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Comma.ai, self-driving cars and indefinite optimism

109 points by bko 6y ago

chollida1 6y ago
What is comma.ai's business model here? I mean whose auto insurance(both collision and more importantly liability) has a clause that lets anyone hook up a random after market self driving toolkit to their car. Who has liability once you start using their solution? I'm sure comma.ai will have a clause that their solution is only for fun and you can't blame them if their self driving solution drives your car into a bus full of orphans. So what's the point of what they are selling if you can't actually use it? Or put another way, a self driving, or even driving assist add on only has value if the vendor absorbs all liability when using their system.
- stevenhubertron 6y ago
  Bingo. Liability is a huge risk here and they are using their "customers" as alpha testers that are playing Russian roulette with their lives and those around them. I want Comma to succeed but not by shipping alpha-products to the general public that doesn't understand the risks.
  - sodality2 6y ago
    Wait, they're shipping it already? Wtf, all I did was look at their codebase and I assumed they were just making some news about it. Distributing code and shipping a product are very different, and I'll be surprised if nothing bad comes out of it soon.
    - gjsman-1000 6y ago
      Comma thinks they are ready because it's essentially an Adaptive Cruise Control, and as they state on their website, they scored #1 for best at that by Consumer Reports compared to the stock offerings from Ford, Nissan, and other carmakers. Frankly, I don't know if _anyone_ should be including this kind of tech if it's this early, but Comma is currently far from the only one for what it does. Frankly, because it scored #1 and the code is open-source, I'd be much more likely to trust Comma than the stock offering from my manufacturer.
      - sodality2 6y ago
        >It enables your car to steer, accelerate, and brake automatically within its lane. Drive to a highway, press the cruise control SET button, and openpilot will engage Ah, it isn't marketed as a full autopilot. I'm not 100% confident that it should be used in the current state but I'm also not an auto regulator, so we shall see.
        sjcoles 6y ago
        I have one. Works pretty well but requires a fair bit of tweaking. It's called a dev kit for a reason. Many car models limit the amount (and at what rate) that the computer system can turn the wheel. The system is piggybacking off of this engineering for most of its 'safety'. There was people spoofing park assist on some models to get very strong control of the wheel but such discussion got banned on the official discord. Which leads me to my big problem with Comma.ai: it's open source but not very open. Look at the code, go back several releases and watch the number of comments regress. There's zero documentation, the wiki is a fucking joke and for some reason does not come up in a google search and is just missing critical information. No, I don't want to watch a 5 fucking minute video to find a 10 second clip with the information I need. Write that shit down. Instead you ask a question and some asshole that is gunning for a job at comma posts a passive agressive screenshot of them using the discord search. It's almost like if you put effort into having information recorded instead of being a dick you wouldn't have to be a dick. That wouldn't be very fun or inflate egos much so it doesn't happen.
        acct776 6y ago
        Hope you're listening, George (commaai). Long time listener, first time caller - rooting for you. See you soon.
      - 23iofj 6y ago
        > best at that by Consumer Reports compared to the stock offerings from Ford, Nissan, and other carmakers. Read through the Consumer Reports PDF [1]. It's abundantly clear that they have no idea how to properly evaluate adaptive cruise systems. What this report tells you is exactly what you would expect from a Consumer Reports publication: the generic impression that a typical consumer will have after a few hours of use. This sort of superficial analysis is completely unrelated to anything approaching a real safety analysis. [1] https://data.consumerreports.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/consumer-reports-active-driving-assistance-systems-november-16-2020.pdf https://data.consumerreports.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/...
- optional_value 6y ago
  I think their strategy is selling the technology to car manufacturers and investors not average people.
  - bbaumgar 6y ago
    They have a "Shop" button on their homepage that lets anyone buy their product for installation on their own car. I had a coworker purchase Comma.ai + a specific make/model solely for its Comma.ai compatibility last year. Average people are getting in on this, for the better or (likely) worse.
    - optional_value 6y ago
      But isn't the real value the data they gather to train their models? This is where to money is.
- agentdrtran 6y ago
  > Who has liability once you start using their solution? Their FAQ just says "ask your insurance company" lol
- nzmsv 6y ago
