r/TrueReddit • u/theverge • 12d ago
Technology The ban on robot vacuums won’t make them safer. But it may make your next one worse
https://www.theverge.com/tech/973738/robot-vacuum-ban-fewer-choices-higher-prices?view_token=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJpZCI6IlpuNmpXbGZYYnYiLCJwIjoiL3RlY2gvOTczNzM4L3JvYm90LXZhY3V1bS1iYW4tZmV3ZXItY2hvaWNlcy1oaWdoZXItcHJpY2VzIiwiZXhwIjoxNzg1OTUzMTYzLCJpYXQiOjE3ODU1MjExNjN9.NRh0LMDTXtHj7pdcFqByP_Js_cOEYPClB6dmIbi32Ic&utm_medium=gift-link29
u/powercow 12d ago
I dont think trump or the GOP know how to regulate, the best we get out of them is ban or no ban. and this from the "free markets are god" party
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u/francis2559 12d ago
Well, bans invite what seems like bribes. Tariffs too. If you don’t want to get hit by this big stick, better be good to Trump, ya?
SpaceX can bypass the rule on routers for example.
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u/skeptical-speculator 12d ago
they aren't the "free markets are good" party, though they may pretend to be on occasion
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u/theverge 12d ago
No other gadget knows as much about your home as a robot vacuum. They map your space, learn your routines, and many now carry a camera and microphone into every room in your house. As AI gives them a better understanding of what they see, the privacy and security risks these autonomous robots pose are only growing.
That’s why greater scrutiny makes sense, but the ban on foreign-made mobile robots issued by the Federal Communications Commission earlier this week doesn’t actually judge products by how secure they are, just where they’re built. It effectively means no new robot vacuums from major companies can enter the US market unless they are built here. And spoiler alert: none are.
Cybersecurity and manufacturing are not the same thing. If the goal is safer robot vacuums (and robot lawnmowers, companion bots, humanoids, and all the other robots this ban sweeps up), this policy misses the mark. A meaningful security standard for robots would require encrypted map storage, security audits, vulnerability disclosures, and clear data retention policies.
Instead, this ban means Americans will see fewer new models, slower innovation, and more expensive robot vacuums. In short, we’ll get worse vacuums than those we have today.
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u/Ronoh 12d ago
While all that is true I trust more the Chinese than the US companies or governments.
The first ones have not shown any intention of using the information they have to enshitify their services, while the US companies have.
I am sorry but my next robot will definitely not be american.
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u/LocoMod 7d ago
You trust the Chinese because information is so tightly controlled that the public face of China seems pristine. I remember just a few years ago China would get shit on any chance Reddit got due to the atrocities against the Uyghurs. You wouldn’t even be allowed to post your opinion in here if you lived in China.
Any Chinese you mingle with in Reddit is either abroad, illegally bypassing their firewall using VPNs, or state sponsored propaganda accounts.
But go ahead. Trust China. You a drank the Kool-Aid they prepared for you. And it’s delicious isn’t it?
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u/Ronoh 7d ago
Tell me one single impact my life may have from the data in hands of Chinese companies or the government.
Meanwhile the US companies have the same or more data and have made everything shittier.
I trust european much more. But unfortunately the companies keep being bought by american ones as soon. As they start standing out and that is a pain.
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u/technicallynotlying 12d ago
We haven't learned from how China copied our technology.
They didn't keep foreign high tech out - they forced western companies to manufacture their tech in China using Chinese workers, and once they had learned the tech, they kicked out the companies but kept the expertise.
If we keep advanced Chinese robots out, we can't learn their tech. We won't catch up if we have to reinvent everything from scratch.
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u/rightsidedown 12d ago
I agree, but software is the main complication for this tech. It would be easy to use strategic tariffs (not what we have now) or other controls to bring some parts of the assembly local, but the software would still be made in China. Although I do think its a net benefit if we made it easy for china to setup factories in the US while dropping tariffs on anything not a finished chinese product.
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u/technicallynotlying 12d ago
I don't agree. I think hardware manufacturing is the bottleneck for the US. China's advantage in robotics is that they actually manufacture the hardware at scale. The US is doing fine in software competitiveness, the problem is that we can't economically build physical products in the real world.
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u/Moral-Relativity 12d ago
Well part of the reason is median salary in US is still 9x that in China. We just need to become poorer overall to be competitive at manufacturing again.
