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Why is the situation in Peru at all relevant? I too have been to lots of places where self-driving cars would have a ridiculously hard time. Those places are a

Why is the situation in Peru at all relevant? I too have been to lots of places where self-driving cars would have a ridiculously hard time. Those places are also very far from the cutting edge of technology. Even if self-driving cars are confined to US highways, cities, and suburbs they have terrific potential. The future doesn't have to be evenly distributed to arrive on time. Seriously, I don't even understand you argument. Why would the existence of challenging backwaters in Peru prevent the development and deployment of self-driving cars in the US?

paganel 10y ago
Not the OP but I think he gave Peru just as an example. I would personally say that "normal" and non-hazardous traffic like that from the US and some Western European countries is the exception rather than the norm if we look at the whole planet.
- morgante 10y ago
  Sure, but population is far from the most important metric when it comes to developing new technologies. The iPhone was out of reach of most of the world when it launched (from a financial perspective), and it was only available in the US. That didn't make it an impossible product to develop. Even if self-driving cars were confined to only the USA that would still be a massive market and provide a huge ROI for the developers. Thinking self-driving cars have to work everywhere or even most places to be useful is myopic. It's like saying cell phones will never work because you can't get reception in Antarctica.
  - paganel 10y ago
    I think the biggest market for cars has now become China. India will probably reach the top-5 in the next 10-20 years. Looking forward to the next 30-50 years the biggest demographic increases (meaning future car buyers) will come from places like Africa and South and SE-Asia. It would be myopic to disregard those places as having people who would never afford cars. To continue with your example, almost all of Sub-Saharan Africa passed from having no phone at all to having cell phones (because it was too expensive to install land-lines).
    - morgante 10y ago
      I think you missed my point. I'm not saying that China and India will never have self-driving cars. There's obviously tremendous profits to be made in bringing cars to those markets. My point is that a self-driving car doesn't have to be ready for those markets to be launchable as an excellent and profitable product. The iPhone very successfully launched in only select markets—and then made even more money after expanding to China. It'll probably be similar with self-driving cars. Why exactly do you think a self-driving car has to be globally deployable before launching in the US?
      - paganel 10y ago
        > Why exactly do you think a self-driving car has to be globally deployable before launching in the US? I think it can launch in the US all-right, but I don't think it will easily export to the other markets because of the above reasons. In iPhone's case that was easily fixable by people in said markets reaching middle-class status, but in case of self-driving vehicles I don't see that happening because one would have to change very ingrained cultural traits (basically you'd have to re-teach most than half to three-quarters of the world on how to drive sanely, good luck with that). I'd say that for such a capital-intensive market like the car industry only relying on the US and some select Western European markets (+ Japan and South Korea) won't be profitable on the long term, hence my pessimism that self-driving cars will conquer the world.
        yummyfajitas 10y ago
        you'd have to re-teach most than half to three-quarters of the world on how to drive sanely, good luck with that). This is already happening in the wealthier parts of the world. I don't think current self-driving cars will work very well in India. But I think they'd work just fine in the rich parts of Pune, to name one area I know well. That's because driving norms in this region are already becoming quite sane. From what I've seen the same is true in the wealthier parts of Mumbai. Lane discipline isn't quite as good as in the US, but I'm perfectly comfortable driving a two wheeler on these roads. (I'd be a lot more scared driving in Delhi.) I question whether "sane" driving is actually cultural. Is it possible that "sane driving" is actually just the natural human reaction to good roads and homogeneous vehicles capable of driving at similar speeds (as opposed to a mix of cars, auto rickshaws, pedal rickshaws, 3 wheeled mini trucks, etc)?
- melling 10y ago
  So, self-driving cars will be limited to about a billion people in the short-term? In the US alone we have about 4.5 million accidents and 30,000 deaths yearly. Perhaps the rest of the world will see the benefit and adapt to the cars.
  - paganel 10y ago
    A stagnating billion people market, both when it comes to incomes and demographics (even though the US is doing slightly better here). AI-run cars would also have to be price comparable to many of the hatchbacks now dominating Western Europe, we're talking about a maximum price of 20,000 euros (with an average purchase price of 15,000). A month or two ago I was told on HN that AI cars are not for people like me, for whom the $35,000 price of a Tesla 3 model was too much (and Tesla 3 is seen as the base, cheap model), so I'd cut a big percentage off of that 1 billion people market you're talking about.
