# Bye bye self driving cars



## UberIsAllFubared (Feb 24, 2016)

With the death of ONE person who apparently was watching a movie while his Tesla was driving, law makers are already looking to regulate this industry. Its not gonna happen in our life times. I am not even gonna say whether or not its safer, cause it very well may be, but in the perception of most people, its not.


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## MattyMikey (Aug 19, 2015)

If that's true that makes most people stupid. It is safer, it will only get safer. Humans drive like shit. Not hard to make computers drive better than most human drivers.


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## Undermensch (Oct 21, 2015)

Sorry bro, nothing's going to stop this freight train.

Sure, there might be some holdouts similar to bible belt states refusing to teach evolution, but it's going to happen everywhere else very soon regardless of the backwards holdouts.


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## GILD (Feb 8, 2016)

this makes number 2.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/tesla-crash-autopilot-mode_us_577c2b55e4b0416464110cbc
guy survived, car flipped on guard rail. Tesla auto pilot.


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## cubert (Feb 13, 2016)

If big money involve in this business - it will happen


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## UberIsAllFubared (Feb 24, 2016)

Its not gonna happen in our life time. California has already said they will mandate by law that there has to always be a driver there that can take over the car... And unless every car is driverless, which will never happen, everyone will take advantage of a driverless car, just like they take advantage of the slow moving asian woman.


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## cubert (Feb 13, 2016)

UberIsAllFubared said:


> the slow moving asian woman.


Always was wandering why they drive like that , no racism ofcourse


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## Oscar Levant (Aug 15, 2014)

UberIsAllFubared said:


> With the death of ONE person who apparently was watching a movie while his Tesla was driving, law makers are already looking to regulate this industry. Its not gonna happen in our life times. I am not even gonna say whether or not its safer, cause it very well may be, but in the perception of most people, its not.


Here's the argument that pro-SDC'ers miss:

They can seem to be safe, but even if they got a million lines of code in them machines,
there will always be something new that programmer's can't foresee, and that one thing can kill you.

I can live with an injury if it's my fault, but if it's not my fault, that injury's really a b i t c h.


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## Mountainsoloist (Nov 16, 2015)

They're still coming. This death was unfortunate, as are the many which come from non driver assisted vehicles. It should be noted that the autopilot feature does not make the car autonomous or driverless. At this point it is an extremely advanced cruise control, and an active driver is still required. It is certainly going to be a precursor to the inevitable driverless car technology but it is still under development.

This event is not going to derail the development of autonomous cars completely. Many states will require human drivers long after the vehicles on the market are capable of handling all driving tasks independently, but they will take hold. We will eventually entrust our lives to self driving cars on a regular basis with the same trust we give the automakers, the other drivers, the roads, and ourselves behind the wheel of these machines.


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## Undermensch (Oct 21, 2015)

Oscar Levant said:


> Here's the argument that pro-SDC'ers miss:
> 
> They can seem to be safe, but even if they got a million lines of code in them machines,
> there will always be something new that programmer's can't foresee, and that one thing can kill you.
> ...


By that rationale, no one would ride escalators...

Have you seen those videos? Horrifying when there is an accident. The frequency of escalator accidents (which almost always result in death or dismemberment) is about the same as you can expect from self driving cars (not Tesla's autopilot, I'm talking about full Level 4 self driving for an entire trip handling all safety-critical driving functions).

Definition of the levels here: http://www.techrepublic.com/article/autonomous-driving-levels-0-to-5-understanding-the-differences/


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## bobbybq (Jan 13, 2016)

MattyMikey said:


> If that's true that makes most people stupid. It is safer, it will only get safer. Humans drive like shit. Not hard to make computers drive better than most human drivers.


computers fails sometimes


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## MattyMikey (Aug 19, 2015)

bobbybq said:


> computers fails sometimes


True. But humans fail often. That's the point. Computers are smarter than people. Less risk. Still some risk, but MUCH less.


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## Undermensch (Oct 21, 2015)

bobbybq said:


> computers fails sometimes


Humans fail quite often as well:

http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/magazine/2014/04/the-road-to-self-driving-cars/index.htm



> Research shows that 90 percent of crashes are caused by human error.


