5 ms·

Google is still light years ahead, also, self-driving cars are expected to drastically reduce the number of cars being sold as they will be used much more effic

Google is still light years ahead, also, self-driving cars are expected to drastically reduce the number of cars being sold as they will be used much more efficiently and now one will own a car, at least when self-driving cars will be a majority which admittedly won't be for another 15 to 20 years.

toomuchtodo 11y ago
> Google is still light years ahead Google also had a gentleman's deal with Elon to buy Tesla and allow him to continue operating it if they were unable to get their financing together. They have shared goals (electric transportation, reduced/eliminated mobility fatalities). > self-driving cars are expected to drastically reduce the number of cars being sold as they will be used much more efficiently and now one will own a car Agree completely. Google is excellent at software. Tesla is excellent at hardware. > at least when self-driving cars will be a majority which admittedly won't be for another 15 to 20 years. Google's head of their self-driving vehicle team has committed to general availability of their self-driving cars in 4 years
- patrickaljord 11y ago
  > Google's head of their self-driving vehicle team has committed to general availability of their self-driving cars in 4 years Yes, but I said "self-driving cars will be a majority" in 15 to 20 years. The internet was invented in 1983, made available to the public in 1990 and took over 10 to 15 years later, even today there's a good proportion of the population that do not use it.
  - toomuchtodo 11y ago
    The future is hard to predict. It depends on two things: * Regulations * Manufacturing capacity The world auto fleet is replaced pretty slowly. Perhaps its turned over quicker for every self-driving car released onto the roads. If I recall correctly, for every Zipcar shared car in a neighborhood, ~20 cars are no longer kept by owners in the area. Self-driving vehicles could have the same effect, limited to only how fast they can be built and shipped on rail to their final operational region. Regulations. These are important. Self-driving cars will kill less people than human drivers. Full stop. If you incentivize people to use self-driving cars (insurance rates skyrocket for human drivers), you'll push people to automated vehicles faster. Less deaths, less capital outlay for humanity as a whole for buying cars, lots of efficiency all around. If you want to make a gentleman's Long Bet [1] on it, I'd be down for that (token amount donated to the winner's charity of choice). [1] http://longbets.org/ http://longbets.org/
- threeseed 11y ago
  And what's Googles record on hardware like ? Apple has hired everyone under the sun to work on their rumoured car project and they already have decades of experience in global supply chain management. That is what I would be expecting from Google today if they were planning on shipping a car in 4 years. Far more likely they will license their software to Tesla. Which would be one of the only car companies interested since everyone has had autonomous systems project in place for many years.
  - toomuchtodo 11y ago
    According to Google's latest monthly report [1]: Miles driven since start of project in 2009 “Autonomous mode” means the software is driving the vehicle, and test drivers are not touching the manual controls. “Manual mode” means the test drivers are driving the car. * Autonomous mode: 1,158,818 miles * Manual mode: 877,477 miles * We’re currently averaging ~10,000 autonomous miles per week on public streets (my note: over a million miles without an accident caused by software) [1] http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en//selfdrivingcar/files/reports/report-0815.pdf http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en/... Don't let their track record on consumer hardware fool you. Apple makes nice phones and laptops, while Google has built an entire simulation of where their vehicles drive, continually updates that data with vehicles in the field, and runs their self driving algorithms against those world simulations. This ain't no Apple Maps.
    - threeseed 11y ago
      Software is just one very small part of the work involved in building and selling a car globally. Not sure why you are fixated on it. At this point in time there is no evidence Google has put in the necessary steps to be ready to sell a car in 4 years time. And yes their absymal record on consumer hardware counts.
      - toomuchtodo 11y ago
        You're, of course, free to you're opinion. I'm fixated on reducing traffic deaths to zero and eliminating fossil fuel use by any means necessary. If that means I'm obsessed, so be it. Google, Tesla, whomever doesn't need to sell the cars. They just need to provide you the option of transportation through your smartphone. You don't own a 777, and yet, you can travel across the country for a few hundred dollars with a purchase on your smartphone.
- gress 11y ago
  Do you have a reference for that commitment?
  - toomuchtodo 11y ago
    http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en//selfdrivingcar/files/reports/report-0815.pdf http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en/... "Our project lead Chris Urmson’s goal is to make sure his 11 year old son doesn’t need to get a driver’s license."
    - gress 11y ago
      That's not a commitment, and neither does it imply 4 years, since only 50% of 17 year olds currently have a license and that figure has been dropping anyway.
casylum 11y ago
Remember how computers were supposed to eliminate paper in the office? Now we have more paper than ever thanks to computers. With self-driving cars people can have their cars out running errands for them during the day. Need to pickup something two hours away? No problem, send your car to get it while you are at work. The car that was sitting idle in the parking lot is now out on the road during the day. By eliminating the driver the number of cars on the road might increase dramatically.
- toomuchtodo 11y ago
  > By eliminating the driver the number of cars on the road might increase dramatically. Charge road tax by the mile. Replaces the gas tax, regulates a limited physical resource.
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  Right. Looked at a different way, self-driving cars increase the utility provided by cars, so -- since people will only buy self-driving cars if the price premium over non-self-driving cars is less than the added utility -- can be expected, all other things being equal, to increase the number of cars sold and in use. OTOH, because self-driving cars decrease the number of cars needed in society to deliver a given degree of utility, they could facilitate a reduction in the number of cars, but some other changes would need to occur to realize that reduction. Tax, regulatory, and/or urban design policies which disfavor individual ownership of vehicles in favor of centralized on-call services would have to reduce the number of cars on the road.
- Retric 11y ago
  I have gone over a full year without thouching paper at work before so the 'paperless' office is real.