    - yessql 10y ago
      With self-driving it is important to separate owning and using.
  - greeneggs 10y ago
    > In the US alone we have about 4.5 million accidents and 30,000 deaths yearly. More like 40,000 deaths yearly, these days. In 2015, it was 38,300 [1], and it had increased 8% (or 2067 deaths) in the first nine months of 2016 [2]. [1] http://www.newsweek.com/2015-brought-biggest-us-traffic-death-increase-50-years-427759 http://www.newsweek.com/2015-brought-biggest-us-traffic-deat... [2] http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/traffic-deaths-surged-8-months-2016-article-1.2945696 http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/traffic-deaths-surg...
bambax 10y ago
> Even if self-driving cars are confined to US highways... Self-driving cars "confined" to anywhere are not self-driving cars, because you obviously need a human driver to get to and from that special place.
- nordsieck 10y ago
  ... unless your entire life fits inside that special place, in which case they're good enough.
  - Firadeoclus 10y ago
    Indeed. It's easy to imagine urban centres replacing internal traffic with a fleet of self-driving cars. If you're coming from somewhere else, park & ride.
- morgante 10y ago
  Nice selective quoting. Millions of cars spend their entire existence confined to US highways, cities, and suburbs. In what way is a car not self-driving if it can successfully drive you on you everywhere you go in your daily life? You don't "obviously" need a human driver if the car is used entirely in that "special place" (ie. where most cars spend their entire existence). Your argument makes about as much sense as claiming cell phones aren't truly mobile because you can't use them in Antarctica.
  - babyrainbow 10y ago
    > if it can successfully drive you on you everywhere you go in your daily life? Well, simply because I don't know everywhere "I would have to go in my daily life" when I am buying the damn car. >Your argument makes about as much sense as claiming cell phones aren't truly mobile because you can't use them in Antarctica. By that logic, your argument also makes only as much as sense as calling a walkie talkie with 100m range a mobile phone.
    - wrsh07 10y ago
gambiting 10y ago
Because there are 1st world countries where the situation is not that different? Poland for example, actual road: http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/FESuhya2Ig0/hqdefault.jpg http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/FESuhya2Ig0/hqdefault.jpg Signage is absolutely atrocious, there's too many signs, some of them wrong, some of the rules are implied(speed limit ends at any intersection, but if a road is going to a private property, then it's not an intersection, so good luck knowing where a speed limit ends), people drive like crazy, there's loads of unpaved roads.....and yet a person from a very rich western country(say UK or Germany) can drive over there in few hours driving time. Every time someone makes an argument for self driving cars, I keep thinking if they would work back home - the answer is, they wouldn't.
- celticninja 10y ago
  >and yet a person from a very rich western country(say UK or Germany) can drive over there in few hours driving time. And experience the same issues that a self driving car could. But at least on the journey there and back they would be considerably safer.
  - mulletbum 10y ago
    Not to mention do something constructive like their taxes or read a book. Heck, I would just look out the window.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- annnnd 10y ago
  I would buy a self-driving car (even if it only works on normal roads and refuses to drive anywhere else) in a heartbeat. Can't drive some road in Poland? I'll manage. But if it takes the driving out of my daily commute I would pay good money for it. On a separate note, try replacing "self-driving cars / normal cars" with "cars / carriages and horses" in such discussions. It make many answers obvious. (Hint: I am sure there were people who pointed out that the cars couldn't drive over narrow winding paths where horses ruled)
Daishiman 10y ago
Peru's a poor country but it doesn't mean you don't see your fair share of midrange Corollas, BMWs, and Mercedes. You're not going to get commercially successful self-driving cars if they can't target that market.
- caseysoftware 10y ago
  Yes, you can. It's called market segmentation. You can't go after every single market at once with the same product. Building and selling for the high end to bring costs down and expanding the market is econ 101. It's part of the reason the more-powerful-than-Apollo-computer I'm typing on was $1400. Or to put it another way: "The future is here, it's just not evenly distributed."
ConceptJunkie 10y ago
You don't have to go to Peru. Just try driving in Boston.
- euyyn 10y ago
  Anyone that's driven in downtown San Francisco, or just seen it without even driving, knows those arguments are empty. That's why, when the Uber self-driving car blatantly ran a red light, the joke was that it was learning from its environment.

