GM Says It Will Put Fleets of Self-Driving Cars In Cities In 2019 (detroitnews.com) 82
General Motors has laid out a plan to not only mass-deploy self-driving cars on public roads in 2019, but to do it profitably. "With a driverless ride-hailing service as its framework, GM is counting on cost reductions, advancements in autonomous technologies and growth of the ride-hailing market to enable a successful self-driving car launch in 2019," reports The Detroit News. From the report: The automaker is using the all-electric Chevrolet Bolt as its autonomous mule, dovetailing Thursday's autonomous projection with GM's earlier vow to roll out a profitable electric vehicle platform by 2021. "For GM to get the benefit they're looking for, they need these cars on the road at scale as soon as possible," said Navigant Research analyst Sam Abuelsamid. "With ride-hailing services, consumers are saved from sticker shock of how much an EV costs -- and the cost of automation in early years is going to be expensive, too." GM didn't say exactly where it plans to launch its driverless ride-hailing service, but identified "dense urban environments" in the presentation. The Detroit automaker's testbeds for the self-driving Bolt are in Warren, San Francisco and Scottsdale, Arizona.
Fuck this future. (Score:1)
I'm moving to the country.
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Spotted the uber driver.
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No, spotted the Yellow Cab driver.
What if self-driving cars turn into an OS/2 flop? (Score:2, Interesting)
I remember back then that OS/2 was supposed to be the future. Folks were investing millions in it.
What will happen if self-driving cars turn out to be a flop? Will we be able to at least salvage some of all that money that venture capitalists are throwing at it . . . ?
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Re:What if self-driving cars turn into an OS/2 flo (Score:4, Interesting)
Not really an apples-to-apples comparison, OS/2 flopped but only because a different brand of OS won the market while computer use itself exploded. For self-driving cars as a genre to flop it must either end up being unfeasible (cold fusion), unpractical (flying cars), too expensive for the mass market (private jets) or unwanted (3D TV) so that there is no winner just a dead end. Cars exists and are obviously all of the above. Self-driving cars would quite clearly practical and wanted. So it comes down to whether it can be done, at a cost people can pay.
While it's a bit presumptuous to assert the latter before we've solved the former it seems to me that the cost estimates for a sufficient sensor array and equipment are well within the economically feasible compared to a taxi driver, limo service, truck driver and the luxury market - whether it'll be cheap enough to become a standard feature and whether it'll work under all conditions is a topic of debate but not really necessary to address. If it'll work in downtown Phoenix, it works somewhere and it would be strange if they can't expand on that.
It doesn't mean that the first to market will be the winner in the long run though, before Google there was AltaVista and before Facebook there was MySpace. A self-driving car could be a huge game changer where "traditional" driving experience metrics don't matter because you're not driving, even taxis and such are heavily influenced by what they'd like to drive all day and it could be very disruptive for what we consider a "good car". But that's just competition, some might flop and implode like Nokia did in the cell phone market but that's because Apple and Google took over. Cell phones as such very much live on.
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...overhyped (3D printing)
3D printing is not going to flop. It may not do everything some people said it would, but it's going to stay, and it will get even better.
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Yes, but ... I think 3D printing is likely to always be a half century behind current manufacturing technology. For example, when last I checked, 3D printing couldn't do more than the most basic semiconductor. Will they get better? Of course. But state of the art electronics will be becoming more sophisticated as well -- probably at about the same rate. The same is likely to be true of sophisticated materials.
Doesn't mean 3D printing is useless. For example, maybe it could be used to fabricate repair
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Yes, but ... I think 3D printing is likely to always be a half century behind current manufacturing technology. For example, when last I checked, 3D printing couldn't do more than the most basic semiconductor. Will they get better?
I am tempted to ask what cave you have been in :-)
See https://www.siemens.com/innova... [siemens.com]
Siemens has achieved a breakthrough in the 3D printing of gas turbine blades. For the first time, a team of experts has full-load tested gas turbine blades that were entirely produced using additive manufacturing.