toomuchtodo 11y ago

> Google is still light years ahead Google also had a gentleman's deal with Elon to buy Tesla and allow him to continue operating it if they were unable to get their financing together. They have shared goals (electric transportation, reduced/eliminated mobility fatalities). > self-driving cars are expected to drastically reduce the number of cars being sold as they will be used much more efficiently and now one will own a car Agree completely. Google is excellent at software. Tesla is excellent at hardware. > at least when self-driving cars will be a majority which admittedly won't be for another 15 to 20 years. Google's head of their self-driving vehicle team has committed to general availability of their self-driving cars in 4 years

patrickaljord 11y ago
> Google's head of their self-driving vehicle team has committed to general availability of their self-driving cars in 4 years Yes, but I said "self-driving cars will be a majority" in 15 to 20 years. The internet was invented in 1983, made available to the public in 1990 and took over 10 to 15 years later, even today there's a good proportion of the population that do not use it.
- toomuchtodo 11y ago
  The future is hard to predict. It depends on two things: * Regulations * Manufacturing capacity The world auto fleet is replaced pretty slowly. Perhaps its turned over quicker for every self-driving car released onto the roads. If I recall correctly, for every Zipcar shared car in a neighborhood, ~20 cars are no longer kept by owners in the area. Self-driving vehicles could have the same effect, limited to only how fast they can be built and shipped on rail to their final operational region. Regulations. These are important. Self-driving cars will kill less people than human drivers. Full stop. If you incentivize people to use self-driving cars (insurance rates skyrocket for human drivers), you'll push people to automated vehicles faster. Less deaths, less capital outlay for humanity as a whole for buying cars, lots of efficiency all around. If you want to make a gentleman's Long Bet [1] on it, I'd be down for that (token amount donated to the winner's charity of choice). [1] http://longbets.org/ http://longbets.org/
threeseed 11y ago
And what's Googles record on hardware like ? Apple has hired everyone under the sun to work on their rumoured car project and they already have decades of experience in global supply chain management. That is what I would be expecting from Google today if they were planning on shipping a car in 4 years. Far more likely they will license their software to Tesla. Which would be one of the only car companies interested since everyone has had autonomous systems project in place for many years.
- toomuchtodo 11y ago
  According to Google's latest monthly report [1]: Miles driven since start of project in 2009 “Autonomous mode” means the software is driving the vehicle, and test drivers are not touching the manual controls. “Manual mode” means the test drivers are driving the car. * Autonomous mode: 1,158,818 miles * Manual mode: 877,477 miles * We’re currently averaging ~10,000 autonomous miles per week on public streets (my note: over a million miles without an accident caused by software) [1] http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en//selfdrivingcar/files/reports/report-0815.pdf http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en/... Don't let their track record on consumer hardware fool you. Apple makes nice phones and laptops, while Google has built an entire simulation of where their vehicles drive, continually updates that data with vehicles in the field, and runs their self driving algorithms against those world simulations. This ain't no Apple Maps.
  - threeseed 11y ago
    Software is just one very small part of the work involved in building and selling a car globally. Not sure why you are fixated on it. At this point in time there is no evidence Google has put in the necessary steps to be ready to sell a car in 4 years time. And yes their absymal record on consumer hardware counts.
    - toomuchtodo 11y ago
      You're, of course, free to you're opinion. I'm fixated on reducing traffic deaths to zero and eliminating fossil fuel use by any means necessary. If that means I'm obsessed, so be it. Google, Tesla, whomever doesn't need to sell the cars. They just need to provide you the option of transportation through your smartphone. You don't own a 777, and yet, you can travel across the country for a few hundred dollars with a purchase on your smartphone.
gress 11y ago
Do you have a reference for that commitment?
- toomuchtodo 11y ago
  http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en//selfdrivingcar/files/reports/report-0815.pdf http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en/... "Our project lead Chris Urmson’s goal is to make sure his 11 year old son doesn’t need to get a driver’s license."
  - gress 11y ago
    That's not a commitment, and neither does it imply 4 years, since only 50% of 17 year olds currently have a license and that figure has been dropping anyway.

casylum 11y ago

Remember how computers were supposed to eliminate paper in the office? Now we have more paper than ever thanks to computers. With self-driving cars people can have their cars out running errands for them during the day. Need to pickup something two hours away? No problem, send your car to get it while you are at work. The car that was sitting idle in the parking lot is now out on the road during the day. By eliminating the driver the number of cars on the road might increase dramatically.

toomuchtodo 11y ago
> By eliminating the driver the number of cars on the road might increase dramatically. Charge road tax by the mile. Replaces the gas tax, regulates a limited physical resource.
dragonwriter 11y ago
Right. Looked at a different way, self-driving cars increase the utility provided by cars, so -- since people will only buy self-driving cars if the price premium over non-self-driving cars is less than the added utility -- can be expected, all other things being equal, to increase the number of cars sold and in use. OTOH, because self-driving cars decrease the number of cars needed in society to deliver a given degree of utility, they could facilitate a reduction in the number of cars, but some other changes would need to occur to realize that reduction. Tax, regulatory, and/or urban design policies which disfavor individual ownership of vehicles in favor of centralized on-call services would have to reduce the number of cars on the road.
Retric 11y ago
I have gone over a full year without thouching paper at work before so the 'paperless' office is real.