Companies Brought in Robots. Now They Need Human ‘Robot Wranglers.’


企业引进了机器人，但机器人同样会犯迷糊，于是企业现在需要“机器人看管员”。


斯科特·桑普尔斯是“机器人看管员”这一新兴职业人士中的一员。他在通用家电子公司位于佐治亚州拉斐特的家电制造厂工作。

卡罗琳·鲁滕贝格(Caroline Rutenberg)在康涅狄格州温莎市的亚马逊(Amazon.com)仓库工作。有一天，她收到一条警报，她的一名下属需要帮助。 6park.com
Caroline Rutenberg got an alert one day that one of her charges needed help at the Amazon.com warehouse where she works in Windsor, Conn. 6park.com
   
鲁滕贝格穿过仓库走到另一头，发现这名下属被浇了一身白色油漆，在遭遇了意外泄漏事故后无法移动身体。 6park.com
Rutenberg walked across the warehouse floor and found the crew member covered in white paint and refusing to move after an accidental spill. 6park.com
   
鲁滕贝格拿来一块抹布，轻轻擦掉这名工人眼睛上的油漆，得到的回应是呆滞的、面无表情的凝视。但是她似乎并不指望对方会开口道谢——她的下属是一个机器人，一台带轮子的深蹲机，看起来像是顶部带有传送带的Roomba吸尘器。 6park.com
Rutenberg took a cloth and gently wiped off the worker’s eyes, getting a glassy, expressionless stare in return. But it’s not like she expected a “thank you”—her underling is a robot, a squat machine on wheels that looks like a Roomba vacuum with a conveyor belt on top. 6park.com
   
现在，各种形状、大小和功能的机器人被用来做各种各样的事情，比如在仓库里自动运送货物，以及在大学校园里送餐。根据研究公司Interact Analysis的数据，2023年，大约21%的仓库使用了某种类型的机器人，高于2018年的15%。 6park.com
Robots of various shapes, sizes and functions are now employed doing everything from autonomously ferrying goods around warehouses to delivering food on college campuses. About 21% of warehouses used some form of robotics in 2023, up from 15% in 2018, according to research firm Interact Analysis. 6park.com
   
但是，企业们发现，机器人远不能完全取代人类，它们需要一点指引，才能学会如何在现实世界中发挥作用。 6park.com
But far from replacing humans entirely, companies are finding automatons need a little hand-holding to learn how to function in the real world. 


桑普尔斯为用于自主导航和避障的摄像头除尘。

鲁滕贝格是亚马逊的机器人技术员和培训师，作为一个新出现的工人阶层中的一员，她负责聚集和管理机器人，解决小的维护问题并密切关注机器人的位置。这些专业人士表示，他们管理的机器往往能够精确执行任务，但很多时候也有些天真。 6park.com
Rutenberg, a robot technician and trainer at Amazon, is among a new class of workers responsible for corralling and managing the robots, fixing minor maintenance issues and keeping tabs on their locations. The professionals say the machines they work with tend to perform their tasks with precision but often also a little naiveté. 6park.com
    
鲁滕贝格说，有些设备已经名声在外。她管理的一台自主机器人就以行为总是出差错而闻名，这台设备名为“驱动器”，她叫它Blinky，因为它在需要帮助的时候就会闪灯。 6park.com
Some devices get a reputation, Rutenberg said. One autonomous robot she works with—a device called a drive that she named Blinky for the lights it flashes when it needs help—has become known for its misbehavior. 6park.com
   
她说，当机械臂试图将物品放在Blinky的传送带上时，Blinky会让自己的传送带转动过快，从而导致传送失败。人们一眼就能认出Blinky，因为它比其他机器人移动得更快。 6park.com
When a robotic arm tries to set an item down on Blinky’s conveyor belt, Blinky will move its belt too quickly and bungle the transfer, she said. People recognize Blinky on sight because it zooms around faster than the other bots. 6park.com
   
“每个人都知道它的驱动器编号，人们每次看到它都会说，‘哦，不会吧。又是它，’鲁滕贝格说。“我们算是赋予它们一点个性。” 6park.com
“Everyone knows the drive number of it, and people are like, ‘Oh s—, not again. It’s him again,’” Rutenberg said. “We kind of give them a little personality.” 6park.com
   
笔者无法联系到Blinky置评。 6park.com
Blinky couldn’t be reached for comment.  6park.com
    6park.com
在通用家电(GE Appliances)子公司Roper位于佐治亚州拉斐特的家电制造厂，斯科特·桑普尔斯(Scott Samples)被称为“机器人看管员”。当机器人偏离指定路线时，工厂里的工人就会呼叫桑普尔斯。 6park.com
Scott Samples is known as the “robot wrangler” at an appliance-manufacturing plant run by Roper, a subsidiary of GE Appliances, in LaFayette, Ga. Samples is the person factory workers call when a robot wanders off its designated path.  6park.com
   
他说：“工人们要么给我发送带图片的短信，要么给我打电话，他们会说，‘嘿，你的机器人在这里走错了路线，你能过来让它归位吗？’” 6park.com
“I’ll either get a text with a picture or I’ll get a phone call and they’ll say, ‘Hey, your robot’s over here on such and such line, can you come get it?’” he said.