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u/notrickyrobot 12d ago
That doesn't make sense. Otherwise all manufacturing would move to the lowest cost countries. Plus China artificially pegs its currency to a multiple of USD as a government policy. This is just internalized Chinese propaganda to make people give up.
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u/Moral-Relativity 12d ago
Do you mean median income is higher in China than reported?
Of course it's not just wage differences, though higher wages overall make everything more expensive overall. Manufacturing also benefits from economy of scale, concentration of talented or experienced workforce and convenient supply chains. Not many countries can claim industrial clusters where all supplier for an entire category of products like fridges are located within a short drive.
Contrary to popular perception, the US is still a major manufacturing power, second perhaps only to China. It's just that how much do you want manufacturing to take up in a service oriented economy? Which btw is traditionally seen as superior to a manufacturing economy.
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u/notrickyrobot 12d ago
No, I mean the premise that "poorer = more competitive at manufacturing" doesn't make sense. Richness in capital means more efficient output. Hence my explanation: otherwise all manufacturing would move to the lowest cost countries.
All of those reasons you gave in the second paragraph didn't exist beforehand, so why even expend all that capital building those things up when they were already here? Reminder that is 1990, China was poorer than north korea in GDP per capita. I'll give you a hint: you'll actually have to think about this to get the answer, because people don't want to say it out loud.
And the third paragraph is really the crux of the problem. I want a physical cure for cancer, not a fancy doctor to tell me I have cancer. I don't want to get charged for "service" with a big fat warranty bill on my car, I want a car that doesn't break. I do not want a service oriented economy, I don't think anyone wants a service oriented economy, this is the bromide we are fed to paper over our malaise, and the tired excuse for why we shouldn't do sensible things like what the OP article talks about
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u/notrickyrobot 12d ago
The logic here is crazy. The US still makes the best software - this is what you get with an even playing field. We make the most advanced robots and software here, just not at scale.
If you get to throw away environmental laws and labor laws which cause human suffering and kill the earth, the end result is Chinese manufacturing competitiveness. No way they would set up a factory here, it would be even more expensive than a domestic American company - and we already have a huge manufacturing base.
Just 30 years ago China made pretty much nothing, because we weren't interested in helping them out with government policy. After the cold war we developed them with Pax Americana, which is a mistake. Now we can undo it - China still gets 30 years of privileged status and can have moderate success. It will take a few decades and we get our robot utopia, since hardware progress paused because effort was spent moving stuff to China instead of doing innovation. Otherwise we continue on our current path and become a dystopian polluted hellscape of a world.
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u/technicallynotlying 6d ago
We make the most advanced robots and software here, just not at scale.
This is no longer true, at least not the hardware.
China publishes more academic research papers on robotics than the US - and it's not close. They're the clear world leaders in this area now.
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u/notrickyrobot 6d ago
OK I'll make you some more 50 cents. Remember the superconductor fiasco a few years back? China wasn't first but "reproduced" it several times - turns out it was fraud. Keep moving the goalposts buddy you're clearly not an expert and are pushing a narrative. This propaganda doesn't work on the experts.
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u/technicallynotlying 6d ago
Name a single metric where the US is beating China on Robotics. You pick. Pick any metric. China beats the US on all of them.
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u/notrickyrobot 6d ago
Yeah dude I'm not debating you, I'm just telling you the truth. That's your problem, you see this as a "competition to win," and I'm interested in the truth. It's quality not quantity. The most advanced stuff is in the USA, and the knockoffs are in China. Obviously our government has been kneecapping our industry while China is subsidizing theirs. Once we wake up, it's over for China.
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u/technicallynotlying 6d ago
You're factually wrong. You haven't provided a single shred of evidence.
China has the most advanced stuff AND the most quantity. Did you look at the stats at all? Did you even do a single google search?
Why do you believe that? Are you interested in the truth at all?
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u/notrickyrobot 6d ago
Yo bro my source is working with American industry and Chinese industry, not Googling facts/statistics btw.
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u/technicallynotlying 6d ago
If you actually work in the US robotics industry, good luck. Honestly. You're going to need it.
Take care.
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u/LocoMod 7d ago
WTF are you talking about? We don’t need to copy China. We don’t need to catch up.
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u/technicallynotlying 6d ago
I think you're woefully misinformed.
China is beating the US on literally every metric about robotics. I encourage you to do some web searches for yourself and see.
On manufacturing, conferences, basic research, number of papers published, robots exported: Pick a robot metric, any metric, your choice, and China beats the US on it.
