Neato Botvac 80 (Refurbished)
Our Take
- Keep your house spotless with this robotic indentured servant - Schedule cleanings for what you’re gone, or push a button and watch the little robot dance – dance, we say! - Eliminate dust, pet hair, and other floor dirt stuff- Includes charging base, charge cord, combo brush, high performance filter, side brush, battery (pre-installed, and also brand new), boundary marker, and something else … oh yeah, a robot vacuum - Give it any name you choose, including Gertrude, Tabatha, Francisco, Earl, and Mr. Roboto- Model: 945-0135 (There’s no better way to ensure your model number faces stiff search result competition than giving it the same format as a freaking phone number)
Welcome to the age of robotics!
Thats what we would have said over 10 years ago when we first sold a robotic vacuum (under another monosyllabic nonsense name). At the time it seemed like home automation robots were on the verge of ubiquity. If robots could automatically vacuum our carpets, after all, what couldnt they do?Not much, it turns out. In the intervening decade weve experienced the rise of the smartphone, the advent of machine learning, and the development of the self-driving car. But if youre buying a robot for your home, its probably still one that sweeps up crumbs.After the moon landing, everybody thought wed be visiting Mars in the near future, then colonizing it. Epcot Center stands as a weird/cute/sad testament to this belief. But we didnt send a human to Mars in the following decades, nor do we have any (real) plan to anytime soon, unless you believe ol Musky. The Space Age was a dud.Robotics are still advancing, for sure. Earlier this week Alibaba CEO and martian Jack Ma suggested we stop training workers for manufacturing jobs since robots would soon be taking that over. But we dont hear much about new robots for the home anymore. Turns out that smartphone manufacturing is an easier process to automate than cleaning the bathroom.Does that mean you shouldnt buy a robotic vacuum? On the contrary! For one thing, these vacuums may be the only robots we get to own in our lifetime, so you should seize the opportunity to own a little electronic servant. For another thing, were selling one today so of course we think you should buy one.And 10 years from now well likely look back at 2017 as an adorably bright-eyed period of technological optimism:How cute they thought VR was going to catch on!Isnt it quaint they thought self-driving cars would ever work?How naive of them to think their robot vacuums wouldnt rise up and enslave humanity!