  They want to avoid thinking about non-engineering things like liability for as long as possible and focus on the engineering problem. It's a valid approach. As for the "who has liability" question it's simple: the driver does. Or at least it's intended to be simple in the absence of lawyers twisting the wording around. Regular, non self driving cars have basic driving assists. For example, cruise control will happily ram your car into the back of another one. Adaptive cruise still has a chance of doing that, plus it has the additional risk of causing an accident by randomly slamming on the brakes for no reason at all. For all these failure modes the liability is understood to lie with the driver: it is up to them to be alert enough to override the automation when it malfunctions. However, if you do a long distance drive with and without cruise control you'll quickly admit that it has value, even with all the imperfections. Same for Comma.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - 23iofj 6y ago
    > They want to avoid thinking about non-engineering things like liability for as long as possible and focus on the engineering problem. It's a valid approach. When you write software that can kill people, you don't get to roll your eyes at questions like "who is responsible when someone dies?". These sorts of questions ARE engineering questions, and answering these questions with thought and care is important! Why? Because if the answer is "this is alpha quality and we might be liable" then you wait to deploy the feature. Which is why comma.ai is "ahead" of its competitors -- because they aren't doing real engineering. Thinking about the real-world context into which your system is being deployed is the thing that separates real engineering from R&D/hacking. What you're describing is not engineering; it's R&D. Even comma.ai admits this. And, look, R&D is perfectly okay! Everyone else is also doing R&D on real roads! E.g., all of the major auto manufacturers are putting cars on real roads with full L5 (and safety driver backups where appropriate). In fact, the major auto manufacturers are all WAY ahead of comma.ai when it comes to R&D-quality systems! Compare Cruise or Argo or Uber ATG or Waymo to comma.ai. But it's a terrible idea to ship R&D to paying customers when lives are on the line. If comma.ai wants to drive their system with their own safety drivers, that's fine. This isn't even (just) a normative or ethical statement. It's simply a statement of fact, at least in the USA. For some reason Software never became a "real" engineering discipline. But automotive
- PragmaticPulp 6y ago
  They first famously tried to sell the technology to Tesla. When that didn’t work, I think they set out to develop a proof of concept that they could use to generate hype, then wait until an automaker wanted to buy their technology to catch up. I get the impression they cursed future acquisition opportunities by refusing to even engage with safety regulators. They’re now selling their product in clever ways designed to shift all liability to the user.
  - gamblor956 6y ago
    They’re now selling their product in clever ways designed to shift all liability to the user. In "clever ways" that completely fail to succeed in this goal, legally speaking. Product liability (law) is very expansive and generally covers every person in the chain from user to manufacturer.
  - bratcomplex 6y ago
    Not exactly. Elon made an offer to geo to make a better mobile eye. some work was done, geo wasn’t okay with the deal. But he was still interested in the problem so he forumd comma
- elicash 6y ago
  > I mean whose auto insurance(both collision and more importantly liability) has a clause that lets anyone hook up a random after market self driving toolkit to their car. On the one hand, if I get wasted and crash my car into a tree, insurers will generally cover that even though I was negligent. On the other hand, if I get cheaper home insurance by lying about having smoke detectors, and my house burns down, I might be in violation of the contract and not be covered. So it seems like where this SHOULD end up is that insurers could charge more (or less as it gets better) for driving with these features. That said, I wouldn't fault an insurance company for not wanting to cover a system that says in all caps, as the linked article points out, "THIS IS ALPHA QUALITY SOFTWARE FOR RESEARCH PURPOSES ONLY." I'd possibly equate that warning to somebody who got into an accident after doing research on how well they could drive steering with their teeth, and it'd make me consider broadening the definition of "intentional" damage.
- bko 6y ago
  As a slight tangent Hotz has joked (?) that his real business will be to provide auto insurance to his drivers since he's confident that they'll be safer drivers. He'd basically pick off the best drivers and he has more data than anyone about what constitutes a safe driver. He makes this interesting observation that essentially all good drivers are alike; each bad driver is bad in his own way. It's an interesting insight and great for self driving since the "good" drivers would be clustered while the "bad" drivers would essentially be noise.
  - rtx 6y ago
    Vision guided missiles are hot right now.
ilovefood 6y ago
I'm biased, but OP hasn't done any due diligence. Here's from 2017 with regards to Audi https://www.audi-mediacenter.com/en/technology-lexicon-7180/driver-assistance-systems-7184 https://www.audi-mediacenter.com/en/technology-lexicon-7180/..., there is also new info out there. "But most importantly let’s just stop being so derisive when it comes to world changing technologies." You just did it yourself.
- Tepix 6y ago
  The AUDI page you linked doesn't contain the words "liable" or "liability".
dkjaudyeqooe 6y ago
How is Comma's behaviour substantially different from Tesla's? Arguably Comma is being a little more upfront about the user being a guinea pig for their software.
- gjsman-1000 6y ago