I am designing for the https://markforged.com/ [markforged.com] now, using embedded graphite composites. For some applications, they are already better than traditional manufacturing, especially in the economics for scaling t
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The times I've checked that kind of thing out, each particular kind of production environment needed a custom designed 3-D printer that essentially only worked in that environment...and was a lot more expensive than the standard 3-D printer.
So I expect the GP was correct for general purpose 3-D printers. This is a long way from saying they're useless, but they appear to be significantly over-hyped.
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The times I've checked that kind of thing out, each particular kind of production environment needed a custom designed 3-D printer that essentially only worked in that environment...and was a lot more expensive than the standard 3-D printer.
I guess it whether 'hype' existed or not would depend on which Golgafrincham Ark ( “A”, “B” and “C” ) one has a ticket for. The Internet is full of penny a word bloggers and FaceBook walls people post to without reading. I can't speak to it because I simply probably don't read places where it is common place. My 3D printing experience resulted from passing around specifications and tables. The sales people didn't hype anything, all I contacted were actually upfront if the
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You are clearly right that the degree of hype depends on where you read the article, but most people don't read the articles aimed at specialists.
That said, you seem to be agreeing with my point that the high quality 3-D printers are designed for specific jobs. The one that prints titanium can't print cement, etc. This means that their utility in space is limited, though there are other places where they can be extremely useful. I agree that it's reasonable that the high quality printers be more expensiv
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You are clearly right that the degree of hype depends on where you read the article, but most people don't read the articles aimed at specialists.
One of the progressive trends in manufacturing is that, what was once advanced manufacturing tool chains has radically come down in price and accessibility - i.e. not so much specialists any more. A buddy of mine, a residential general contractor, just build a 3-axis CNC router from of the shelf extrusion and MDX sheets for making cabinet panels. He's a little smarter than the average bear, but only has an associates degree from a community college - but the documentation and online forums were there (commu
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I'm on your side. I don't see how they can possibly come up with the necessary software in two years or less. And keep in mind that many of the "1%" problems have potentially lethal consequences. But GM has to be aware of the problems, so either the nature of what is planned must not be what we think or there must be something we (you and I) don't know.
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A third alternative is that this is an expanded prototype project that got hyped by a marketing team that didn't bother to understand it. Of course, it's also true that what you call "1%" problems is actually a lot rarer than 1%, but that doesn't suffice, as they need to be a lot rarer than 1%.
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I remember back then that OS/2 was supposed to be the future. Folks were investing millions in it.
What will happen if self-driving cars turn out to be a flop? Will we be able to at least salvage some of all that money that venture capitalists are throwing at it . . . ?
When you push 3 tons of autonomous steel to market at the speed of IoT, you end up with the integrity and security of IoT as the result.
You can't "salvage" human lives lost. Fuck these companies for pushing to be first to market faster than they should. I'm not necessarily against automation. I'm against the kind of fucking greedy mentality that makes any product ultimately unsafe.
When human drivers kill 40,000 people a year in the US, but autonomous solutions "only" kill 30,000 people a year due to avo
Re:What if self-driving cars turn into an OS/2 flo (Score:4, Insightful)
When human drivers kill 40,000 people a year in the US, but autonomous solutions "only" kill 30,000 people a year due to avoidable glitches, Greed will still arrogantly sell that as a win.
In my book, that is a win. And if the glitches were avoidable, that's even better, because that means the numbers will only go down in the future.
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When human drivers kill 40,000 people a year in the US, but autonomous solutions "only" kill 30,000 people a year due to avoidable glitches, Greed will still arrogantly sell that as a win.
In my book, that is a win. And if the glitches were avoidable, that's even better, because that means the numbers will only go down in the future.
Latest drug on the market kills 75% of people because they rushed to market? Oh well, we can only improve from here!
Latest pesticide poisons 75% of humans because of Greed? Oh well, more jobs to help reformulate!
Let's hope your Charlie Sheen flavored formula of "winning" doesn't become infectious. Greed kills enough people today.
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Latest drug on the market kills 75% of people because they rushed to market? Oh well, we can only improve from here!
You're forgetting to mention that without the drug, 100% of the people would have died anyway. Oh, no, greed is saving 25% of the people!
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Latest drug on the market kills 75% of people because they rushed to market? Oh well, we can only improve from here!
