A humanoid robot just walked 106km from Suzhou to Shanghai. It set a world record. But here's what really matters.
The robot could only walk at night. Between 10pm and 6am. Why? Safety concerns. Unclear road rights. No charging infrastructure along the way.
It can recognize red lights but doesn't know when they'll turn green. It needs a support vehicle following behind for battery swaps. The team had to use "semi-autonomous" mode instead of full autonomy.
This is the real gap between lab demos and deployment. Making a robot jump and do backflips is impressive. Making it walk reliably for hours in unpredictable conditions is engineering.
The robot didn't fall once during the entire journey. That's progress. But society isn't ready yet. No charging stations. No clear rules. No legal framework for where robots should walk.
We're building humanoid robots for the real world. But the real world wasn't built for humanoid robots.