Tesla Launches Steering-Wheel-Free Cybercab Robotaxi In Austin (businessinsider.com) 101
Tesla has begun offering public rides in Austin in its purpose-built Cybercab, a two-seat robotaxi with no steering wheel or pedals. "You can go outside, take rides," said Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla's VP of AI. "Anyone can take rides. It's open to the entire public." Previously, the fleet consisted only of Model Ys.
Texas records show Tesla had registered 45 Cybercabs as of Thursday, though the company has not disclosed how many are currently carrying passengers. Tesla also says it eventually wants consumers to be able to buy the vehicles for under $30,000. Business Insider reports: Videos posted online by Tesla influencers and content creators who were invited to the Austin event showed that the Cybercab can be hailed through the Robotaxi app. In a video posted by David Moss, an autonomous-vehicle content creator, Robotaxi users could open the car's butterfly doors through the app. After the riders enter the car, the doors closed automatically, Moss said in the video. The launch comes nearly two years after Tesla first unveiled the Cybercab at its "We, Robot" event in Burbank, California.
Texas records show Tesla had registered 45 Cybercabs as of Thursday, though the company has not disclosed how many are currently carrying passengers. Tesla also says it eventually wants consumers to be able to buy the vehicles for under $30,000. Business Insider reports: Videos posted online by Tesla influencers and content creators who were invited to the Austin event showed that the Cybercab can be hailed through the Robotaxi app. In a video posted by David Moss, an autonomous-vehicle content creator, Robotaxi users could open the car's butterfly doors through the app. After the riders enter the car, the doors closed automatically, Moss said in the video. The launch comes nearly two years after Tesla first unveiled the Cybercab at its "We, Robot" event in Burbank, California.
Re:45 Cybercabs as of Thursday (Score:5, Funny)
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Re: 45 Cybercabs as of Thursday (Score:1)
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".... and you'll be able to just send your own Tesla to run cab overnight..."
Yep, be great to earn dollars from all of those people who need to be out and about at 2 AM...
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Not enough to make up for waking up in the morning to go to work, only to find out some drunk puked in your front seat.
Or the used condoms in the back.
We don't need to stinkin' badgers in cabs (Score:1)
Trying to propagate the humor without the vacuous brain fart, but can't figure out how to work cabs or taxis or even robocars/robocabs into a more appropriate Subject...
However I actually had a more serious reaction to the joke because it wouldn't make much economic sense to only send your car out at night. Too much competition. Much more reasonable to adjust your own travel schedule to off-peak times and send your car out to make money because you don't need it at peak-demand times.
However the "stink" refe
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Musk picked Austin for Tesla’s robotaxi trials and rollouts primarily because the city serves as the home base for Tesla's corporate headquarters, and it offers close proximity to company engineers and executives overseeing the project.
Also, Texas law does not permit individual cities to regulate or ban autonomous vehicles, so it's an AV friendly environment.
Finally, other autonomous vehicle networks, such as Waymo, had already established testing footprints in Austin.
So sorry, but I think your conspi
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Sure, mock him now, but you'll not be laughing when SpaceX sorts out the time machine that he had been secretly baking into his predictions all along.
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Last I heard, Schpace-Yikes is making 90% of its money from those jet turbines coupled inefficiently to generators in violation of all regulations in Missouri or wherever.
The actual space business is apparently barely scraping along.
So yeah, the time machine trick would be of immense help. Elona could go steal the Nazi gold or something.
Let me think (Score:5, Insightful)
Not only that (Score:3, Interesting)
On a more practical front - if there's an emergency how TF are emergency teams supposed to move the car out of the way or get it on the back of a tow truck easily if they can't fecking well steer it and the computer is dead?
This is just yet more tech for its own sake. Musk needs to realise sci-fi is not a how-to manual, its entertainment.
Re: Not only that (Score:1)
Re: Not only that (Score:2)
Safer that way too.
One of us has never operated a rollback wrecker.
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While they *can* move a car that cannot be steered on it's own, they generally prefer not to resort to it. It takes longer and requires more equipment. It's unavoidable if an accident messes up the steering or drive of the car badly enough, but even in pretty significant wrecks, they will frequently steer it. When someone totaled my car so badly the door was stuck and I had to climb through the window, they still drove it out of the way, and then onto the flatbed.
The "no steering wheel even possible" is
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... removing the wheel is just stupid.
Elon? Stupid? Nah, couldn't be! Why, he invented the Hyperloop fer chrissakes!