  And Comma, if you read their website, shows how Consumer Reports compared them to Tesla Autopilot as well as Nissan, Ford, and other car manufacturer's stock offering for what is essentially Adaptive Cruise Control. CR looked at features and safety together and Comma scored #1, so from Comma's perspective, they're doing better than what car manufacturers are currently selling, and they are certainly way more upfront than those manufacturers that you are a guinea pig.
  - dawnerd 6y ago
    I don’t know how they “best Tesla” but it’s Not that hard to do better than the oem lane assist features. Scoring better then super cruise is surprising too, but perhaps that’s because super cruise is geo fenced.
    - 23iofj 6y ago
      > but perhaps that’s because super cruise is geo fenced. Exactly. The Consumer Reports test wasn't a comprehensive safety analysis; it was a superficial "how will this feel to a consumer based upon a few drives" analysis. We are talking about a consumer reviews magazine... no regulator or jury is going to give a shit what a Microwave/Refrigerator review website said after performing 37 "tests". In other words, the other products are "worse" because those are production-quality products for which automakers with substantial assets to forfeit are willing to accept a degree of real liability. I'm sure if you compared comma.ai to GM's equivalent "alpha quality software" -- aka Cruise's L5 prototype -- the latter would come out way on top. But GM isn't stupid enough to ship alpha quality self-driving software, even as an aftermarket add-on. Including comma.ai in this comparison was a huge oversight on the part of Consumer Reports. They should be comparing comma.ai to competitors' "alpha" products, which are all L5 prototypes.
bri3d 6y ago
Python straw man aside, Comma could improve their safety dramatically, today, by documenting their safety systems, requiring a specific, audited checklist for new vehicles to be introduced, producing a real change management and detailed test result report for each release, utilizing a real safety processor in their "Panda" CAN intercept product, and working to reduce their use of bus effects like message-stuffing or first-in-wins racing with CAN control messages where possible. But there's no way I would bring this up in their GitHub, for example, because it isn't the culture of the project - and that's the problem. For example, their "leader" shows up and makes commits to their safety code like "WTF WHY WAS THIS SHIT EVERYWHERE." To Comma's credit, they have made great strides in safety since the first two years of their product - since 2018, they've introduced safety checks that (while undocumented), seem to be somewhat consistent (or trying to be) across vehicles, are written in MISRA C which is at least something that's actually used in the field, and exist at the low level of the system. Commits are signed now, and their founder seems to make fewer non-documenting troll commits to the product. These are all signs that the company is growing up (and, if we look at the history of the company and their leadership, we certainly see some signs as to why this may be the case...). But, these are things that should have been in place since day one, and the founders and company were certainly not unaware. It is absolutely fair to judge products and companies for the decisions they make, ESPECIALLY when their product is purportedly "world-changing," and in the case of Comma, safety does not seem ingrained into the decision-making process. As an aside, this blog post is killing me, between extensive Peter Thiel quotes, random jabs at California's COVID policy, Elon worship, and a lionization of a startup company with an immature founder building safety-related hardware.
- 23iofj 6y ago
  > For example, their "leader" shows up and makes commits to their safety code like "WTF WHY WAS THIS SHIT EVERYWHERE." Every self-driving product that deploys to consumers is going to end up in court eventually. It's inevitable. Imagine trying to defend comma.ai to a lay jury... the prosecution won't even have to try.
  - acct776 6y ago
    There's still some culture of personal responsibility in the US.
AlbertoGP 6y ago
Just watched today George Hotz’s interview in Lex Fridman’s podcast from last October, 3 hours talking about many interesting things including comma.ai and how it compares with Tesla’s approach. He even mentions HN a couple of times: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_L3gNaAVjQ4&t=53m35s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_L3gNaAVjQ4&t=53m35s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_L3gNaAVjQ4&t=2h18m17s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_L3gNaAVjQ4&t=2h18m17s
- airstrike 6y ago
  Since I didn't know who George Hotz was until yesterday, I thought I'd mention he's aka geohot of iOS jailbreaking and PS3 reverse engineering fame https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Hotz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Hotz
  - zacharyz 6y ago
    Still one of my favorite raps of all time https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iUvuaChDEg&ab_channel=geohot https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iUvuaChDEg&ab_channel=geoho...
atty 6y ago
