Link: Tesla is hiring people to do the robot

Tesla is hiring people to help train its humanoid Optimus robot using motion capture suits. The role, titled "Data Collection Operator," offers up to $48 per hour and involves walking for over seven hours a day, carrying up to 30 pounds, and wearing a VR headset for extended periods.

Employees must be between 5’7’’ and 5’11’’ tall, similar to Optimus' projected 5’8’’ height. Tesla’s Optimus X account has hinted at the job's demands, and the company has already hired over 50 workers for this position in the past year.

Using motion capture to train robots in human-like movements is common, but Tesla is among the first to attempt this at scale. Optimus, however, may require millions of hours of data before being factory-ready, according to Nvidia researcher Animesh Garg.

Garg estimates that gathering the necessary data could cost up to half a billion dollars. He questions whether even with that investment, success is guaranteed.

This level of training is typical for humanoid robots and their AI systems. Despite Elon Musk's optimistic timeline for "genuinely useful" bots by next year, Optimus seems no closer to completion than similar projects from Boston Dynamics, Figure, and Apptronik. #

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