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"The "no steering wheel even possible" is a needless way to signal your overconfidence in the tech."
Zoox does the same thing. Regardless, it's only "needless" if you don't care about the costs involved.
Perhaps all "pure" self driving vehicles need a port into which one can plug a joystick when needed.
Then again, the systems are "fly-by-wire" anyway, so if the vehicle is truly disabled the pedals and wheel aren't going to do much.
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...need a port into which one can plug a joystick when needed.
That's close to what many Chinese self-driving busses do - there is a basic yolk folded down underneath a service panel. When needed, an employee can open it up to access reprogramming ports or fold out the controls to steer. To not do otherwise is calculated passing the costs off onto others.
Lol troll (Score:1)
Racism is real and Leon is a Nazi
All Nazis are cowards (Score:2)
Not all cowards are Nazis, but the one modding me down is
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Why would he have to make a car to have an opinion? That argument is generally a "well there's nothing better on the market, so if you know better, clearly you can do better", except here pretty much *everyone* is doing it better by having a wheel except Zoox.
Even Zoox at least gets *something* for skipping the steering wheel: more passenger volume and ability to face each other. The Tesla concept is a two-seater for zero benefit.
Re:Not only that (Score:4, Informative)
"The Tesla concept is a two-seater for zero benefit."
It's smaller, lighter, and it costs less, which isn't inconsequential if your goal is to make and operate millions of the things.
Besides, according to the states, approximately 90% to 95% of taxi and ride-hailing trips involve two passengers or less.
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Thank you.
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These vehicles have a control panel hidden behind a locked panel, and a train driver with the correct key could open it and operate manually the vehicles. [www.ansa.it]. If there's a power failure, there's also a diesel powered locomotive that could be used to tow the train cars
These safety measures a
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Public transportation is sharing a vehicle, and that's communism, like sharing your car or wife!11!!!!! A true robber baron capitalist heaven can't allow one, as people getting used to it becomes a slippery slope to Sacco and Vanzetti and eventually full Marx-Lenism1!!!
Unconscionable!
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Fear not! If something goes wrong you can just drive it with a Logitech wireless gamepad!
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Fire and Police just need forklifts as part of standard equipment.
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Though often it's also a warning, that could not be worded any more clearly.
Musk and his ilk think it's aspirational.
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On a more practical front - if there's an emergency how TF are emergency teams supposed to move the car out of the way or get it on the back of a tow truck easily if they can't fecking well steer it and the computer is dead?
One of those logging trucks with the giant claw?
Re:Let me think (Score:5, Insightful)
Buy a car where there are no mechanical linkages from the 'passenger' to vehicle control systems: Everything is a touch-screen element totally at the mercy of a corporation. What could go wrong?
Anyone for what could go right? Like NOT being harmed or killed by yet another distracted driver drunk on 100-proof doomscrolling behind the wheel?
Yeah. We do know what possibly could go wrong. But until we address what definitely goes wrong every day, put the fucking junkie in the backseat and let the machine drive. It’s a lot more sobering event. For all of us.
Yes. This is the “answer” when you cater to grown-ass children as we now do. You coddled immaturity. Then they all grew up. In body only. Teenagers are immature to the point of not even wanting to learn how to drive, because responsibility is ick. That mentality simply did not exist last century unless you were born with a silver chauffeur in your drivers seat.
Sadly, the You’ll Own Nothing auto-driving solution here is also a response to the $50,000 new car price and the $350/month insurance cost that will total that unitard chassis design the moment you get a fender bender. Negative Equity is the name of the fiscal prostitute hired by the stealership pimp to try and sling that shit as sexy now. Yeah. That bad.
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This is a taxi service - the kidult would already be sitting in the back in a normal cab. The ONLY thing this achieves is
A) Putting taxi drivers out of work (seems to be a Musk fetish)
B) Making it harder to move the car if the systems fail because no steering wheel.
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This is a taxi service - the kidult would already be sitting in the back in a normal cab. The ONLY thing this achieves is A) Putting taxi drivers out of work (seems to be a Musk fetish) B) Making it harder to move the car if the systems fail because no steering wheel.
When the new car price goes from $50,000 to $70,000 in the next decade..along with $500/month insurance premiums accounting for the unitard chassis idiocy putting the frame on the outside of the car to completely total your chances of avoiding negative equity, you’ll realize we’re not just building a taxi cab network for the next generation.
Were telling the next generation they won’t be responsible for learning how to drive. Which also means personal autonomy is dead. And sadly, damn nea
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"Which also means personal autonomy is dead."
