Former NFL quarterback and civil rights activist Colin Kaepernick took the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 on Wednesday to discuss the challenges people face when trying to disrupt – each in the world of technology and beyond.

“One of the biggest challenges you’re probably going to face when you try to disrupt something – or you try to do something you’re passionate about and you end up disrupting something in the process, is that you’re going to encounter a lot of resistance,” Kaepernick said. “There are going to be hard times and in those moments you want to have people you can lean on, people who can support you and that really gives you that resilience.”

Kaepernick isn’t any stranger to disrupting the establishment, having made national headlines in 2016 when he took a knee to protest racial injustice. The former NFL star says that while he faced quite a lot of resistance, he also saw the have to create a greater and more equitable future.

“When you do that and you see such a strong reaction, you really gain perspective and insight,” Kaepernick said. “We have a protracted road ahead of us. But on the other hand, what I learned during this era, there are also many individuals who wish to go this great distance with you, and I feel the most beautiful thing about it’s that there was resistance to there was also quite a lot of organization.”

As someone who has had 1000’s of stories written about him, he now desires to help creators take control of their narratives with Lumi. The startup’s goal is to empower creators by helping them create and publish stories and content on their very own.

As for founders trying to pivot and explore their passions, Kaepernick had some advice.

“Do you do your homework and know why you do what you do,” he said. “And secondly, once you know it, go after it with passion and go after it with everything you have and take people with you. I wouldn’t be sitting here today, and none of you would know me at all, if it weren’t for the many people who have helped me, and that includes everyone from my wife to family and friends, teammates, coaches, some of them investors and advisors , whom I met along the way. So keep these people with you because it builds us up and makes us sustainable in the long run.”

Zoox co-founder and CTO Jesse Levinson doesn’t imagine Tesla will launch a robot transportation service in California (or anywhere else) next 12 months, despite what Elon Musk recently claimed.

“The fundamental problem is that they don’t have the technology that works,” Levinson said Wednesday at the TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 conference. “I also want to make a distinction between a driver-assist system that drives most of the time — except when it doesn’t work, and then you have to take over — compared to a system that is so reliable and robust that no person is needed.”

Levinson went further and specifically noted Tesla’s decision to rely solely on cameras to support its driver assistance system. “Our perspective is that it really will take much more hardware than Tesla installs in its vehicles to build a robotaxi that is not only as safe, but especially safer than a human,” he said.

Levinson’s comments come just weeks after Musk unveiled a prototype of Tesla’s so-called robotics “Cybercab.” Musk also announced at the Cybercab conference that Tesla wants to start out enabling Model 3 sedans and Model Y SUVs to operate as robots in California and Texas by the end of 2025.

Levinson said he uses Tesla’s self-driving (supervised) software “every few weeks.” And while he called it “impressive,” he also said he found it “a little stressful.”

“He usually does something good and then he kind of lulls you into a false sense of complacency and then he does something bad,” he said. “You think: Oh my God!”

Levinson further added that he believes FSD is “about 100 times less safe than a human if you look at all publicly available metrics.” (Tesla releases quarterly safety reports claim that driver assistance systems cause fewer accidents than cars without them – although these are self-reported statistics criticized as selective.)

The comments about Tesla got here as Levinson announced that Zoox will launch a custom-built robotaxi in the San Francisco and Las Vegas markets in the coming weeks. The company plans to make them available in the Early Rider program in 2025.

Boston Dynamics’ latest humanoid is quietly and leaps and bounds improving behind the scenes. It was announced in April, and in August we got a transient insight into the ability of the electric Atlas with a video of the robot doing push-ups. The latest moviereleased Wednesday, shows the robot doing work in an illustration space, moving engine parts between containers.

Boston Dynamics is quick to notice that actions are performed autonomously, without “prescribed or remotely controlled movements.” This disclaimer is seemingly a shadow solid over other humanoid demonstrations which were misleading in an try and attract attention online.

The video comes two weeks after Hyundai’s robotics company announced a landmark agreement with the Toyota Research Institute. It’s unclear how much of the three-minute video is the results of this partnership, which sees TRI bring impressive robotics learning capabilities and real-time adaptations to the platform.

Boston Dynamics notes: “The robot is capable of detect and reply to changes within the environment (e.g., moving equipment) and operational errors (e.g., cover not in place, tripping, collision with the environment) using a mix of vision, force, and proprioceptive sensors “

As with competitors like Figura, Tesla and Apptronik, Boston Dynamics’ first applications for the two-legged robot include work in car factories. This focus is sensible considering the corporate is currently owned by Hyundai, which has decided to strike a cope with Toyota’s research wing. The automotive industry has also been well ahead of the automation curve for many years.

In addition to autonomously performing tasks, the video shows off the impressive adaptive — and powerful — actuators because the robot rotates on the waist. The motion minimizes movements, saving precious seconds in the method.