Can't publish data on gazebo_ros_control command topics

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Hello ROS community!

I am trying to follow this gazebo tutorial on ros_control in order to control the links of a custom robot model. I am using ROS1 and gazebo 11.11.0 on ubuntu 20.04.04 LTS.

I was able to spawn my robot in gazebo and control it using gazebo's force controllers (right hand side tab) and it behaved the way I expected. Naturally the next step was to control it through ROS as I said above.

The problem is that even though i can see the new /microbot topics with rostopic list

rellum@yoga:~$ rostopic list 
/clock
/gazebo/link_states
/gazebo/model_states
/gazebo/parameter_descriptions
/gazebo/parameter_updates 
/gazebo/performance_metrics
/gazebo/set_link_state
/gazebo/set_model_state
/microbot/joint_states
/microbot/left_joint_controller/command
/microbot/left_joint_controller/pid/parameter_descriptions
/microbot/left_joint_controller/pid/parameter_updates
/microbot/left_joint_controller/state
/microbot/right_joint_controller/command
/microbot/right_joint_controller/pid/parameter_descriptions
/microbot/right_joint_controller/pid/parameter_updates
/microbot/right_joint_controller/state
/rosout
/rosout_agg

nothing is happening after i publish data to the /command topics, as instructed in the tutorial.

rellum@yoga:~$ rostopic pub -1 /microbot/left_joint_controller/command std_msgs/Float64 "data: 0.8" 
publishing and latching message for 3.0 seconds

After I run my launch file, everything seems to start without warnings or errors.

SUMMARY
========

PARAMETERS
 * /gazebo/enable_ros_network: True
 * /microbot/joint_state_controller/publish_rate: 50
 * /microbot/joint_state_controller/type: joint_state_contr...
 * /microbot/left_joint_controller/joint: platform_to_left_...
 * /microbot/left_joint_controller/pid/d: 1
 * /microbot/left_joint_controller/pid/i: 1
 * /microbot/left_joint_controller/pid/p: 1
 * /microbot/left_joint_controller/type: effort_controller...
 * /microbot/right_joint_controller/joint: platform_to_right...
 * /microbot/right_joint_controller/pid/d: 1
 * /microbot/right_joint_controller/pid/i: 1
 * /microbot/right_joint_controller/pid/p: 1
 * /microbot/right_joint_controller/type: effort_controller...
 * /robot_description: <?xml version="1....
 * /rosdistro: noetic
 * /rosversion: 1.15.14
 * /use_sim_time: True

NODES
  /
    gazebo (gazebo_ros/gzserver)
    gazebo_gui (gazebo_ros/gzclient)
    spawn_urdf (gazebo_ros/spawn_model)
  /microbot/
    controller_spawner (controller_manager/spawner)

auto-starting new master
process[master]: started with pid [880913]
ROS_MASTER_URI=http://localhost:11311

setting /run_id to ea0d1d5a-eb39-11ec-8ffc-bd72914f1943
process[rosout-1]: started with pid [880937]
started core service [/rosout]
process[gazebo-2]: started with pid [880940]
process[gazebo_gui-3]: started with pid [880947]
process[spawn_urdf-4]: started with pid [880954]
process[microbot/controller_spawner-5]: started with pid [880956]
[ INFO] [1655139452.531792, 0.000000]: Controller Spawner: Waiting for service controller_manager/load_controller
[ INFO] [1655139452.841190758]: Finished loading Gazebo ROS API Plugin.
[ INFO] [1655139452.841940214]: waitForService: Service [/gazebo/set_physics_properties] has not been advertised, waiting...
[ INFO] [1655139452.939723190]: Finished loading Gazebo ROS API Plugin.
[ INFO] [1655139452.940800785]: waitForService: Service [/gazebo_gui/set_physics_properties] has not been advertised, 
waiting...
[ INFO] [1655139453.230924421, 0.008000000]: waitForService: Service [/gazebo/set_physics_properties] is now available.
[ INFO] [1655139453.244949178, 0.022000000]: Physics dynamic reconfigure ready.
[ INFO] [1655139453.658197765, 0.368000000]: Loading gazebo_ros_control plugin
[ INFO] [1655139453.658298649, 0.368000000]: Starting gazebo_ros_control plugin in namespace: /microbot
[ INFO] [1655139453.658703745, 0.368000000]: gazebo_ros_control plugin is waiting for model URDF in parameter 
[/robot_description] on the ROS param server.
[ INFO] [1655139453.801262215, 0.368000000]: Loaded gazebo_ros_control.
[INFO] [1655139454.039562, 0.607000]: Controller Spawner: Waiting for service controller_manager/switch_controller
[INFO] [1655139454.041235, 0.609000]: Controller Spawner: Waiting for service controller_manager/unload_controller
[INFO] [1655139454.043021, 0.611000]: Loading controller: left_joint_controller
[INFO] [1655139454.065464, 0.634000]: Loading controller: right_joint_controller
[INFO] [1655139454 ...