I think the author is guilty of exactly what he’s accusing everyone else of. The major car companies are delivering relatively high quality products at scale (we have decent certainty it’s high quality because the presence of many of these driver assist features correlate with reduced accidents). And they’re rolling out slowly without a ton of stories of cars going haywire and flying off the road. And of course certain cars will only have certain features (addressing his Ford complaint) because those features require the correct mix of sensors and compute that is not yet present on every vehicle. That’s how technology that can affect personal safety should be rolled out. Slowly, carefully, and very boringly. Releasing “alpha” level software and saying essentially “lol have fun idk” when it can significantly impact customer safety is childish, bad business, morally wrong, and something we as an industry need to move away from. It doesn’t matter if your customer base are early adopters, hackers, or open source supporters. You still owe them their safety and a reasonable and coherent privacy policy.
- bko 6y ago
  I didn't mean to shit on big auto and I like their features. My car has collision detection that I find pretty reliable and useful. My main complaint is what I see as the unfair attacks of comma.ai by engineers where we should be applauding his efforts and openness, especially compared to the competition. I don't see the Ford complaint as them introducing features slowly and carefully. To me its a code smell. But my biggest complaint is that its opaque. If they had a detailed description of the features, what sensors are used and their limitations, then I would be much happier. But instead they have nothing more than a name and a trademark. Again, the "alpha" level doesn't mean anything. Hotz is immature and some of his actions are regretful. It certainly doesn't live up to the thought and care he puts into his products. Of course, I don't know the guy but I have heard him speak for hours and was very impressed.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - atty 6y ago
    Why would having different features be a code smell? I would compare it more to purchasing version X or Y of photoshop, or something similar. If you buy and older or cheaper version of the software, you get a different feature set. I can completely agree the naming and descriptions are horrendous though. I think that as more of these technologies start to provide assistance in more areas of driving, more of the time, education and transparency are nearly as important as safety. And that’s an area where every one of these projects is failing to a greater or lesser degree.
technobabble 6y ago
First off, just because the HN community lays on criticism doesn't meant that the people making the criticism don't think the technology is a good idea. If I spend the energy to criticize $technology, it means that I care about it to an extent. There's a baseline level of interest. If I didn't care about $technology, then I wouldn't spend the energy to break down into concrete, detailed criticism. Also, the author quotes Peter Thiel, claiming that the current cynicism towards self-driving technology is a type of "indefinite optimism" that hampers people's ability to plan the future. This is juxtaposed with the 1950's-1960's America, where Thiel claims "definite optimism" reigned. That type of indefinite optimism, at least in 1960's America, did not account for minorities, people of color, people of disabilities, etc. There was no future plan for them. Indefinite optimism, though it may appear lethargic and slow, at least is able to investigate the multitudes of edge-case scenarios that any $technology will face.
Hydraulix989 6y ago
Now that every car company has its own self driving arm and is also working on its own separate drivers assist, the limited time window for Comma AI go-to-market under its current approach is closing.
- grekiki 6y ago
  You know comma2 exists right?
  - Hydraulix989 6y ago
    Yes, and why would someone ever use what is essentially a rehash of Comma1 if their new Toyota already has driver assist built-in?
    - bratcomplex 6y ago
      Because the end result user experience is better +ota ?
godelzilla 6y ago
>Elon Musk is trying to save humanity and colonize Mars That sweet, delicious, HN kool-aid.
Traster 6y ago
Ok first,I’m impressed someone is monetising their HN comments. But this entire argument is ridiculous, Comma AI’s transparency isn’t a positive compared to traditional car companies. Traditional car companies aren’t transparent because the expectations of a customer is “I buy the product and it works”. Transparency isn’t a substitute for well designed and tested products. Comma AI has a massive advantage over car companies- they have no intention of following industry standard design procedures to ensure they don’t kill people- instead they sell their software with a sticker saying “if you kill someone you don’t know us”. I won’t be derisive as this author claims I would be, I’ll be serious. I’ve worked on autonomous driving solutions with traditional car companies, they move slower because BMW means something and they know it’ll mean death if they fuck up. Comma AI haven’t learned from the industry they’re trying to replace. This is the continual edge that Silicon Valley has over the rest of the world - they’re happy to just use legal arbitrage to gain an advantage and then pivot once their advantage is entrenched. It’s thus ridiculous “how were we supposed to know this would happen” excuse that’s trotted out all the time that’s absolute self serving bullshit.
bratcomplex 6y ago
I think something that is completely missed by the industry that comma dose quite well in comparison, is driver monitoring. sure self driving cars is the engineering end goal. But really we aren't we trying to cut fatalities? Good driver monitoring is a pretty god Dayum good way to prevent distracted driving from causing an accident.

