Even robots get tired!

The Tesla Optimus robot has once again become an internet star – and, unfortunately, not because of its “superpowers”, but because it spectacularly fell on its back right during the event. If robots had Instagram, this moment would have already become its most embarrassing Reels.

The incident happened at a presentation in Miami, where Optimus was supposed to play the role of a neat drink server. And everything was going quite decently until the robot suddenly raised its arms in front of itself, as if someone had panicked and ripped a VR headset off it. The next action is pure absurd theater: Optimus simply falls onto its back, without even trying to stay upright, as if someone had pressed the “off” button.

This is where the most interesting part begins. Tesla has been caught several times showing that their “fully autonomous” humanoid robots are actually controlled by remote operators through AR/VR systems. Essentially, it’s the technological version of the old trick: “Look, it walks by itself!” – until a hand with a controller peeks out from backstage.

Witnesses claim that the fall happened at the exact moment when the operator who controlled the robot, judging by the characteristic hand movement, literally “took off the VR glasses”. For a human – a short pause. For the robot – the loss of all life orientation, after which it obediently collapses onto its back like a puppet whose strings have been released. This gesture, which Optimus repeated mechanically, became direct evidence that it was manually controlled right until the moment of the fall.

It is worth noting that in the process of training robotics, Tesla indeed uses telepresence mode: operators move, robots copy, sensors collect data. This is standard practice in the industry. The problem is something else: at presentations such robots must at least create the illusion of autonomy. However, in reality, operators are used not for training but to prevent accidents when the robot interacts with real people, objects, or, as in this case, beverages.

But this very attempt to “play it safe” backfired on Tesla: the moment the operator got distracted for just one second, the demo turned into a circus-style fall right in front of the audience.

One would like to believe that the operators of the famous Tesla robotaxis are different – the kind who at least don’t step out for a smoke break in the middle of a workday. Although after this video, even that hope sounds overly optimistic.

The video fragment of the incident can be viewed in our Telegram channel.