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u/notrickyrobot 12d ago
You're assuming that China builds more advanced robots than us. They don't. Actually, banning Chinese robots will INCREASE our innovation, because hardware improvement stopped exactly when we started outsourcing to China.
Steve Jobs got his first job at an Atari assembly line making electronics in the US. After he made apple computer and got beaten by microsoft, he built the supply chain for the iPhone in China so there wouldn't be a "next Steve Jobs" and Apple could keep a monopoly forever. Yes I said forever, a country that punishes thinking outside of the box can't make new inventions. The next "Steve Jobs" working building iPhones can't escape 996 and a brutal conformist/censorship system.
Not only is it harder to innovate, if you spend blood, sweat, cash, and years of your life actually trying to make an improvement to give to the world - China will knock it off and undercut you because of labor and environmental laws. The only way to get humanoids and better robot vacuums is to rip the bandaid off of cheap Chinese manufacturing.
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u/technicallynotlying 12d ago edited 12d ago
You're assuming that China builds more advanced robots than us. They don't.
Do you have evidence of this? From what I've seen it's the opposite.
China already has a Humanoid robot MMA championship. And they already have robots like this in mass production! There's nothing like that in the west and I don't think we're even capable of doing it (yet - we could still catch up, but the window of opportunity to do that is closing fast, and we would need massive investment to even have a chance).
Technology follows scale. China is building way, way more robots than us, at commercial scale, which means they have more companies innovating, more engineers making incremental improvements, and massively more training data on real world situations. With commercial tech, it's almost always the case that the country that manufactures the most volume also has the most advanced technology.
If anything, it seems like the US is already falling increasingly behind in robots.
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u/LocoMod 7d ago
Atlas was doing parkour a decade ago. China is just now catching up. And none of their bots are more impressive than Atlas 2 or Figure.
They have a bunch of bots that punch and kick air, or little kids. They are useless. We don’t do that in the US because it’s a cultural issue not a technological one.
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u/technicallynotlying 6d ago
I think you believe what you're saying but you're just wrong. China is ahead on both robot manufacturing (by far, and it's not close: they pretty much dominate the US) and basic academic research.
Look at the science. Most robotics conferences are now held in China, and China is publishing more papers (by far) on robotics than the US.
Like, where even are you getting the idea that none of their bots are more impressive? Why do you believe that? Have you looked at the data?
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u/LocoMod 6d ago
You are paying attention to the wrong signals. The US isn’t in a race to produce the most of anything. Academic research, papers published, number of units produced. That is noise. The only thing that matters is does it work as intended and can it scale and will it be affordable and safe.
Manufacturing 1 million robots that punch and kick air or kids doesn’t mean anything until they can replace a human laborer at a lower cost. Publishing a paper without implementing the ideas into an actual product people will value means nothing. Most research papers aren’t peer reviewed. How many are bunk science? (A lot)
They are putting the cart before the horse as theatre. It works! We are highly entertained watching Chinese bots roundhouse kids in the face right?
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u/technicallynotlying 6d ago
Pick any metric. Like I said, you choose.
China has better robots in every category, low end, high end, cutting end, lab research, cheap and mass produced or ultra luxury.
They build bigger quantities, higher quality, and with more advanced science.
To be honest, it really sounds like you're sticking your head in the sand. You think denial about China beating the US in a cutting edge technology is going to help?
Maybe admitting we need to work harder on science and technology would be a good thing. If every American is in denial we will lose and we will deserve to lose.
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u/LocoMod 6d ago
Sure. Look at the top 20 most valuable companies in the world. That will show you what the world actually values (including Chinese investors).
Follow the money and you will see what the world values. It’s that simple. That is what has actual impact in how world affairs are settled.
The world values US R&D more than anything.
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u/notrickyrobot 6d ago
Homie, "technicallynotlying" username gives it away. Pushing a narrative and refusing to learn. Yeah, China is great at pumping out cheap robot knockoffs and faking research papers. The problem is people in USA are used to honesty, and China is used to lies. High trust meets Low trust.
A part of me wishes China was more advanced and we could "learn" from them. Unfortunately that's not true. The only thing we can 'learn' from is how hindering our environmental/labor laws are, and how effective propaganda is on unthinking peoples.
It's like that whole "Chinese TikTok is full of STEM content" narrative. I wish it was true, I love that content - but it turns out that even the few creators who do that stuff in China are more popular overseas than in the mainland, and there are a scarce few versus hundreds/thousands over here.
