the dryer too long and they are all wrinkled, and you have to run it again (at least for a little while).

I grew up watching everyone in my family do this, sometimes multiple times for the same load. That’s why I set timers and remove stuff promptly.

The dishwasher I agree, and it’s usually best to leave them in there at least for a little while once it’s done. However, not unloading it means dirty dishes start to stack up on the counter or in the sink, so it still creates a problem.

As far as “load, start, unload” goes. We covered unload, but load is also an issue where some people do have issues. They load the dishwasher wrong and things don’t get clear, or they start it wrong and are left with spots all over everything. Washing machines can be overloaded, or unbalanced. Washing machines and dryers can also be started wrong, the settings need to match the garments being washed. Some clothes are forgiving, others are not. There is still human error in the mix.

> Leave things wet in the washer too long and they smell like mold and you have to run it again. Leave them in the dryer too long and they are all wrinkled, and you have to run it again (at least for a little while).

Not a problem for the two-in-one washer/dryers for the mildew issue, and for the wrinkles, most dryers have a cycle to keep running them intermittently after the cycle finishes for hours to mitigate most of the wrinkling issues. You’ve got a much much longer window before wrinkles are an issue with that setup.

You know what I want? A LM that navigates customer support phone trees for me.

If you want to waste my time with an automated nonsense we should at least even the playing field.

This is feasible with today’s technology.

Sounds like Google Duplex, but I guess they never expanded the tech beyond restaurant reservations.

But on my Pixel now, on some phone trees it shows a UI with numbers and choices, and even predicts ahead for the other choices so you aren't forced to wait. Very handy!

Self-driving cars are required to beep when in reverse. In both San Francisco and San Diego homes near Waymo charging facilities are a nuisance. The neighbors hate the beeping, and they operate late hours, and use things like shop vac cleaners that are loud. Whoever thought of this hates self driving cars and people. There is no way this can work in mixed urban areas.

> In terms of white collar work I’m paying my fucking lawyers more than ever. Why don’t they solve an actual problem

Rule 0 is that you never put your angel investors out of work if you want to keep riding on the gravy train

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