So true. Unless, of course, one had the ability to walk, bike, ride a scooter, take a bus, train, plane or ride on some other mass transit system.
There's more to "personal autonomy" than being about to go vroom-vroom in a car.
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you know what "personal autonomy" means, right ? that means the ability for YOU to go ELSEWHERE regardless of what someone else provides.
so you can walk, bike or ride a scooter in your present neighbourhood but not travel across the country. youre not mobile and dont have personal autonomy if youre dictated to by the whims of mass transit run by a corporation. remember COVID ? they can shut down or enforce mandatory mass transit bans at any time. during COVID the only people who could travel were those with
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Which doesn't mean that in an emergency that they can't shut down roads and highways to automotive traffic or stop and arrest offenders who're violating the law.
Not to mention that your ability to operate a motor vehicle is largely dependent on the state and deemed a privilege, not a right. (Sovereign citizens to the contrary.) It can be taken away.
Your version of "personal autonomy" is illusionary.
Re: Let me think (Score:2)
They wouldnt even need to go to the trouble of roadblocks, they could just ration fuel as has happened in many countries in times of strife.
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That's one of the reasons I never understood the pushback against EVs in certain circles. Put a solar panel on your roof and you're now independent of the grid and gas stations.
I mean, it's a LOT harder to put an oil well and refinery in your backyard.
Re: Let me think (Score:2)
No one provided you with roads?
Teenagers don't want to learn to drive (Score:1)
You see this over and over again. We fuck up the economy and ruin the lives of young people and take away their future. Then the
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Lots of people don't want to drive. What changed in the last century is we started requiring it of everyone (in the US) who wanted to be a part of society. That meant the people who didn't want to drive, couldn't drive, or were just bad it nonetheless *had* to share the road with the people who actually wanted to be there.
This is a (terrible) solution to that problem. A much, much better solution, which we've had for literal centuries, is significantly increased urban density serviced by trains.
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I agree wholeheartedly that we should do everything possible to prioritize mass transit, walkability, and biking, and minimize car use.
But.
In the US we've spend the last century designing our cites around urban sprawl. Like it or not, that's where many of our homes are and where people live.
You're simply NOT going to solve sprawl, especially in western cities, with mass transit.
As such, some form of personal transportation must exist. And if so, then it benefits everyone to make it as efficient, and as clea
Re: Let me think (Score:3)
You do realize that nowadays in modern cars practically everything is drive-by-wire, chip and software, right? You are making suggestions on a bus and control units then decide what to actually do based on a lot of other factors and tuning.
It would not be all that practical but you could easily steer these teslas with a gaming controller if you REALLY want to drive yourself but the idea for a market and a direction based on safety stats is clear: the mass of cars in the future will drive themselves, and the
Re: Let me think (Score:4, Interesting)
You do realize that nowadays in modern cars practically everything is drive-by-wire, chip and software, right?
There are almost zero exceptions to the only thing being solely drive-by-wire being the throttle. Literally the only production vehicle without steering linkage is the Cybercuck. Every other one uses a linkage with a normally locked electric clutch which is disengaged during normal operation but which fails closed so that you can still steer. Every single vehicle with brake by wire uses mechanical brakes with a spring and pedal sensor before the mechanical part to do the electronic braking. So no, that is patently false and if you think it's true then you don't understand vehicles, the argument, or both.
Re: Let me think (Score:5, Informative)
You do realize that nowadays in modern cars practically everything is drive-by-wire, chip and software, right?
Actually there's only 4 cars ever put in production with drive by wire steering. Cybertruck, the top trim of Mercedes EQS, Lexus RZ, and the Infinity Q50 (this one has a clutch override).
Every car on the road not one of these has a direct mechanical connection between the wheel and the road. It includes power steering assist, and in cars which self drive the computer can apply force to the wheel, notable not a single one of those 4 cars can apply enough torque on the wheel to overpower even a small woman yanking on the steering wheel.
The same kind of system applies to the brakes. You have a mechanical connection between breaks and wheels. ABS can apply a secondary force reduction that is limited in duration. But it's not braking by wire. The computer can also apply a separate breaking action not linked to the brake pedal.
The only truly drive by wire system you have is the accelerator, and that's been true since the days of fuel injection.
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The only truly drive by wire system you have is the accelerator, and that's been true since the days of fuel injection.