You're forgetting to mention that without the drug, 100% of the people would have died anyway. Oh, no, greed is saving 25% of the people!
Greed is responsible for rushing products prematurely to market, which has consequences. Consequences that are often easily avoidable. A bug in this case can end a life, not just lose the family pictures to ransomware or leak webcam video.
You're also dismissing other risks with autonomous vehicle networks coming under attack and being responsible for causing more deaths than we have today, which perhaps could have also been avoided had a half-ass solution not been rushed to market. It's very odd how we a
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Greed is responsible for rushing products prematurely to market, which has consequences.
If the products end up saving lives overall, it's not premature.
which perhaps could have also been avoided had a half-ass solution not been rushed to market
We can also avoid a bunch of accidents if we didn't rush a bunch of immature teenagers behind the wheel, after they complete some half-ass test.
You're also dismissing other risks with autonomous vehicle networks coming under attack and being responsible for causing more deaths than we have today
You haven't shown that these risks are real.
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You're also dismissing other risks with autonomous vehicle networks coming under attack and being responsible for causing more deaths than we have today
You haven't shown that these risks are real.
He may not have the precise risks correct, but there will be problems that haven't been prepared for. These are complex systems, and it's impossible to thoroughly test them before distribution. But I see no reason to believe that they'll average worse than humans. That, however, is something that only time will reveal.
OTOH, it's nearly certain that they will have unexpected failure modes. This really needs to be prepared for, but we all know it won't be. If there's a major problem and all the autonomou
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"In my book, that is a win. And if the glitches were avoidable, that's even better, because that means the numbers will only go down in the future."
It's a win, I agree. BUT ... When autonomous vehicles kill or maim folks, it's a safe bet that the US -- and probably other countries as well -- legal systems are going to find the manufacturer liable. Who else are they going to blame? Given the tendency of juries to make ludicrous damage awards against outfits with deep pockets, that could eventually end up
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Even if autonomous vehicles resulted in 30,000 deaths a year (which they won't), saving 10,000 lives a year is a win. And the difference is that while the number of human-driver deaths keeps climbing (because people are too busy talking or texting on their smartphones to pay attention to the road), the number of autonomou
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Even if autonomous vehicles resulted in 30,000 deaths a year (which they won't), saving 10,000 lives a year is a win.
When a hacker attacks a freeway full of autonomous vehicles during rush hour and causes 1,000 deaths to include one of your loved ones, you'll likely be revisiting your "winning" position here. The end result of a bug in this case isn't family pictures being lost to ransomware. Lives are on the line this time, and yet all I see are manufacturers rushing to market like they always do. Liability may be able to put a price tag on a life, but your loved one is gone forever, due to something that could have b
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When a hacker attacks a freeway full of autonomous vehicles during rush hour and causes 1,000 deaths to include one of your loved ones, you'll likely be revisiting your "winning" position here.
An when a hacker takes over an airplane. you'll be revisiting the plan to allow air travel.
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When a hacker attacks a freeway full of autonomous vehicles during rush hour and causes 1,000 deaths to include one of your loved ones, you'll likely be revisiting your "winning" position here.
An when a hacker takes over an airplane. you'll be revisiting the plan to allow air travel.
I'm not advocating for a "good-enough" solution in any product, particularly where shit solutions can result in loss of life.
Greed has dismissed Quality because Limited Liability makes it worth it, and justifies rushing to market with half-assed solutions.
Far too often, Risk gets tossed out the window by Greed, with the end result of the masses being abused as test monkeys. We're better than that.
criminal Liability can not be EULAed a way (Score:2)
criminal Liability can not be EULAed a way nor can they make an victim sign an EULA
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When human drivers kill 40,000 people a year in the US, but autonomous solutions "only" kill 30,000 people a year due to avoidable glitches, Greed will still arrogantly sell that as a win.
I doubt it. Guns, outside of law enforcement, suicides and gang-murders kill so few people it's barely a rounding error[1], and yet there are still plenty of people who want them banned. Same with terrorism, mass shootings, etc. It's about fear, not numbers.