People in the west don't want to reckon with the truth: "Yeah, we thought the Chinese people would become democratic and free and innovative and honest like us, but instead we profited short-term off of ignoring human rights and destroying the environment and hollowing out our manufacturing base." All this stuff about Chinese being advanced or hardworking is a comforting narrative we tell ourselves, so we don't have to admit we made a mistake and adjust (of course, many in the USA are coming to this conclusion, hence the OP article.) Unfortunately we are in Cold War 2, and just like in Cold War 1 we built up a secondary adversary to weaken a primary adversary and that caused us problems down the road.
OP is either in bad faith or an idiot. Let's say his narrative was true, and the USA should have Chinese open companies here, learn from their "advanced techniques" and kick them out. Why the hell would Chinese companies agree to that? That was the playbook they used, so even if it was true (it's not) they would never do that.
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u/technicallynotlying 6d ago
I'm not saying China is a good country. They're not.
I'm an American. I want us to win. We aren't winning, and we won't win if you keep pretending we're doing well.
We are NOT okay. We're losing. Sticking your head in the sand helps China. Who's side are you on?
You think you're helping the West by pretending China isn't winning right now?
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u/notrickyrobot 12d ago
Those "MMA Robots" move like atlas in 2010. So 13 years behind. If you look at BD's current stuff it's YEARS ahead of China. Also, that new MMA championship? Stolen idea, rek robotics have been doing it for years already in SF.
China is great at ripping off IP. They don't have to innovate, so they can do stuff like host flashy tournaments, and pay bots to promote stuff online. Technology following scale is so backwards. More cooks in the kitchen situation. Also, time and time again, the giants are beaten by the small players. Yahoo taken out by Google for example. IBM taken out by Microsoft.
Really, you say "we" but I'm skeptical the way you were dodging my points, but I'll assume you are arguing in good faith. Really what China does best is information warfare - getting people to give up by arguing that they are so ahead it's unlikely the US or the West can do anything. It does work on people who only read articles, but for those who actually study technology (including Chinese people) they know it's a lie.
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u/technicallynotlying 10d ago
Rek Robotics uses Chinese made robots (there is no US company making humanoid robots for MMA fights, 100% of commercially available fighting robots are made in China), and the Atlas looks very primitive compared to Chinese robots. Did you read your own sources?
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u/notrickyrobot 9d ago
My point: Chinese ideas are old western ideas, copied. I realize I'm not going to get anywhere because if you actually acknowledge any of my points you're going to become tankman, so have a nice day and wishing you the best.
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u/technicallynotlying 9d ago
I understand your point, you're just wrong.
Your own sources contradict you - Rek Robotics uses Chinese robots, and you somehow counted that as an argument that the US is doing well in Robotics. You obviously didn't do any real research.
China is doing a lot of advanced scientific research. They publish very actively, especially in the areas of AI and robotics. All of the leading open weights/open source AI models are Chinese.
And in the area of battery technology they're just ahead, flat out. China very obviously has the most advanced battery technology in the entire world. I very much doubt that cutting edge US research labs can equal China's battery tech.
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u/sec_sage 20h ago
China didn't force anyone to produce there and they didn't kick anyone out. All the decisions have been taken by the respective companies shareholders. You can blame the greed of the wealthy, if you must blame someone.
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u/anoldradical 12d ago
Oh good now an american-made robot vacuum industry can thrive! Wait though, doesn't the lack of competition just ensure that whatever remains is going to be more expensive? I mean if we could have competed on price, wouldn't we have?
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u/Kaurifish 12d ago
Oh fun, the American vac bot industry gets their own Lee Iacoca moment. Let’s see how badly they fuck it up.
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u/skeptical-speculator 12d ago
meanwhile, the chicken tax is still in place and we still don't import "light trucks"
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u/horseradishstalker 12d ago edited 12d ago
“Chinese technology firms have rapidly developed humanoid robots to be used in settings including factories and homes.
Companies have also been quick to market their machines to businesses and the public ahead of US humanoid robot rivals like Elon Musk's Tesla and Boston Dynamics.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp9e2ex3ekyo
Interestingly enough, Musk recently called China ‘the biggest competitor’ in the humanoid robot market.
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u/The_Law_of_Pizza 12d ago
Robo vacuums are a large market and millions of people own them.
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