Get $20 an hour to walk robot dogs, no work experience needed: San Francisco startup has an unusual job offer, but there is a catch

Imagine walking down a San Francisco street and spotting someone taking a robot dog for a stroll. It might look like an unusual experiment or a scene from a science-fiction film, but for one startup, it is part of a job. Dimensional, an artificial intelligence (AI) startup, is offering people $20 an hour to walk robotic dogs around the city. The role does not require previous work experience or robotics knowledge, and the company is also offering paid training. However, there is one catch.

The company is hiring people to operate four-legged machines on outdoor testing routes lasting between four and six hours. According to The New York Times, the job advertisement appeared in the Facebook group Bay Area Jobs earlier this month but the listing has since been deleted.

What makes this robot dog walking job different?

Unlike traditional dog walkers, people taking up this assignment will be working with machines weighing approximately 33 pounds (15 kg). The robots can sometimes overheat or stop working during outdoor testing. When that happens, the human operator is expected to carry the machine back to the company's office in San Francisco's Dogpatch neighbourhood.


Workers use a handheld remote or a mobile application to guide the robots along designated routes. The machines, meanwhile, have cameras and sensors that record information about their surroundings.

The original job advertisement promised paid training and payment after every completed shift. As per New York Times, it also stated, "Start right away and get paid right after each completed shift. Paid training is included."

Why does the startup needs people?

There is a larger purpose behind the unusual job. Dimensional is working on an open-source operating system designed to let AI agents control robots and eventually perform physical tasks with minimal human involvement.

The company wants its technology to help robots work in environments such as factories, data centres and construction sites. However, getting AI systems to operate physical machines independently remains a challenge.

Dimensional founder Stash Pomichter, 26, told The New York Times, "What we determined from our dog-walking experiment was that agents are still very bad at controlling hardware." He added, "And humans are still needed in the loop."

By having people guide the robots through city streets, the startup can collect real-world navigation data and examine how the machines respond to their surroundings. This information can help improve the AI systems controlling them.