109 points by bko 6y ago

What is comma.ai's business model here? I mean whose auto insurance(both collision and more importantly liability) has a clause that lets anyone hook up a random after market self driving toolkit to their car. Who has liability once you start using their solution? I'm sure comma.ai will have a clause that their solution is only for fun and you can't blame them if their self driving solution drives your car into a bus full of orphans. So what's the point of what they are selling if you can't actually use it? Or put another way, a self driving, or even driving assist add on only has value if the vendor absorbs all liability when using their system.

stevenhubertron 6y ago
Bingo. Liability is a huge risk here and they are using their "customers" as alpha testers that are playing Russian roulette with their lives and those around them. I want Comma to succeed but not by shipping alpha-products to the general public that doesn't understand the risks.
- sodality2 6y ago
  Wait, they're shipping it already? Wtf, all I did was look at their codebase and I assumed they were just making some news about it. Distributing code and shipping a product are very different, and I'll be surprised if nothing bad comes out of it soon.
  - gjsman-1000 6y ago
    Comma thinks they are ready because it's essentially an Adaptive Cruise Control, and as they state on their website, they scored #1 for best at that by Consumer Reports compared to the stock offerings from Ford, Nissan, and other carmakers. Frankly, I don't know if _anyone_ should be including this kind of tech if it's this early, but Comma is currently far from the only one for what it does. Frankly, because it scored #1 and the code is open-source, I'd be much more likely to trust Comma than the stock offering from my manufacturer.
    - sodality2 6y ago
      >It enables your car to steer, accelerate, and brake automatically within its lane. Drive to a highway, press the cruise control SET button, and openpilot will engage Ah, it isn't marketed as a full autopilot. I'm not 100% confident that it should be used in the current state but I'm also not an auto regulator, so we shall see.
      - sjcoles 6y ago
        I have one. Works pretty well but requires a fair bit of tweaking. It's called a dev kit for a reason. Many car models limit the amount (and at what rate) that the computer system can turn the wheel. The system is piggybacking off of this engineering for most of its 'safety'. There was people spoofing park assist on some models to get very strong control of the wheel but such discussion got banned on the official discord. Which leads me to my big problem with Comma.ai: it's open source but not very open. Look at the code, go back several releases and watch the number of comments regress. There's zero documentation, the wiki is a fucking joke and for some reason does not come up in a google search and is just missing critical information. No, I don't want to watch a 5 fucking minute video to find a 10 second clip with the information I need. Write that shit down. Instead you ask a question and some asshole that is gunning for a job at comma posts a passive agressive screenshot of them using the discord search. It's almost like if you put effort into having information recorded instead of being a dick you wouldn't have to be a dick. That wouldn't be very fun or inflate egos much so it doesn't happen.
        acct776 6y ago
        Hope you're listening, George (commaai). Long time listener, first time caller - rooting for you. See you soon.
    - 23iofj 6y ago
      > best at that by Consumer Reports compared to the stock offerings from Ford, Nissan, and other carmakers. Read through the Consumer Reports PDF [1]. It's abundantly clear that they have no idea how to properly evaluate adaptive cruise systems. What this report tells you is exactly what you would expect from a Consumer Reports publication: the generic impression that a typical consumer will have after a few hours of use. This sort of superficial analysis is completely unrelated to anything approaching a real safety analysis. [1] https://data.consumerreports.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/consumer-reports-active-driving-assistance-systems-november-16-2020.pdf https://data.consumerreports.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/...
optional_value 6y ago
I think their strategy is selling the technology to car manufacturers and investors not average people.
- bbaumgar 6y ago
  They have a "Shop" button on their homepage that lets anyone buy their product for installation on their own car. I had a coworker purchase Comma.ai + a specific make/model solely for its Comma.ai compatibility last year. Average people are getting in on this, for the better or (likely) worse.
  - optional_value 6y ago
    But isn't the real value the data they gather to train their models? This is where to money is.
agentdrtran 6y ago
> Who has liability once you start using their solution? Their FAQ just says "ask your insurance company" lol
nzmsv 6y ago
