4 ms·

I thought google has a head start with self driving cars. Do they? Has GM caught up?

by atomical 9y ago

slantaclaus 9y ago
They have a lot to prove to investors
rgbrenner 9y ago
note, the title is "GM wants to".. There's nothing in the article that others haven't already done.
pj_mukh 9y ago
With articles like these, the PR submarine always comes to mind. http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html
- djsumdog 9y ago
  I had not read that Graham post before. Interesting .. Keep in mind the term Public Relations was though to have been coined by Edward Berneys. He's said on camera that the US Government realized propaganda worked well during WW2, but propaganda had become a bad word. So he created the US Department of Public Relations. It's literally a weasel word for propaganda.
- atomical 9y ago
  Who upvoted this? It has nothing to do with my comment.
  - pj_mukh 9y ago
    I should've been more descriptive. In general, it's hard to know who's "ahead" as neither of them has launched anything. However, Google has spent more capital over a longer time on it. This piece though seems mostly to be PR covered up as journalism (aka the submarine).
Fricken 9y ago
GM hasn't caught up, but they're closing the gap quickly, and they're doing it with an aircraft carrier against Google's Frigate.
joshvm 9y ago
The headstart that both Tesla and Google have is test data. Tesla has more, because they've collected data from production cars from the get go. Google likely has more mature software (pure speculation), and it has comprehensive mapping data, but it doesn't have 100k customers providing them with useful real-world information. It does, however, have millions of Android users, but that's not the same. I believe all new Tesla vehicles send back autopilot data to the mothership. There's some interesting comparisons. On the one hand you have Google, which is primarily a software company with hardware interests. Then you have GM which is an auto company with software interests. And you have Tesla which positioned itself in the middle, aiming to both build cars and software. As a result, Google has a lot of core software expertise and infrastructure (particularly for machine learning). GM has the production capacity and the ability to roll out features to potentially millions of new vehicles. Google had to buy in automotive people. GM had to buy in software people. Tesla had to buy in both, but they did it from the very beginning with clear goals in mind. From an outsiders' perspective, building a car that can drive by itself isn't terribly difficult nowadays. If you have the cash, you can buy a team that will build it. The challenge is getting from that stage to a car that can reliably drive better than a human in all driving conditions and deal with unexpected events. That will take much more time, and much more data. There are other aspects like getting the sensors down to a price that people can actually afford.

I thought google has a head start with self driving cars. Do they? Has GM caught up?

slantaclaus 9y ago

They have a lot to prove to investors

rgbrenner 9y ago

note, the title is "GM wants to".. There's nothing in the article that others haven't already done.

pj_mukh 9y ago

With articles like these, the PR submarine always comes to mind. http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html

djsumdog 9y ago
I had not read that Graham post before. Interesting .. Keep in mind the term Public Relations was though to have been coined by Edward Berneys. He's said on camera that the US Government realized propaganda worked well during WW2, but propaganda had become a bad word. So he created the US Department of Public Relations. It's literally a weasel word for propaganda.
atomical 9y ago
Who upvoted this? It has nothing to do with my comment.
- pj_mukh 9y ago
  I should've been more descriptive. In general, it's hard to know who's "ahead" as neither of them has launched anything. However, Google has spent more capital over a longer time on it. This piece though seems mostly to be PR covered up as journalism (aka the submarine).

Fricken 9y ago

GM hasn't caught up, but they're closing the gap quickly, and they're doing it with an aircraft carrier against Google's Frigate.

joshvm 9y ago

The headstart that both Tesla and Google have is test data. Tesla has more, because they've collected data from production cars from the get go. Google likely has more mature software (pure speculation), and it has comprehensive mapping data, but it doesn't have 100k customers providing them with useful real-world information. It does, however, have millions of Android users, but that's not the same. I believe all new Tesla vehicles send back autopilot data to the mothership. There's some interesting comparisons. On the one hand you have Google, which is primarily a software company with hardware interests. Then you have GM which is an auto company with software interests. And you have Tesla which positioned itself in the middle, aiming to both build cars and software. As a result, Google has a lot of core software expertise and infrastructure (particularly for machine learning). GM has the production capacity and the ability to roll out features to potentially millions of new vehicles. Google had to buy in automotive people. GM had to buy in software people. Tesla had to buy in both, but they did it from the very beginning with clear goals in mind. From an outsiders' perspective, building a car that can drive by itself isn't terribly difficult nowadays. If you have the cash, you can buy a team that will build it. The challenge is getting from that stage to a car that can reliably drive better than a human in all driving conditions and deal with unexpected events. That will take much more time, and much more data. There are other aspects like getting the sensors down to a price that people can actually afford.