Maybe it's time for people to admit that self-driving is being romanticized by carmakers because they're trying to sell you their cars and therefore they have an incentive to blow their capabilities out of proportion.
I think for one carmakers are misleading about these systems' true capabilities, but second, I don't think they even know how imperfect these systems are because of a potentially unimaginable number of edge cases (which they thought would be much smaller and manageable).
There are three narratives I’ve come into contact with vis a vis SDV’s.
1.) Utopian: Any sacrifice is worth getting people out from behind the wheel. That sacrifice never seems to belong to the person espousing this view. I run into this almost exclusively from friends and acquaintances in tech, or online. It’s an extension of all utopian thinking, and like all utopian thinking is dangerous.
2.) The future is now: This argument (often yells) that SDV’s are currently safer than human drivers, so just shut up, people kill people too. When evidence to the contrary is presented they frequently reveal themselves to be utopian.
3.) Wait, what?: People who have no idea just how widespread this technology is on the roads, and range from uneasy to terrified. I mostly run across this from people I know who aren’t in tech, and rarely see this online.
When I show people in group 3 comments from groups 1 and 2, they get really really pissed.
This is the best taxonomy I have seen. I'd like to add another, smaller category.
There is a fourth group, people in tech, who are fully aware how widespread this technology is on the roads and follow it like a train wreck in slow motion.
At this point, it is a well-known failure mode of the Tesla Autopilot:
It does not notice tractor trailers.
It does not notice street sweepers.
It does not notice fire trucks.
It does not notice lane barriers.
All happened in daylight, and in good conditions. The Autopilot just continues in high speed without even attempting to slow down - Controlled Flight Into Terrain.
Wired has a piece trying to explain why it cannot notice stationary objects [1].
It's like the joke about the dancing bear. We are impressed not by how well the bear dances, but by the fact it can dance at all.
Just don't try and change anything on the flight after booking. I had to cancel a flight and although Ryanair won't refund you the ticket price, they will refund the taxes. However interestingly their administration fee for the refund was exactly the same as the amount of taxes I was due to be refunded, so I got nothing.
I don't think they are nearly as bad as they used to be - pretty sure the "I don't want to buy travel insurance" is no longer half way down a list of countries!
The average starting NFL lineman was around 325 in 2016[1]. The game does like lighter and faster players, but often that's a tradeoff against durability.
They'll exist, doesn't mean they'll be relevant, or profitable. If I were asked to bet against the stock, I probably would. Everything about their valuation and IPO smells to high heavens.
It's a shame that what started as one of the most private messaging apps around still doesn't use end-to-end encryption and has since been surpassed by many on that front, though.
I would bet that they don't end up completing the terms of the Google contract as signed; and that it would be heavily modified by year 3 of the contract.
One supposes that might seem "obnoxious", to those who were somehow psychologically committed to what... the perpetual existence of America? That ain't me. It seems unlikely that the continent will sink into the ocean anytime in the next five years, however.
Perhaps I could have been clearer, but I didn't say that Alphabet would fail anytime soon anyway. I referred rather to G's habit of discontinuing popular services.
A good question. From the article, one of the things the guidelines call for is that manufacturers "develop technology to identify when the devices are being used by a driver while driving. That would ensure the limits are placed on drivers and not other vehicle occupants."
I bet that if the handset manufacturers were to work with the car manufacturers, they could pretty easily locate the phone to a foot or so with minimal battery impact.
Really? Deploy location technology inside a car just to enforce a "driver mode"? A market that consistently rejects tech to enforce speed limits isn't going to accept technology to limit app use in cars. All it will take is one story of someone trapped inside a crashed/stuck car being unable to call for help, or unable to text for help, and nobody will dare to so disable phones.
I cannot wait to see that tech also be deployed to enforce "airplane mode 2.0" so a voice can break in to my music to inform me about the latest skymall deals.
That's overly hyperbolic. Nobody is saying the phone should be completely disabled, just that they should design things so you need to interact with them less. Voice control is a fantastic tool here IMO.
But also, would it be that crazy for them to disable these restrictions in the case of an accident? Like how current cars unlock doors, shut off the engine, and put on flashers in the case of an accident now.
Ah, so now we have location within the car, and accident detection. And we would need to detect accidents nearby so that drivers can call 9/11 without getting out their vehicles. This is too many layers of tech simply to stop people from doing something they already know is wrong. Spend all those development cycles on direct anti-drunk, anti-speeding and anti-crash tech.
It's also not all that hyperbolic. Similar tech has been deployed with GPS. During the early days of handhelds many shutdown at high ground speeds as to prevent them being used to guide aircraft. I forget what the speed was (200mph?) but it was well below the arms limitations (mach 2+ and/or 60,000feet).
Again, it's not like the phone will just shut down and not allow you to do anything, but will most likely have a "car UI" that is limited. The people coming up with these things tend to give them more than a few seconds of thought.
And how many times have you been affected by the GPS thing?
This is actually very possible you'd be surprised. Find a keyless car system that also lets you start it such as in the Mitsubishi Evo X and test the range around doors and within the driver seat etc that it lets you start the car. Surprisingly accurate.
Key just outside the drivers door won't start and the boot won't open if it's basically where the tail light is etc. and that's 10 year old tech.
What about the passenger seat though? My EE/physics is rusty, but inside vs outside of a giant metal cage might be easier than slightly to the right but still inside.
Perhaps they could also call for the manufacturers to "develop technology" to give every driver a pony, while they're at it. It's kind of infuriating to hear from someone who thinks you can just say "develop technology" and then anything will happen.
You seem to be assuming that the NHTSA has no idea how feasible such technology is, and so may be asking for something that is very hard or even impossible.
That's a quite questionable assumption. They almost certainly talked to automobile and smartphone industry experts while developing these guidelines, and know that there are several fairly easy ways to do what they are asking for.
My car's sensor will trigger on a semi-decent sized watermelon. Drives me fucking insane - it's a Volvo so it really explodes when it triggers when going fast...
It's like somebody just fired a missile at you -.-
If the phone is connected to a car by Bluetooth or USB, assume it's the driver's. If you get it wrong, it's just a minor inconvenience (unplug if you really need to use those features).
This would be a disaster for me. Whenever my wife and I are traveling in the US she is the driver and I am the navigator. My phone will be connected and I have to "translate"/enhance Waze directions for her and take care of the music. So none of that would be possible anymore. Would be the same BS as some cars that won't allow me to pair my phone while my wife is driving. I guess we would just have to use the phone speakers then.
My partner and I will trade off who drives, but mine is always the one on Bluetooth. This would make it super annoying for me to navigate to places as a passenger, and I'd have to use her phone, which then shows the defects in the system.
Random brainstorm: Disable every phone in motion, the only way to enable it is to pair with the car. If everyone has to register with a single database and car manufactures have control over it then the car can detect if the person paired with Bluetooth is allowed to be on their phone or not. This wouldn't work if driver wanted the passenger to use their phone. Just thinking out loud, seeing as this is a idea I don't like