They want to avoid thinking about non-engineering things like liability for as long as possible and focus on the engineering problem. It's a valid approach. As for the "who has liability" question it's simple: the driver does. Or at least it's intended to be simple in the absence of lawyers twisting the wording around. Regular, non self driving cars have basic driving assists. For example, cruise control will happily ram your car into the back of another one. Adaptive cruise still has a chance of doing that, plus it has the additional risk of causing an accident by randomly slamming on the brakes for no reason at all. For all these failure modes the liability is understood to lie with the driver: it is up to them to be alert enough to override the automation when it malfunctions. However, if you do a long distance drive with and without cruise control you'll quickly admit that it has value, even with all the imperfections. Same for Comma.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- 23iofj 6y ago
  > They want to avoid thinking about non-engineering things like liability for as long as possible and focus on the engineering problem. It's a valid approach. When you write software that can kill people, you don't get to roll your eyes at questions like "who is responsible when someone dies?". These sorts of questions ARE engineering questions, and answering these questions with thought and care is important! Why? Because if the answer is "this is alpha quality and we might be liable" then you wait to deploy the feature. Which is why comma.ai is "ahead" of its competitors -- because they aren't doing real engineering. Thinking about the real-world context into which your system is being deployed is the thing that separates real engineering from R&D/hacking. What you're describing is not engineering; it's R&D. Even comma.ai admits this. And, look, R&D is perfectly okay! Everyone else is also doing R&D on real roads! E.g., all of the major auto manufacturers are putting cars on real roads with full L5 (and safety driver backups where appropriate). In fact, the major auto manufacturers are all WAY ahead of comma.ai when it comes to R&D-quality systems! Compare Cruise or Argo or Uber ATG or Waymo to comma.ai. But it's a terrible idea to ship R&D to paying customers when lives are on the line. If comma.ai wants to drive their system with their own safety drivers, that's fine. This isn't even (just) a normative or ethical statement. It's simply a statement of fact, at least in the USA. For some reason Software never became a "real" engineering discipline. But automotive
PragmaticPulp 6y ago
They first famously tried to sell the technology to Tesla. When that didn’t work, I think they set out to develop a proof of concept that they could use to generate hype, then wait until an automaker wanted to buy their technology to catch up. I get the impression they cursed future acquisition opportunities by refusing to even engage with safety regulators. They’re now selling their product in clever ways designed to shift all liability to the user.
- gamblor956 6y ago
  They’re now selling their product in clever ways designed to shift all liability to the user. In "clever ways" that completely fail to succeed in this goal, legally speaking. Product liability (law) is very expansive and generally covers every person in the chain from user to manufacturer.
- bratcomplex 6y ago
  Not exactly. Elon made an offer to geo to make a better mobile eye. some work was done, geo wasn’t okay with the deal. But he was still interested in the problem so he forumd comma
elicash 6y ago
> I mean whose auto insurance(both collision and more importantly liability) has a clause that lets anyone hook up a random after market self driving toolkit to their car. On the one hand, if I get wasted and crash my car into a tree, insurers will generally cover that even though I was negligent. On the other hand, if I get cheaper home insurance by lying about having smoke detectors, and my house burns down, I might be in violation of the contract and not be covered. So it seems like where this SHOULD end up is that insurers could charge more (or less as it gets better) for driving with these features. That said, I wouldn't fault an insurance company for not wanting to cover a system that says in all caps, as the linked article points out, "THIS IS ALPHA QUALITY SOFTWARE FOR RESEARCH PURPOSES ONLY." I'd possibly equate that warning to somebody who got into an accident after doing research on how well they could drive steering with their teeth, and it'd make me consider broadening the definition of "intentional" damage.
bko 6y ago
As a slight tangent Hotz has joked (?) that his real business will be to provide auto insurance to his drivers since he's confident that they'll be safer drivers. He'd basically pick off the best drivers and he has more data than anyone about what constitutes a safe driver. He makes this interesting observation that essentially all good drivers are alike; each bad driver is bad in his own way. It's an interesting insight and great for self driving since the "good" drivers would be clustered while the "bad" drivers would essentially be noise.
- rtx 6y ago
  Vision guided missiles are hot right now.

