NAO, the first built humanoid robot, at a trade fair in Germany in 2018. This is the type of robot that might take your job someday — but a lot of robots right now are just watching you at work. | Alexander Koerner/Getty Images The robot apocalypse is already here, it just looks different than you thought. The robot revolution is always allegedly just around the corner. In the utopian vision, technology emancipates human labor from repetitive, mundane tasks, freeing us to be more productive and take on more fulfilling work.