[1] Citation [quora.com]
Re: What if self-driving cars turn into an OS/2 fl (Score:2)
Re: What if self-driving cars turn into an OS/2 fl (Score:1)
Some possibilities (Score:3)
A Beowulf cluster of Bolts
Taking over the cars and forcing all their processors to mine bitcoins.
A swarm of Killbots controlled by terrorists/hitmen/hackers.
.
It's not the sticker price (Score:1)
It's that they won't even sell the Bolt(Opel Ampera-e) in most of Europe. It's just a compliance car.
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Thus demonstrating it's a bad idea for the regulators to force a company to make a product that the company think isn't commercially viable.
Look at the EV-1. The consumers who tried it liked it but not enough people were willing to pay a price that made it viable. GM were forced to produce it so they had a lease scheme. But that wasn't viable for them either. As soon as they could kill it they did.
I read this as "GM says it will kill many and dama (Score:4, Insightful)
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How many people (Score:1)
are going to be killed by these things before we realize they were a bad idea?
CAPTCHA: Embalm
Re: How many people (Score:5, Insightful)
Dear Horsebuggy Driver,
I am not sure if you are talking about the cottengin, steam engine, train, steam car, motorcycle, mainframe, corn harvester, wind farm, aeroplane, iPhone, or Pokémon Go.
Could you clarify?
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Re: How many people (Score:2)
No, every one of those had someone say the same thing as the original poster. Everyone of them killed quite a number of people since inception. Most had quite a bit of safety measures prior to public deployment. And still the original cars were quite shitty to look at, mostly useless, and basically a fashion statement.
Just because this one appears to be rushed doesnâ(TM)t mean it is. Today we have far more pre and post safety checks than anytime in history. But at the end of the day, true improvement
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Not true, they need to be out there not causing accidents for anyone. If one person who wouldn't have otherwise gets in an accident would not have gotten in one, then it is too many.
That is nonsense, and you are being nonsensical. If it saves more lives than it takes, let alone if it prevents more accidents than it causes, then it is positive. Letting people drive their own cars kills people all day, every day. If letting the cars drive themselves kills less people than letting people drive them, then it's irresponsible not to change to self-driving.
Far reaching myopia (Score:2)
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If an auto-driving auto gets into an accident, whose insurance covers the cost?
In an accident involving two+ vehicles, where it is impractical to discern blame, insurers would probably split claims. More interestingly, would all autonomous autos in the future have required insurance or be remotely disabled from operating?
What if you are drunk?
Then we'd much rather see you in an autonomous vehicle, so there will be no penalty for that.
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Actually, under current law, I believe that if you are "operating" a self-driving car you need to have a license and be in a legal condition to drive. This may vary from state to state, of course.
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If an auto-driving auto gets into an accident, whose insurance covers the cost?
The one that caused the accident, just like now.
Wow what service (Score:2)
Re:Wow what service (Score:4, Funny)
You're totally right. This will completely fail because you have to bring your own sunglasses. I hope your message comes early enough for GM to see the huge mistake they are about to make.
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It is actually rather straightforward to write some code that transfers your playlist and preferred seat position from one car to another. I worked for a such a project a few years ago - the end customer being a car sharing service.
Full Circle - General Motors Streetcar Conspiracy (Score:1)
For GM's effort to be successful, their lobbyists will also submit model legislation progressively requiring the abandonment of personal vehicles and hold harmless laws / limited liability for the manufactures and operators of autonomous vehicle systems. Brings to mind history:
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
"The General Motors streetcar conspiracy refers to convictions of General Motors (GM) and other companies for monopolizing the sale of buses and supplies to National City Lines (NCL) and its su
List Of Cities (Score:2)
"Gee, a plastic bag blew into the road, 'better stop..."
I predict these cities will have the slowest traffic in the country.
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"Gee, a construction cone is out of place, 'better slow down..."
When the road is obstructed, I slow down.
"Gee, a plastic bag blew into the road, 'better stop..."
When a plastic bag blows into the road, I avoid it. I don't want it to cover over any of the grill area.
State & Local Laws? (Score:2)
Snow (Score:2)
One has to laugh at all these self driving car companies that do their development in places were it doesn't snow and often doesn't even rain a lot.
Self driving car startups should be in places like Detroit and Buffalo...