ilovefood 6y ago

I'm biased, but OP hasn't done any due diligence. Here's from 2017 with regards to Audi https://www.audi-mediacenter.com/en/technology-lexicon-7180/driver-assistance-systems-7184 https://www.audi-mediacenter.com/en/technology-lexicon-7180/..., there is also new info out there. "But most importantly let’s just stop being so derisive when it comes to world changing technologies." You just did it yourself.

Tepix 6y ago
The AUDI page you linked doesn't contain the words "liable" or "liability".

dkjaudyeqooe 6y ago

How is Comma's behaviour substantially different from Tesla's? Arguably Comma is being a little more upfront about the user being a guinea pig for their software.

gjsman-1000 6y ago
And Comma, if you read their website, shows how Consumer Reports compared them to Tesla Autopilot as well as Nissan, Ford, and other car manufacturer's stock offering for what is essentially Adaptive Cruise Control. CR looked at features and safety together and Comma scored #1, so from Comma's perspective, they're doing better than what car manufacturers are currently selling, and they are certainly way more upfront than those manufacturers that you are a guinea pig.
- dawnerd 6y ago
  I don’t know how they “best Tesla” but it’s Not that hard to do better than the oem lane assist features. Scoring better then super cruise is surprising too, but perhaps that’s because super cruise is geo fenced.
  - 23iofj 6y ago
    > but perhaps that’s because super cruise is geo fenced. Exactly. The Consumer Reports test wasn't a comprehensive safety analysis; it was a superficial "how will this feel to a consumer based upon a few drives" analysis. We are talking about a consumer reviews magazine... no regulator or jury is going to give a shit what a Microwave/Refrigerator review website said after performing 37 "tests". In other words, the other products are "worse" because those are production-quality products for which automakers with substantial assets to forfeit are willing to accept a degree of real liability. I'm sure if you compared comma.ai to GM's equivalent "alpha quality software" -- aka Cruise's L5 prototype -- the latter would come out way on top. But GM isn't stupid enough to ship alpha quality self-driving software, even as an aftermarket add-on. Including comma.ai in this comparison was a huge oversight on the part of Consumer Reports. They should be comparing comma.ai to competitors' "alpha" products, which are all L5 prototypes.

bri3d 6y ago

Python straw man aside, Comma could improve their safety dramatically, today, by documenting their safety systems, requiring a specific, audited checklist for new vehicles to be introduced, producing a real change management and detailed test result report for each release, utilizing a real safety processor in their "Panda" CAN intercept product, and working to reduce their use of bus effects like message-stuffing or first-in-wins racing with CAN control messages where possible. But there's no way I would bring this up in their GitHub, for example, because it isn't the culture of the project - and that's the problem. For example, their "leader" shows up and makes commits to their safety code like "WTF WHY WAS THIS SHIT EVERYWHERE." To Comma's credit, they have made great strides in safety since the first two years of their product - since 2018, they've introduced safety checks that (while undocumented), seem to be somewhat consistent (or trying to be) across vehicles, are written in MISRA C which is at least something that's actually used in the field, and exist at the low level of the system. Commits are signed now, and their founder seems to make fewer non-documenting troll commits to the product. These are all signs that the company is growing up (and, if we look at the history of the company and their leadership, we certainly see some signs as to why this may be the case...). But, these are things that should have been in place since day one, and the founders and company were certainly not unaware. It is absolutely fair to judge products and companies for the decisions they make, ESPECIALLY when their product is purportedly "world-changing," and in the case of Comma, safety does not seem ingrained into the decision-making process. As an aside, this blog post is killing me, between extensive Peter Thiel quotes, random jabs at California's COVID policy, Elon worship, and a lionization of a startup company with an immature founder building safety-related hardware.

23iofj 6y ago
> For example, their "leader" shows up and makes commits to their safety code like "WTF WHY WAS THIS SHIT EVERYWHERE." Every self-driving product that deploys to consumers is going to end up in court eventually. It's inevitable. Imagine trying to defend comma.ai to a lay jury... the prosecution won't even have to try.
- acct776 6y ago
  There's still some culture of personal responsibility in the US.

AlbertoGP 6y ago

Just watched today George Hotz’s interview in Lex Fridman’s podcast from last October, 3 hours talking about many interesting things including comma.ai and how it compares with Tesla’s approach. He even mentions HN a couple of times: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_L3gNaAVjQ4&t=53m35s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_L3gNaAVjQ4&t=53m35s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_L3gNaAVjQ4&t=2h18m17s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_L3gNaAVjQ4&t=2h18m17s

airstrike 6y ago
Since I didn't know who George Hotz was until yesterday, I thought I'd mention he's aka geohot of iOS jailbreaking and PS3 reverse engineering fame https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Hotz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Hotz
- zacharyz 6y ago
  Still one of my favorite raps of all time https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iUvuaChDEg&ab_channel=geohot https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iUvuaChDEg&ab_channel=geoho...