Fuel injection in cars is from the 1950s. It was mechanical. Most throttles were cable operated even decades into the era of sequential fuel injection, though some vehicles went throttle by wire in the eighties like GM diesels with the 6.5 liter engine. So no and no.
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And these vehicles released into the wild in Austin are their R&D project to fine-tune things, for consumers and for actual taxis.
And these vehicles released into the wild in Austin are their R&D project to fine-tune things, for corporate overlords whose wet dreams are of a dystopian future in which they monitor and sometimes prescribe the movements of all 'average' citizens. FTFY.
Feel free to tell me that I'm wildly exaggerating, so long as you provide a convincing argument. I'd really like to be wrong, but I think that level of control is where the world is heading.
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> What could go wrong?
Insurance companies are offering discounts as much as 50% for every mile you drive in FSD on the Tesla 3. They wouldn't do that unless the actuarial tables are telling them it's significantly safer than when a human is in control.
Can things go wrong? Always possible - this is the real world we're talking about. Do they go wrong more often with the average driver behind the wheel vs FSD? Yea, definitely does.
Tesla FSD is safer.
People generally feel less secure only because they a
Re: Let me think (Score:2)
Would those same insurance companies even cover a wreck that happened if the driver hopped in the back seat? That is what we are talking about, not a driver using autonomous features that they can instantly override at any time.
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`Which still brings an interesting question to light. If self-driving vehicles turn out to be dramatically safer, will insurance companies give reduced rates to them?
Or to flip that around, charge "normal" drivers extravagant rates because they're costing them more money?
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You honestly think an always-on system that's always looking to the front, back, and sides simultaneously and that reacts in milliseconds is going to be less safe than all of the other dumb, drunk, distracted, texting, road raging idiots who currently drive their cars into walls, other cars, pedestrians, bikes, etc.?
In the US we currently kill 40,000 people a year in auto accidents. Injure 2.5 million more. Have 6 million collisions.
That's a pretty low bar to beat. Do HALF as good and you save 20,000 people
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They are, for the most part, illegal. That doesn't seem to stop the deaths and injuries, now does it?
40,000 people a year. Year in, and year out.
3,000 people die in a WTC attack and we flip out.
Kill 40,000 men, woman, and kids each and every year... and we accept it as "normal".
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I shouldn't worry, either you can't get in, or you can't get out, since Teslas also have the death-trap-door-handles that don't open in an emergency.
Honestly, it's getting to the point I'd have to think twice about going in a Tesla. Already it's a concern if a taxi shows up and I've got to put my kids in the back seats.
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They're reportedly fixing those in future iterations as China balked and passed a law requiring mechanically operateable handles.
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Buy a car where there are no mechanical linkages from the 'passenger' to vehicle control systems: What could go wrong?
Everything... except user error.
That exception is pretty big.
Launches? (Score:2)
As a limited demo product
In the handful of areas Tesla self driving taxis have been approved for testing
Later, after we start in Austin
Elon Musk level launch!
Will these be cheaper? (Score:2, Interesting)
Will it be cheaper to ride in a no-driver vehicle than in a regular old taxi or Uber? Because if it is (and the programming was such that I could put luggage or some other item on there and not have to worry about the vehicle disappearing with my stuff) I would absolutely want to use it when I need to move something too big for the bus or train.
Re: Will these be cheaper? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Well, in the long run it'll probably be cheaper for the owners, but obviously they won't be passing those savings along to the consumers.
Re: Will these be cheaper? (Score:4, Insightful)
Nothing is ever going to be cheaper than the thing before it.
Go back 100 years and tell me how many 1926 dollars you would need to buy one of those newfangled automobiles. Think you’ll find millionaires bragging about how “cheap” they are?
Go back 50 years and buy a personal computer. If you are important enough to sell it to, you’ll find out the price because you know what they say. If you gotta ask, it must be..cheaper?
Do I dare ask a teenager to look at a cell phone bill from 25 years ago? Back when you paid per text message each way (incoming and outgoing), and charged per minute of talk time? Think per megabyte would be cheaper today? Just my landline long distance bill was over $100/month. That’s still cheaper than 90% of the internet plans that ultimately replaced it and much more.
And people wonder why the newest generation, appears spoiled.
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Nothing is ever going to be cheaper than the thing before it.
Go back 100 years and tell me how
Eh? I thought the nutter must have been being ironic. You telling me he's actually just a moron? No!?
Re: Will these be cheaper? (Score:5, Insightful)
In 1924 the average earnings were $1,303
And the price of a model T (the most popular car model sold that year) was $290.