paganel 10y ago

Not the OP but I think he gave Peru just as an example. I would personally say that "normal" and non-hazardous traffic like that from the US and some Western European countries is the exception rather than the norm if we look at the whole planet.

morgante 10y ago
Sure, but population is far from the most important metric when it comes to developing new technologies. The iPhone was out of reach of most of the world when it launched (from a financial perspective), and it was only available in the US. That didn't make it an impossible product to develop. Even if self-driving cars were confined to only the USA that would still be a massive market and provide a huge ROI for the developers. Thinking self-driving cars have to work everywhere or even most places to be useful is myopic. It's like saying cell phones will never work because you can't get reception in Antarctica.
- paganel 10y ago
  I think the biggest market for cars has now become China. India will probably reach the top-5 in the next 10-20 years. Looking forward to the next 30-50 years the biggest demographic increases (meaning future car buyers) will come from places like Africa and South and SE-Asia. It would be myopic to disregard those places as having people who would never afford cars. To continue with your example, almost all of Sub-Saharan Africa passed from having no phone at all to having cell phones (because it was too expensive to install land-lines).
  - morgante 10y ago
    I think you missed my point. I'm not saying that China and India will never have self-driving cars. There's obviously tremendous profits to be made in bringing cars to those markets. My point is that a self-driving car doesn't have to be ready for those markets to be launchable as an excellent and profitable product. The iPhone very successfully launched in only select markets—and then made even more money after expanding to China. It'll probably be similar with self-driving cars. Why exactly do you think a self-driving car has to be globally deployable before launching in the US?
    - paganel 10y ago
      > Why exactly do you think a self-driving car has to be globally deployable before launching in the US? I think it can launch in the US all-right, but I don't think it will easily export to the other markets because of the above reasons. In iPhone's case that was easily fixable by people in said markets reaching middle-class status, but in case of self-driving vehicles I don't see that happening because one would have to change very ingrained cultural traits (basically you'd have to re-teach most than half to three-quarters of the world on how to drive sanely, good luck with that). I'd say that for such a capital-intensive market like the car industry only relying on the US and some select Western European markets (+ Japan and South Korea) won't be profitable on the long term, hence my pessimism that self-driving cars will conquer the world.
      - yummyfajitas 10y ago
        you'd have to re-teach most than half to three-quarters of the world on how to drive sanely, good luck with that). This is already happening in the wealthier parts of the world. I don't think current self-driving cars will work very well in India. But I think they'd work just fine in the rich parts of Pune, to name one area I know well. That's because driving norms in this region are already becoming quite sane. From what I've seen the same is true in the wealthier parts of Mumbai. Lane discipline isn't quite as good as in the US, but I'm perfectly comfortable driving a two wheeler on these roads. (I'd be a lot more scared driving in Delhi.) I question whether "sane" driving is actually cultural. Is it possible that "sane driving" is actually just the natural human reaction to good roads and homogeneous vehicles capable of driving at similar speeds (as opposed to a mix of cars, auto rickshaws, pedal rickshaws, 3 wheeled mini trucks, etc)?
melling 10y ago
So, self-driving cars will be limited to about a billion people in the short-term? In the US alone we have about 4.5 million accidents and 30,000 deaths yearly. Perhaps the rest of the world will see the benefit and adapt to the cars.
- paganel 10y ago
  A stagnating billion people market, both when it comes to incomes and demographics (even though the US is doing slightly better here). AI-run cars would also have to be price comparable to many of the hatchbacks now dominating Western Europe, we're talking about a maximum price of 20,000 euros (with an average purchase price of 15,000). A month or two ago I was told on HN that AI cars are not for people like me, for whom the $35,000 price of a Tesla 3 model was too much (and Tesla 3 is seen as the base, cheap model), so I'd cut a big percentage off of that 1 billion people market you're talking about.
  - yessql 10y ago
    With self-driving it is important to separate owning and using.
- greeneggs 10y ago
  > In the US alone we have about 4.5 million accidents and 30,000 deaths yearly. More like 40,000 deaths yearly, these days. In 2015, it was 38,300 [1], and it had increased 8% (or 2067 deaths) in the first nine months of 2016 [2]. [1] http://www.newsweek.com/2015-brought-biggest-us-traffic-death-increase-50-years-427759 http://www.newsweek.com/2015-brought-biggest-us-traffic-deat... [2] http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/traffic-deaths-surged-8-months-2016-article-1.2945696 http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/traffic-deaths-surg...

