iRobot is likely to collapse within 12 months.
iRobot is likely to collapse within 12 months.
: We're doomba, say Roomba goombas, unless...
Troubled robot vacuum-cleaner maker iRobot, abandoned by Amazon after regulators effectively doomed the web giant's takeover offer, has warned investors it may not survive the next 12 months.
It would be great if more smart devices had a LAN-only control mode like my 3D printer, TV and AV receiver.
I would be perfectly happy if my iRobot phone app only worked from inside my network.
At that point, I wouldn't trust ANY device that cannot be controlled locally, either natively or at least through some hacks.
Tried several of those vacuums but none really worked that well
Have you tried Roborock? It's an amazing vacuum and connects very well inside Home Assistant.
I'm a bit of a diy and repair nerd for damned near anything. I have a near 20 year old roomba 530 model that still works great. Back then and for a good many years roombas were hands down the best bang for your buck. I haven't recommended them for the past decade. They fell behind in ability and build quality. Let alone any of the privacy concerns stuff. Damned shame.
Mozilla gave them an OK privacy rating. Not great, but not terrible.
Patiently awaiting Congress to ban any Chinese robot vacuums out of national security risk
Had an old one that kinda works but is a pain. More recently, we splurged on a more modern pet version with Wi-Fi and all the bells.
It was fantastic. And 3 weeks in, couldn't stay connected to the network even right beside the router and was doing constant very short runs before returning to the dock saying it was full.
Returned it.
(I know I didn't contribute shit & just complain but) ... isn't it a bit weird how after all this time there arent any good open sauce diy robot kits?
Like, materials, sensors, brushes, filters, batteries, etc are all cheaply available, a basic board could literally be just cut plywood with the rest is the things mounted on top (who even needs a cover?). And ofc one could mount various weapons mod on it.
I love DIY tech projects and yet I would never go through the effort to make a robot vacuum because vacuuming is already the easiest chore in the house. You kinda just stand there and go swoop swoop swoop a few times. Takes like 3 minutes to do an entire room. As opposed to listening to the robot vacuum rumble around for an hour and do a half ass job, if it even finishes without getting spooked by a shadow thinking it’s a 100ft cliff
Yes, we all need to manage our lives & our shortcomings.
I like vacuum cleaning chore too, but can have periods when my brainhole just won't register the todo.Got a good deal on a Roomba, I have a shark with HEPA filter and all, very good vacuum. I can vacuum, then let the Roomba run, and it still finds shit. I like it, especially for pet hair. Only thing I don't like is it's random pattern, mine doesn't map the room, refuse to get one with a camera.
Popular Science had an "open source" robot lawnmower plans in the...80s? I have it somewhere. Old enough that it used deep cycle lead-acid batteries and spinning round dremel blades. No laser to cut the grass, although it did use LEDs for sensors for grass height.
There is https://valetudo.cloud/ for a lot of existing models, it's about the closest thing we have.
Go ahead and make one then. Nobody is stopping you from being the first.
... I'm that, my best is what is stopping me :(.
What about LEGO Mindstorms? Does that count?
I mean, I don't demand an open source washing machine or dryer either.
Ok, but that would be amazing.
Imagine the ability to actually define your own cycles.
Tho how most are built, that shouldn't be that hard with a little arduino.
yes but they don't need a cloud service, neither scanning your home to function
Hmm so this entire trick of setting up companies just to be bought by mega corps appears to be not a viable strategy if anti trust law is enforced?
Hmm as if last 30 years of corpo behavior has been essentially to maintain mega corp dominance via captured regulators and legislators
We got the capitalism alright but where is the free market at, daddy?
setting up companies just to be bought by mega corps
iRobot was originally founded all the way back in 1990 and have sold quite a lot of Roomba vacuums, advancing innovation in home automation along the way. I don’t think anyone can ever say that they set up this company for a quick flip corpo pump and dump.
Don't worry, the new strategy is to string a company along with talks of a buyout, then when their cash runs out and they declare bankruptcy, to buy all the assets on fire sale.
oh its free alright. for oligarchs to do whatever the fuck they want.
You just gotta be big enough that you can buy enough people. FAANG is there (though this is Wild West politics nowadays so who the fuck knows what’s gonna happen). But when you own the people writing the laws to control you… they’re not controlling you.
Pretty much inevitable. Nowadays there are so many robot vacuum cleaners from different brands, and everyone has more or less figured out the tech so they all work pretty well. (I have a Roborock, and have nothing to say about it other than it keeps the floors clean and doesn't cause me any grief.) There's no moat, so consumer market success is purely a matter of manufacturing and cost efficiency, and iRobot obviously would have a huge upfill fight against Samsung, Xiaomi, and a thousand other light consumer goods makers.
I bought a roborock Q Revo the other week, and it works great at vacuuming and mopping.
I changed its spoken language to Chinese though, to remind me who I'm living with.
I thought this was a funny gag, until I changed my router and wifi, and then had to update the robots wifi connection with all the voice prompts in chinese
i bought a roomba 2 years ago. It wasnt the cheapest, but it was the only company that isnt some cheap, chinese knockoff brand. American designed and operated still had some advantages for me at the time.
This was before USA plunged into facism though. Now i'm not sure what i would buy.
Another company squandering their patents and market advantage. Reminds me of TiVo.
I love my TiVo. I had to find someone to repair my current unit because it's an antenna version. They don't have/make new antenna versions.
This. I know someone who used to work there. They wouldn’t enforce the patents in China to the point where you could drop in Roomba subassemblies in competitor robots and they would still work…
Their products require their app, would this effectively turn their devices useless when the servers die?
I know it supports a single button to start cleaning, but I wonder if that will work properly without being able to call home.
Might be time for people to look for alternatives.
Requires an app? As soon as Amazon bought it, mine has never again connected to an app or the internet.
It usually has a big start button on it'
I assume this will brick all Roombas past the 800 series. All the scheduling, advanced mapping features etc are hosted on AWS. You’ll be able to press clean to start but that’s pretty much it… That’s unless they open up their software which they probably won’t
You can root a lot of the earlier ones.
The alternatives are Chinese, or vacuum your own floors... Nobody wants to do that
I’ve got a Samsung that works just fine completely offline with no app. I don’t need some app to block it from going somewhere I just put some things in the way. Takes 3 minutes to prep for it driving around.
my first thought was aren't they a part of the Military Industrial Complex, how could they possibly go bankrupt? It turns out they sold off that part of their business in 2016 to private equity. Oops.
Do you not see the logic of my plan?
Yes, but it just seems too heartless.I’m glad my old, non-smart one still works fine. It slams into things and says, “Roomba needs help” or something when it eats a sock or wire I missed. But at least it will outlast the company’s servers.
Any European alternatives?
Electrolux.
I rarely use mine, but can I block them from using the Internet and they'll still work?
Nice. Might buy one when it’s on sale for $30
Not trying to make this sound like nyah, nyah or anything...
But here's where I'm glad I never got into that genre of "robotic" assistants. Happy to clean my floors by hand, thank you.
Wonder what kind of illumination this situation might be shining on the current "AI assistant" craze...?? 🤷♂️ 🤷♂️
My robo cleaner is just not connected to the internet... No app, no one can kill it remotely...
IMO, this thing was one of my best investments ever. Saved me days of time...
I’ve got pets and just having the hair off the floors on a regular basis without having to spend 20 min a day hauling a vacuum around strikes me as being a nice labor savings. But I haven’t sprung for one yet.
Have dog, considered same.
But, I live alone and don't bother to vacuum everyday.
Haven't yet found the cost/benefit to be worth it. 🤷♂️