atty 6y ago

I think the author is guilty of exactly what he’s accusing everyone else of. The major car companies are delivering relatively high quality products at scale (we have decent certainty it’s high quality because the presence of many of these driver assist features correlate with reduced accidents). And they’re rolling out slowly without a ton of stories of cars going haywire and flying off the road. And of course certain cars will only have certain features (addressing his Ford complaint) because those features require the correct mix of sensors and compute that is not yet present on every vehicle. That’s how technology that can affect personal safety should be rolled out. Slowly, carefully, and very boringly. Releasing “alpha” level software and saying essentially “lol have fun idk” when it can significantly impact customer safety is childish, bad business, morally wrong, and something we as an industry need to move away from. It doesn’t matter if your customer base are early adopters, hackers, or open source supporters. You still owe them their safety and a reasonable and coherent privacy policy.

bko 6y ago
I didn't mean to shit on big auto and I like their features. My car has collision detection that I find pretty reliable and useful. My main complaint is what I see as the unfair attacks of comma.ai by engineers where we should be applauding his efforts and openness, especially compared to the competition. I don't see the Ford complaint as them introducing features slowly and carefully. To me its a code smell. But my biggest complaint is that its opaque. If they had a detailed description of the features, what sensors are used and their limitations, then I would be much happier. But instead they have nothing more than a name and a trademark. Again, the "alpha" level doesn't mean anything. Hotz is immature and some of his actions are regretful. It certainly doesn't live up to the thought and care he puts into his products. Of course, I don't know the guy but I have heard him speak for hours and was very impressed.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- atty 6y ago
  Why would having different features be a code smell? I would compare it more to purchasing version X or Y of photoshop, or something similar. If you buy and older or cheaper version of the software, you get a different feature set. I can completely agree the naming and descriptions are horrendous though. I think that as more of these technologies start to provide assistance in more areas of driving, more of the time, education and transparency are nearly as important as safety. And that’s an area where every one of these projects is failing to a greater or lesser degree.

technobabble 6y ago

First off, just because the HN community lays on criticism doesn't meant that the people making the criticism don't think the technology is a good idea. If I spend the energy to criticize $technology, it means that I care about it to an extent. There's a baseline level of interest. If I didn't care about $technology, then I wouldn't spend the energy to break down into concrete, detailed criticism. Also, the author quotes Peter Thiel, claiming that the current cynicism towards self-driving technology is a type of "indefinite optimism" that hampers people's ability to plan the future. This is juxtaposed with the 1950's-1960's America, where Thiel claims "definite optimism" reigned. That type of indefinite optimism, at least in 1960's America, did not account for minorities, people of color, people of disabilities, etc. There was no future plan for them. Indefinite optimism, though it may appear lethargic and slow, at least is able to investigate the multitudes of edge-case scenarios that any $technology will face.

Hydraulix989 6y ago

Now that every car company has its own self driving arm and is also working on its own separate drivers assist, the limited time window for Comma AI go-to-market under its current approach is closing.

grekiki 6y ago
You know comma2 exists right?
- Hydraulix989 6y ago
  Yes, and why would someone ever use what is essentially a rehash of Comma1 if their new Toyota already has driver assist built-in?
  - bratcomplex 6y ago
    Because the end result user experience is better +ota ?

godelzilla 6y ago

>Elon Musk is trying to save humanity and colonize Mars That sweet, delicious, HN kool-aid.

Traster 6y ago

Ok first,I’m impressed someone is monetising their HN comments. But this entire argument is ridiculous, Comma AI’s transparency isn’t a positive compared to traditional car companies. Traditional car companies aren’t transparent because the expectations of a customer is “I buy the product and it works”. Transparency isn’t a substitute for well designed and tested products. Comma AI has a massive advantage over car companies- they have no intention of following industry standard design procedures to ensure they don’t kill people- instead they sell their software with a sticker saying “if you kill someone you don’t know us”. I won’t be derisive as this author claims I would be, I’ll be serious. I’ve worked on autonomous driving solutions with traditional car companies, they move slower because BMW means something and they know it’ll mean death if they fuck up. Comma AI haven’t learned from the industry they’re trying to replace. This is the continual edge that Silicon Valley has over the rest of the world - they’re happy to just use legal arbitrage to gain an advantage and then pivot once their advantage is entrenched. It’s thus ridiculous “how were we supposed to know this would happen” excuse that’s trotted out all the time that’s absolute self serving bullshit.

bratcomplex 6y ago

I think something that is completely missed by the industry that comma dose quite well in comparison, is driver monitoring. sure self driving cars is the engineering end goal. But really we aren't we trying to cut fatalities? Good driver monitoring is a pretty god Dayum good way to prevent distracted driving from causing an accident.