工厂众多自动机器人中的两台与桑普尔斯合影。他是所有自动机器人的联系人。

Roper有25台形状各异的机器人，用桑普尔斯的话来说，其中一台看起来就像是“装了轮子的南瓜”。这些机器人的任务包括将零部件和材料运送到装配线上以及将成品运走。它们经过编程后会沿着工厂的电子地图行进，并使用摄像头视觉和光线探测及测距技术来保持航线。但偶尔它们会偏离到边界之外，无法在电子地图上给自己定位，就会关机并等待帮助。 6park.com
The 25 robots at Roper—which come in a variety of shapes, including one that Samples says looks like “putting wheels on a pumpkin”—work on tasks such as delivering parts and materials to the assembly line and moving finished products. They are programmed to follow a digital map of the facility and to use camera vision and light detection and ranging technology to stay on course. But occasionally they stray out of bounds, where they can no longer locate themselves on the digital map, shut down and wait for help.  6park.com
    
桑普尔斯说：“我们在一个接收站找到它们，它们就像在公园里迷路的孩子。”还有些时候，他说，机器人会“经过某人的办公桌，或者试图钻到他们的桌子底下”。 6park.com
“We’ve found them on a receiving dock, just lost like a child in the park,” Samples said. Other times the automatons are “over by somebody’s desk or trying to get under their desk,” he said. 6park.com
   
当桑普尔斯接到关于机器人偏离航线的电话时，他会在自己的计算机上调出这台机器人，通过安装在设备上的摄像头和传感器观察周围情况，试图在这家占地面积达140万平方英尺（约13万平方米）的工厂找出这台机器人的具体位置。然后，他会走出办公室，亲自找到这台机器人，并将其引导回边界之内。 6park.com
When Samples gets a call about a robot wandering off, he pulls up that particular bot on his computer and looks out of the cameras and sensors attached to the device to try to figure out where it is within the 1.4 million-square-foot facility. He then goes out, manually finds the robot and guides it back inside its boundaries. 6park.com
   
桑普尔斯说，这家工厂的人类工人给机器人起的名字从赫比(Herbie)到神奇女侠(Wonder Woman)，五花八门，他们通常与这些自动化的同事相处愉快。但有时候，人类和机器之间也会出现对峙。 6park.com
Samples said the facility’s human workers name the robots everything from Herbie to Wonder Woman, and they generally get along with their automated counterparts just fine. But sometimes there are standoffs between the humans and the machines.


工厂一台机器人的屏幕上显示着一条信息。


桑普尔斯指着一份关于JOHNNY5的报告，这台机器人根据电影《短路》中机器人的名字命名。

他说，“如果有东西挡住了去路，这些机器人会做出决定，绕过障碍，但人类工人也会这么做。”这可能会导致这种情况发生：机器人和工人同时试图给对方让路，但总是让成同一边，互相堵住对方的去路。 6park.com
The robots “make a decision if something’s in the way, they’ll go around it, but so will a person,” he said. That can lead to the robot and a person both trying to move out of each other’s way at the same time but repeatedly crossing into one another’s paths. 6park.com
   
桑普尔斯说，这个时候，工人就会告诉他：“这个东西总是跟着我，不让我过去。”他说：“他们不明白机器人行为背后的技术层面。” 6park.com
That’s when workers will tell Samples, “This thing is following me and will not let me by,” he said. “They don’t understand the technical aspect behind the scenes of why it’s behaving the way it is.” 6park.com
    
机器人看管这一新兴领域是为了弥合以往的仓库管理模式和未来的自动化设施之间的缺口，在这个过程中，除了利用机器人搬举物品、运送箱子和打包电子商务订单之外，人类工人也要打卡上班。 6park.com
The nascent field of robot wrangling is an attempt to bridge the gap between the warehouses of the past and the automated facilities of the future, as human workers clock in besides robots that can lift items, carry boxes and package e-commerce orders.  6park.com
   
机器人看管员表示，他们部分工作内容是帮助员工学会如何与机器人一起工作，如何将机器人视为帮手，而非职业生涯中的障碍或威胁。 6park.com
Robot wranglers say part of their job is to help employees learn how to work with the robots, and how to see them as a help rather than a hindrance or a threat to their careers. 