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## ATX 22 (Jun 17, 2015)

SDC's are at least 10-15 years out, according to the engineer I had a lengthy discussion with during SXSW. Humans drive millions of miles per year, and per capita, have relatively few deaths per mile. The technology won't work properly unless all of the human drivers are removed, and the cars can communicate with each other. Similar to the scenes in Minority Report, where the cars move like schools of fish.
He also indicated that people like to drive, and that will be a major factor in whether or not self driving technology ever makes it to full scale use in cars. Trains and other modes of transport, especially freight transport will likely be the first automated vehicles, according to him.


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## Mountainsoloist (Nov 16, 2015)

ATX 22 said:


> SDC's are at least 10-15 years out, according to the engineer I had a lengthy discussion with during SXSW. Humans drive millions of miles per year, and per capita, have relatively few deaths per mile. The technology won't work properly unless all of the human drivers are removed, and the cars can communicate with each other. Similar to the scenes in Minority Report, where the cars move like schools of fish.
> He also indicated that people like to drive, and that will be a major factor in whether or not self driving technology ever makes it to full scale use in cars. Trains and other modes of transport, especially freight transport will likely be the first automated vehicles, according to him.


These are great points. The autonomous cars must operate on the roadways with human drivers. While I firmly believe that most cars on the road will have the capability of driverless operation in the future I know there will be many holdouts driving themselves (humans).

I don't believe that full scale adoption of this technology requires all vehicles on the road to be autonomous. This constraint won't stop their development either. The engineers will find ingenious ways to implement driverless capabilities without all cars running them.


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## Oscar Levant (Aug 15, 2014)

Undermensch said:


> By that rationale, no one would ride escalators...
> 
> Have you seen those videos? Horrifying when there is an accident. The frequency of escalator accidents (which almost always result in death or dismemberment) is about the same as you can expect from self driving cars (not Tesla's autopilot, I'm talking about full Level 4 self driving for an entire trip handling all safety-critical driving functions).
> 
> Definition of the levels here: http://www.techrepublic.com/article/autonomous-driving-levels-0-to-5-understanding-the-differences/


So you are equating riding in an elevator where there is no reasonable alternative to rise 40 flights in a building on par with riding in a random environment with no driver at the helm?

For cars to be the equivalent, you would have to remove randomity in the self driving car Universe comparable to that of the elevator universe. In other words, in that comparison all cars would need to be self-driving cars , all cars would need to be computer speaking to each other, and all cars would need to be communicating with the road and traffic lights etcetera --until then the comparison does not work.


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## DriverX (Aug 5, 2015)

Well before the Tesla tech will ever work a complete remodel of all the US roadways will need to occur first. good luck with that.

I doubt whatever google comes up with in 10 years will be able to negotiate reliably when the road ways fail to offer any good data for them to make safe and quick decisions. THis will result in stranded vehicles jamming up roadways. Some of the dirt road exits and alleys and blocked streets or huge pot holes I have to drive around will always present navigation issues to non-humans. 

We are able to risk manage in a way that computers can't in order to get around a roadblock or slow down for a big dip. Do Teslas even see those huge speed bumps or speed dips designed to slow drivers. If your traveling at the speed limit those things will take out your suspension and bottom you out smashing up your oil pan or ******. Does Tesla detect them and slow down to well below the speed limit? or does it maintain the speed its set to? 

Theres a million things humans are doing while driving that the tech has just begun to tackle. It will happen eventually but the vehicles will be slowly integrated with their own lanes and only allowed to drive themselves in controlled environments, like ffrom the time you enter the freeway until you exit. The HOV lanes will be converted to accommodate the developing tech and in another century driven vehicles will have faded away or only be seen and used in special events like the Indy 500.


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## SumGuy (Jul 29, 2015)

UberIsAllFubared said:


> With the death of ONE person who apparently was watching a movie while his Tesla was driving, law makers are already looking to regulate this industry. Its not gonna happen in our life times. I am not even gonna say whether or not its safer, cause it very well may be, but in the perception of most people, its not.