bambax 10y ago

> Even if self-driving cars are confined to US highways... Self-driving cars "confined" to anywhere are not self-driving cars, because you obviously need a human driver to get to and from that special place.

nordsieck 10y ago
... unless your entire life fits inside that special place, in which case they're good enough.
- Firadeoclus 10y ago
  Indeed. It's easy to imagine urban centres replacing internal traffic with a fleet of self-driving cars. If you're coming from somewhere else, park & ride.
morgante 10y ago
Nice selective quoting. Millions of cars spend their entire existence confined to US highways, cities, and suburbs. In what way is a car not self-driving if it can successfully drive you on you everywhere you go in your daily life? You don't "obviously" need a human driver if the car is used entirely in that "special place" (ie. where most cars spend their entire existence). Your argument makes about as much sense as claiming cell phones aren't truly mobile because you can't use them in Antarctica.
- babyrainbow 10y ago
  > if it can successfully drive you on you everywhere you go in your daily life? Well, simply because I don't know everywhere "I would have to go in my daily life" when I am buying the damn car. >Your argument makes about as much sense as claiming cell phones aren't truly mobile because you can't use them in Antarctica. By that logic, your argument also makes only as much as sense as calling a walkie talkie with 100m range a mobile phone.
  - wrsh07 10y ago

gambiting 10y ago

Because there are 1st world countries where the situation is not that different? Poland for example, actual road: http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/FESuhya2Ig0/hqdefault.jpg http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/FESuhya2Ig0/hqdefault.jpg Signage is absolutely atrocious, there's too many signs, some of them wrong, some of the rules are implied(speed limit ends at any intersection, but if a road is going to a private property, then it's not an intersection, so good luck knowing where a speed limit ends), people drive like crazy, there's loads of unpaved roads.....and yet a person from a very rich western country(say UK or Germany) can drive over there in few hours driving time. Every time someone makes an argument for self driving cars, I keep thinking if they would work back home - the answer is, they wouldn't.

celticninja 10y ago
>and yet a person from a very rich western country(say UK or Germany) can drive over there in few hours driving time. And experience the same issues that a self driving car could. But at least on the journey there and back they would be considerably safer.
- mulletbum 10y ago
  Not to mention do something constructive like their taxes or read a book. Heck, I would just look out the window.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
annnnd 10y ago
I would buy a self-driving car (even if it only works on normal roads and refuses to drive anywhere else) in a heartbeat. Can't drive some road in Poland? I'll manage. But if it takes the driving out of my daily commute I would pay good money for it. On a separate note, try replacing "self-driving cars / normal cars" with "cars / carriages and horses" in such discussions. It make many answers obvious. (Hint: I am sure there were people who pointed out that the cars couldn't drive over narrow winding paths where horses ruled)

Daishiman 10y ago

Peru's a poor country but it doesn't mean you don't see your fair share of midrange Corollas, BMWs, and Mercedes. You're not going to get commercially successful self-driving cars if they can't target that market.

caseysoftware 10y ago
Yes, you can. It's called market segmentation. You can't go after every single market at once with the same product. Building and selling for the high end to bring costs down and expanding the market is econ 101. It's part of the reason the more-powerful-than-Apollo-computer I'm typing on was $1400. Or to put it another way: "The future is here, it's just not evenly distributed."

ConceptJunkie 10y ago

You don't have to go to Peru. Just try driving in Boston.

euyyn 10y ago
Anyone that's driven in downtown San Francisco, or just seen it without even driving, knows those arguments are empty. That's why, when the Uber self-driving car blatantly ran a red light, the joke was that it was learning from its environment.