机器人在工厂里四处移动。人与机器之间有时会发生摩擦。

加利福尼亚州奥克兰的机器人工程师肖恩·丘萨克(Sean Cusack)说，传递这样的信息通常并不困难。他说：“人们把机器人想象成类似终结者的完全智能化的东西。”事实上，“它们非常笨。” 6park.com
Sean Cusack, a robot engineer in Oakland, Calif., said conveying that message often isn’t very hard. “People envision robots as these completely intelligent, Terminator-level things,” he said. In reality, “they’re pretty silly,” he said. 6park.com
   
丘萨克参与了洛杉矶卢卡斯叙事艺术博物馆(Lucas Museum of Narrative Art)的建设，负责看管打磨玻璃纤维的机器人。 6park.com
Cusack worked on the construction of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles, overseeing robots responsible for sanding fiberglass.  6park.com
    
一个周末，丘萨克正在加班的时候，他设置好了一台机器人用来打磨材料，然后退回到附近的一个房间进行观察。但是，当这台机器人开始移动时，丘萨克意识到他忘了设置一个关键的控制键。这台机器人沿着一条不可改变的路线直接踏上了一块昂贵的玻璃纤维面板。 6park.com
One weekend when Cusack was working overtime, he set up a robot to sand the material, then retreated to a nearby room to watch. But as the robot began moving, Cusack realized he had forgotten to set a critical control. The bot was on an unalterable path directly into an expensive fiberglass panel.  6park.com
   
他说，这台机器人慢慢地向前爬行，直到它“在面板侧面磨出了一个巨大的圆孔”。他不得不向他的团队解释，由于他没有正确引导机器人，导致了这次价值数十万美元的损失。 6park.com
The robot slowly crawled forward until it “put in a giant circular hole in the side of the panel,” he said. He had to explain to his team the hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of damage was his fault for not properly instructing the bot.


桑普尔斯一直盯着另一名同事。

总部位于旧金山的Starship Technologies的运营主管杰茜·斯托里(Jaci Story)说，机器人可能也有自己的想法。她管理着田纳西大学(University of Tennessee)校园里的一组机器人。这些带轮子的白色盒子在校园里四处移动，为学生递送从汉堡薯条到可乐的各种东西。这些机器人配备了扬声器，可以宣告物品送达并播放音乐。 6park.com
Jaci Story says the robots can have a mind of their own. The operations lead at San Francisco-based Starship Technologies works with a fleet of robots on the University of Tennessee campus, where the white boxes on wheels roll around delivering students items from burgers and fries to coffee. The robots are outfitted with speakers that announce deliveries and play music. 6park.com
    
一天早上，斯托里举起一个机器人，将底部的充电器连接到电源上，为它充电。 6park.com
One morning, Story was lifting up a robot to plug in the charger underneath.  6park.com
    
“当我这么做的时候，其中一台机器人发出了疯狂的尖叫。然后它说，‘哇，哇，你知道的，我们有权利，’她说。“我都快笑死了。” 6park.com
“As I was doing that, one of them just kind of made this crazy sounding scream. And then it said, ‘Whoa, whoa, we have rights you know,’” she said. “I just died laughing.” 6park.com
   
机器人看管员表示，和人类一样，有些机器人的工作能力不如其他机器人。有时候，这些设备必须通过性能改进计划来解决问题行为。 6park.com
Just like with humans, the robot minders say some of their charges are less capable workers than others. At times the devices have to go on performance improvement plans to address problem behaviors.  6park.com
    
Roper的桑普尔斯表示，目前他手上有一台机器人出现了一个尚未找到原因的问题，他和负责处理工程维护工作的团队都无法解决这个问题。这台名叫Apex 2的设备要求更换部件，但即使在更换了部件之后，它还是无法运行。 6park.com
Roper’s Samples said he currently has a robot with an undiagnosed issue that he and the team that handles engineering maintenance work can’t figure out. The device, named Apex 2, is calling for a part replacement, but even now that the part has been replaced, it still won’t run.  6park.com
   
他说：“就连技术人员都无法找出问题所在。我们不得不暂时用一台备用设备来代替它。” 6park.com
“Even the tech can’t figure out what’s wrong with it,” he said. “We’ve had to replace him with a spare for right now.”