Today the average salary is 70k
the price of a new Ford F-150 (the most popular car model sold last year) is from 40k - 115k
So no cars are not cheaper as you seem to suggest. Obviously they're better, but I don't think that was the discussion.
To me the older generation is the spoiled generation. They've lived through one of the wealthiest eras in human history in the wealthiest country and their miserable, constantly complaining and demanding more and electing people who have been massively increasing the national deficit - which the old people will not have to pay off becaue they'll be dead.
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To appear slightly fair, maybe you shouldn't compare a Model T to a fully loaded F-150? The Model T was an entry-level vehicle. The cheapest new vehicle today is the Hyundai Venue at $20k. And that's ignoring all the great-condition used vehicles you can get for $10k and above. And no we can't say people could have bought used vehicles in the 1920s, because used vehicles sucked.
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I'm sure comparing a new car to getting someone's second hand handmedowns nowadays to make the math work is reaaaaaaalllllllly making your point that the previous generation didn't have it better off /s
Re: Will these be cheaper? (Score:2)
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Well, the argument about computers is wrong, too. Admittedly we're talking about S100 bus computers, I think the Apple was a bit later. I *could* have bought an S100 bus computer, but decided to wait a few years...and I was a very recent college grad.
Re: Will these be cheaper? (Score:2)
Emergency Services Can't Move This Elon Car !!1!1! (Score:3)
... or, you can be a nerd on the News for Nerds site and look up the answer. Tesla has a lot of material on their site dedicated to first responders and Tesla vehicles.
Robotaxi First Responder Interaction Plan -
https://digitalassets.tesla.co... [tesla.com]
Robotaxi Rescue Sheet -
https://digitalassets.tesla.co... [tesla.com]
Instructions on what to do whether or not the vehicle is powered.
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Yes, that sure is a lot of material. Every first responder is supposed to train on every vehicle that comes out? I'm skimming the interaction plan and it's got gems in it like "If the windows are rolled down and two-way communication is active, you can speak directly through the two-way speakers in the vehicle." They didn't think to put a microphone on the outside of the fucking vehicle? Holy fucking inept dickface fuckwads, batman. And you thought that was going to make Tesla look good? Where do you people
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That awkwardly addresses one minor facet of a 27 page manual for one car model for emergency situations, and this is the Model Y variant that can be traditionally operated.
Re: Emergency Services Can't Move This Elon Car !! (Score:5, Interesting)
(Former FR, current FR trainer here.) We can, and we will. We're not about to pull out the smartphone we're not carrying (I have a $60 stupid phone because I tend to lose and/or destroy them), figure out what model vehicle this is, navigate to the vendor's web site, find their 27-page manual, read it, study it, absorb it, and then use it....while something or someone is on fire, or drowning, or bleeding, or whatever.
Nor are we going to waste time trying to chat up Tesla personnel to tell them to move the vehicle: we're going to get a fire engine to shove it or drag it.
Understand that from our point of view, vehicles are expendable: we're not there to save property, we're there to save lives. If any property survives, well, that's a happy side effect. But we're not going to waste a moment worrying about it if it's between us and what we need to do.
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Undoing accidental mod :( Mod parent up!
Re: Emergency Services Can't Move This Elon Car !! (Score:2)
You are a coward. That is all you will ever be.
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Fun fact, those documents apply to the Model Y, and does not answer the question about how the car gets manually moved because that question is still obvious because the car has a steering wheel.
But even without that, they are expecting first responders to deal with 27 pages of material over their snowflake and also directs the first responder that they must call Tesla along with everything else.
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I'd bet that they can. [townnews.com]
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I do not wish to defend Musk, but you are significantly devaluing emergency responders.
Emergency responders are dedicated to doing what is needed to save lives.
They will break a window, cut a seatbelt, use the jaws of life to pry doors off, etc. If they need the vehicle to physically move, they will push/pull it.
Do not underestimate emergency responders.
Anyone can take rides. open to the entire pubic.. (Score:2)
Everywhere I look today, it's only children (Score:2)
We already know their self-driving doesn't work (Score:2)
It will however pump the stock and muskrat is completely untouchable. The law just does
legal (Score:3)
Why a two seater? (Score:2)
Make it make sense.
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And because cars are a certain size. Making it half the size for just one person would be nearly as expensive and would be worse for taxi'ing 2 people (which are still a reasonable number of fares).
Roadblock in event of a war (Score:2)
Driverless Waymo Car got stuck last week. (Score:2)