When airbags were first being put in cars, they were actually killing people as well, even to this day they can cause more injuries and death then the car accident itself. Now, most cars have multiple airbags.


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## ptuberx (Jun 28, 2016)

Autonomous driving will not be able to make instant decisions that a human can based on judgment. What if a new, small sinkhole has opened up in front of you on a road, or a brand new line of road construction detours have been put in place around blind corners in heavily populated areas where there is heavy vehicle and pedestrian traffic? The vehicle could interpret this a LOT of different ways.

How would a car deal with a DUI checkpoint? Unless a cop stands in front of the car, it won't stop, and if the car is traveling at a decent speed arriving at the checkpoint with no traffic, do you want to be the guy that walks out in front of the car to stop it, and hope that it sees you and doesn't plow right over you?

What if a hail storm has just went through over a highway and suddenly the road is covered in ice on a warm day, now you have a vehicle going 65+ mph into a hazardous condition that it cannot "see" until after it starts to lose control but it doesn't know why and will most definitely over-correct itself while out of control.

There are just wayyyy too many factors involved for me to ever trust it. The human brain functions at a speed of over 16 terahertz with a kind of bandwidth and intelligence that a computer has yet to accomplish.

Without a complete, new, dedicated, and isolated roadway infrastructure, this will never work, and there would probably always stoll be SNAFU's, some small, some major.

That and more, I also don't want my life to be controlled by "big brother." At some point, there needs to be a limit.


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## UberIsAllFubared (Feb 24, 2016)

Just imagine this ONE scenario, driverless car (you will be able to spot them a million miles away), puts its blinker on to change lanes on the freeway to merge onto another freeway. You speed up because no way in hell you want to get behind slow moving driverless car, he then slows down, but no one will let him in the lane as no one wants to get behind slow ass driverless car. Driverless car runs out of time and can't make the freeway split.


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## ptuberx (Jun 28, 2016)

UberIsAllFubared said:


> Just imagine this ONE scenario, driverless car (you will be able to spot them a million miles away), puts its blinker on to change lanes on the freeway to merge onto another freeway. You speed up because no way in hell you want to get behind slow moving driverless car, he then slows down, but no one will let him in the lane as no one wants to get behind slow ass driverless car. Driverless car runs out of time and can't make the freeway split.


Yup, that's the problem... there are millions of combinations of unique scenarios that software will never be able to account for.

I'll give you another scenario that happened tonight on my last trip: Long fare, 18 miles. I got half a mile from this gal's house, driving by a school, and out of nowhere, a drunk driver came flying across the lawn of the school, already damaged, skipping across the sidewalk onto the curb, back over again, and then the car kept driving on the other sidewalk, then stopped, got on the road, got off, hit some mailboxes again, it was all over the place. I slowed to a crawl behind this idiot before he ever made it 50 feet to the road, traveling from a blind-side direction where there was no road. How do you program a computer to anticipate a car flying out of a landscaped schoolyard before it crosses your path? If you made its awareness THAT sensitive, it would slam on the brakes everytime a bird flew by 100 feet from you. It would never work.


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## UberKevPA (May 14, 2016)

I hope when SDC's do arrive they are also self-cleaning. Woe to the passenger late in the day who has to deal with all the trash and bodily fluids left behind by previous fares.


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## ptuberx (Jun 28, 2016)

UberKevPA said:


> I hope when SDC's do arrive they are also self-cleaning. Woe to the passenger late in the day who has to deal with all the trash and bodily fluids left behind by previous fares.


Another good point.


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## Mars Troll Number 4 (Oct 30, 2015)

UberKevPA said:


> I hope when SDC's do arrive they are also self-cleaning. Woe to the passenger late in the day who has to deal with all the trash and bodily fluids left behind by previous fares.





ptuberx said:


> Another good point.


Self driving cars will kill the for-hire industry in most cities, but not in the way uber thinks it will.

People will have their own self driving car take them to the airport and then turn around to save on parking.

People get drunk and the car goes in auto mode the entire way home.

Most Americans own their own car. Self driving cars won't change that. Also most people commute at the same time so for hire cars could never manage demand anyway.

Also a good chunk of business for cabs... Is people who can no longer drive or could never drive in the first place. Grandma won't be hiring cars to go to the doctor when they can instead take their self driving car. It's not that granny can't afford to own a car, it's that granny can't drive period.

Same with people who are blind, and others with disabilities that prohibit driving.

Another possibility is that....

Anything they save from having self driving cars could be lost in cleaning fees.
These self driving for hire vehicles might need someone in them 24/7 just to make sure that no ones leaving dirty diapers, half eaten sandwiches... The list goes on and on to the point I get physicaly nauseated just thinking about it.

So at the end of the day... It could be cheaper to not have self drovng cars as for hire vehicles with what's left.... Because these cars will be servicing exclauivly with the WORST parts of town and will be treated with the same care as a park bench.
Who on earth would use that when the car in your driveway is... There all the time, and clean.


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## UberKevPA (May 14, 2016)

Mears Troll Number 4 said:


> Self driving cars will kill the for-hire industry in most cities, but not in the way uber thinks it will.
> 
> People will have their own self driving car take them to the airport and then turn around to save on parking.
> 
> ...


I think we're getting close to imagining the future of these cars. While well-intentioned, the geniuses that draw these things up tend to forget the less-than-niceties of human nature that ruin the promise of technology and bring out the worst in people (ie internet porn, online predators, bullies, identity fraud, etc)

They will be a novelty at first but that will quickly wear off when folks realize what a crappy experience they really are: no human interaction, conversation, stainless steel seats/interior, scratched-up windows, plexiglass barrier to keep drunks from grabbing the wheel, graffiti, trash, etc. Some riders will enter and find the interior still wet and humid from the automated fire hoses that will have to rinse out the interiors every two hours. Folks will eventually turn their noses up at them and they will become an ultra-cheap mode of transportation that only the desperate drunk or welfare recipients will use.

I wonder if the "futurists" pushing these things will also start making it difficult for people for people to own, license and maintain their own private vehicles: regulate where in big cities they can be driven or parked; increase regulations, licensing and inspections; increase taxes on fuel, tires and other fossil-fuel products. Folks without means to keep a car will be pushed to use these self-driving boxes of humiliation which you will then share with 3 other degraded human beings If you ever listen to Travis K's TED talk, he talks a lot more about getting cars off the road and more people into each car than anything else. Never a peep about drivers making money, by the way.

Maybe a negative prediction and a ways off still but that's what I see possible with SDC's.


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## Tequila Jake (Jan 28, 2016)

Mears Troll Number 4 said:


> Self driving cars will kill the for-hire industry in most cities, but not in the way uber thinks it will.
> 
> People will have their own self driving car take them to the airport and then turn around to save on parking.
> 
> People get drunk and the car goes in auto mode the entire way home.


I hadn't considered it before but this is a very good point. From what I see, the busiest time for rideshare in many areas is bar closing. If people don't need someone else to provide a safe, legal ride, why would they. They push a button on their phone and their car comes picks them up and takes them home.

Self-driving cars may have the opposite of the intended effect and put MORE cars on the road and increase congestion more than rideshare does.


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## Taxi Driver in Arizona (Mar 18, 2015)

When I was a kid, flying cars were just around the corner.

Where's my flying car?


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## goneubering (Aug 17, 2017)

Undermensch said:


> Sorry bro, nothing's going to stop this freight train.
> 
> Sure, there might be some holdouts similar to bible belt states refusing to teach evolution, but it's going to happen everywhere else very soon regardless of the backwards holdouts.


Do you still think so??!!


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## jocker12 (May 11, 2017)

goneubering said:


> Do you still think so??!!


The only problem that generated the hype and made people believe self driving cars could be possible was corporate propaganda.

When the developers and the corporate people got serious about it and started investing billions, they needed to sell the concept. That selling was highly misleading and one sided.

They've told dreamers what dreamers wanted to hear. The only way to wake them up to reality is to ask them if they will put their little children or little grandchildren inside of one of these robots, or if they'll invest ALL their savings in the SDC technology, because if it's going to be an unstoppable freight train, there is NO reason not to invest everything you have right now.

Publicly anybody could say "yes, I am going to invest" but if privately they have second thoughts or refuse to "get personal" with the technology, then they know is only their game of denial.


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## Undermensch (Oct 21, 2015)

goneubering said:


> Do you still think so??!!


You can get a ride in a self driving car in Arizona. Lyft is doing it somewhere too.

So I guess I'm already right.

But I'm pretty sure I've stated here that it would be silly for Uber or Lyft to change from an asset light model to having to own all the cars. I don't think they should do that.

Now, when will set driving cars be available? I don't know but I wouldn't bet against the billions being invested in this right now. I want to think it might not take off for 10 years. But it could be sooner.


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## goneubering (Aug 17, 2017)

Undermensch said:


> You can get a ride in a self driving car in Arizona. Lyft is doing it somewhere too.
> 
> So I guess I'm already right.
> 
> ...


Have you been to AZ and tried to get a Waymo ride?


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## Aardvark (Sep 18, 2018)

Undermensch said:


> I've stated here that it would be silly for Uber or Lyft to change from an asset light model


It's not an asset light model. Uber and Lyft pay dearly for those assets in the percentage they have to pay the driver. Every time a labor intensive business model is forced to compete with a capital intensive business model, the labor intensive business model loses, every. single. time.


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## jocker12 (May 11, 2017)

Aardvark said:


> Uber and Lyft pay dearly for those assets in the percentage they have to pay the driver.


That is only half of the story.

And the drivers pay dearly for those assets in fuel, maintenance, and depreciation.

The problem with the millenials willing to do business in tech is that the model they want to use is based on exploitation, which is not capitalism (based on competition).

As long as millenials want to make money ripping off their partners or their customers, model in which they will never accept to be treated as partners or as customers the same way they want to treat their potential partners and/or customers, they will fail. Every. Single. Time.

I will give you the example of e-scooters. Let's take a look.
""*Everyone is suffering*. Scooters are being stolen. They're breaking. The supply chains for parts *are not in place yet*," said Shawn Carolan, a partner at Menlo Ventures who has invested in scooter startup Skip and was an early investor in e-bike and scooter company Jump, which was bought by Uber earlier this year. "Right now, there is* zero hardware advantage*" for any company, he said."

and

"There are other costs tied to the current method of manufacturing scooters. All firms that use Chinese manufacturers* are having to pay up due to U.S. tariffs on imports from China, adding about 25% to the original cost of a scooter*, according to a scooter executive and an investor. That has prompted firms to think about assembling vehicles in the U.S. after ordering parts from China, an investor said."

and

"The scooters' *tendency to wear out quickly* has threatened the scooter-rental firms' business model, which hinges on each scooter being rented multiple times per day to cover the cost of hardware and operations. *Scooter batteries also need to be replaced frequently, adding to costs.*"

from https://www.theinformation.com/arti...rcAAszLf4rqjZD_Vrhdyo&unlock=d56d7c35710b2fd5 (Paywall)



Undermensch said:


> but I wouldn't bet against the billions being invested in this right now


Investing millions or billions means almost nothing. Proof?

Theranos - "Founded in 2003 by then-19-year-old Elizabeth Holmes, Theranos raised more than *US$700 million* from venture capitalists and private investors, resulting in a *$10 billion valuation* at its peak in 2013 and 2014. Investors and the media hyped Theranos as a breakthrough in the large blood-testing market, where the US diagnostic-lab industry posts annual sales of over *$70 billion*. Theranos claimed its technology was revolutionary and that its tests required only about 1/100 to 1/1,000 of the amount of blood that would ordinarily be needed and cost far less than existing tests"

and

"On June 15, 2018, Holmes and Balwani were indicted on multiple counts of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud. According to the indictment, investors and doctors and patients were defrauded. It is alleged the defendants were aware of the unreliability and inaccuracy of their products, but concealed that information. If convicted, they each face a maximum fine of $250,000 and 20 years in prison. The case has been assigned to Lucy H. Koh, United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California"

and

"In May 2018 John Carreyrou reported that American business and government leaders lost more than $600 million by privately investing in Theranos. Major investments had been made by the Walton family ($150 million), Rupert Murdoch ($121 million), Betsy DeVos ($100 million), and the Cox family (of Cox Media Group) ($100 million). The final liquidation of the company in September 2018 rendered these investments completely worthless"


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## Undermensch (Oct 21, 2015)

Aardvark said:


> It's not an asset light model. Uber and Lyft pay dearly for those assets in the percentage they have to pay the driver. Every time a labor intensive business model is forced to compete with a capital intensive business model, the labor intensive business model loses, every. single. time.


Interesting idea. Since you cite examples I guess you're talking about factories where you can pay labor or you can buy immensely expensive machines that can run constantly. If you disagree please provide some examples that aren't that but yet make sense.

Unfortunarely, that won't work for Uber. They can't possibly keep the cars constantly busy while also having enough cars for max peak demand. Additionally the cars actually have to be at the place of demand, which will cause them enormous problems serving airports as a drop off from the airport does not mean the next door neighbor needs to immediately go back to the airport...

It won't work to replace all drivers with self driving cars owned by the ride share company. They might own some, but they'd never own all.


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## Aardvark (Sep 18, 2018)

Undermensch said:


> Interesting idea. Since you cite examples I guess you're talking about factories where you can pay labor or you can buy immensely expensive machines that can run constantly. If you disagree please provide some examples that aren't that but yet make sense.
> 
> Unfortunarely, that won't work for Uber. They can't possibly keep the cars constantly busy while also having enough cars for max peak demand. Additionally the cars actually have to be at the place of demand, which will cause them enormous problems serving airports as a drop off from the airport does not mean the next door neighbor needs to immediately go back to the airport...
> 
> It won't work to replace all drivers with self driving cars owned by the ride share company. They might own some, but they'd never own all.


Yes. Just like modern car manufactures can not compete without automated factories, i.e. robots,. Likewise, taxis, rideshare companies will not be able to compete against robot taxis. How does Uber move their fleet around now? With surge. But a company like Waymo is both the driver and the dispatcher and even the company itself. Just like Uber knows exactly where demand is at this moment and where it will be ten minutes from now, so will Waymo. Imagine if Uber could order their fleet of drivers around at will. Uber tries to hide as much info from the drivers as they can in order to trick drivers into taking unprofitable rides. Self driving taxi companies won't have this problem because the drivers and the company are the same entity.


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

ptuberx said:


> Yup, that's the problem... there are millions of combinations of unique scenarios that software will never be able to account for.
> 
> I'll give you another scenario that happened tonight on my last trip: Long fare, 18 miles. I got half a mile from this gal's house, driving by a school, and out of nowhere, a drunk driver came flying across the lawn of the school, already damaged, skipping across the sidewalk onto the curb, back over again, and then the car kept driving on the other sidewalk, then stopped, got on the road, got off, hit some mailboxes again, it was all over the place. I slowed to a crawl behind this idiot before he ever made it 50 feet to the road, traveling from a blind-side direction where there was no road. How do you program a computer to anticipate a car flying out of a landscaped schoolyard before it crosses your path? If you made its awareness THAT sensitive, it would slam on the brakes everytime a bird flew by 100 feet from you. It would never work.


Had this Exact scenario Tonight
1 mile from my home on Interstate !
With Fence on the side of the road !
To restrict access !

Was dark. I dont know if he drove through the fence or what !
Was doing 80 when i noticed him.


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## Stevie The magic Unicorn (Apr 3, 2018)

UberIsAllFubared said:


> Just imagine this ONE scenario, driverless car (you will be able to spot them a million miles away), puts its blinker on to change lanes on the freeway to merge onto another freeway. You speed up because no way in hell you want to get behind slow moving driverless car, he then slows down, but no one will let him in the lane as no one wants to get behind slow ass driverless car. Driverless car runs out of time and can't make the freeway split.


Or an A-hole cabbies that box out (blocking the exit lane) autonomous cars on the highway near the airport Exit just to screw with them...


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