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This wasn’t organic. It was organized by a tiny group of activists looking for an anti-tech flashpoint. It’s a hoax. A fiction. An attempt to portray widesprea

This wasn’t organic. It was organized by a tiny group of activists looking for an anti-tech flashpoint. It’s a hoax. A fiction. An attempt to portray widespread safety concerns among the populace that do not exist. Here’s the local context. There’s a hearing coming up at the board the state of California appointed regarding expansion of the robotaxis. Alongside that vote, the city’s quality of operation has noticeably deteriorated. Encampments are more common, drug intoxication to the point of collapse and physical decay is highly visible. Robberies have become commonplace. These effects are now beyond the point where they be explained by pointing at flat trend data, or as a temporary effect of more severe pandemic measures. A number of local politicians have been facing significant heat over this dysfunction. National and international media publications have begun to distrust local publications for papering over issues and have amplified that pressure. At that point, those SF politicians began a sudden unified push attacking self-driving cars. Self-driving cars have recently become more reliable than manually driven taxis in SF in terms of accidents per miles driven. The attacks escalated to the point that false data was submitted against robotaxis to the California board, mischaracterizing accidents where another driver impacted the self-driven car while stopped. That falsehood was later discovered. When those same people began promoting this “night of the cone” meme, the origin was obvious to even the most casual observer. Robotaxis have been up and operating for some time. The city is in trouble and it needs the revenue innovation brings. We need to stop playing games.

vore 3y ago
What does an activist group putting cones on robotaxis have to do with homeless encampments and public drug use?
- throwaway9274 3y ago
  Scapegoating tech makes for a popular distraction from the increasingly dire real world issues facing the city. Let me give a concrete example. Two weeks ago nine people were shot at a street fair in the Mission. It appears tied to organized gang activity. The SF papers ran with a story about “self-driving car obstructs emergency response” more prominently placed than the actual shooting. The Fire Chief personally debunked the story, but it was syndicated across online outlets, and remains un-retracted.
JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> An attempt to portray widespread safety concerns among the populace that do not exist It’s a good example of a totem. On one side, activists can use the media uptake to show traction in their anti-tech crusade, intentionally muddying attention and support. On the other side, a separate group uses the first to show San Francisco is crumbling and anti-innovation. Neither need any relation to facts, just exist in respect of each other; in their engagement within themselves and with one another, their convictions gain strength.
mighmi 3y ago
> The city is in trouble What are your thoughts on the city's future? I've seen a lot of doomerish articles of late, many did seem to leave during Covid etc. however I still know many who happily look to buy property or relocate to the city right now. Do you believe the core innovation drive is in trouble, threatening it becoming a new Detroit? (Or even just the city itself, while the suburbs continue to boom and do well in the future as the city collapses - like Metrodetroit?)
- throwaway9274 3y ago
  It’s a good question. I believe SF will rebound as a city, and that it remains the indispensable center of the global technology ecosystem. My level of certainty is such that I’m personally betting my livelihood and savings on it by building a startup here. It’s really hard to uproot an ecosystem where multiple stakeholders are co-located (founders, developers, ML engineers, VCs, accelerators, executives experienced with tech business models) and move them elsewhere. The specific cultural factors around openness to experience, centrality to internet culture, and global orientation are difficult to find or replicate in other cities. But the short term disruptions are going to be painful due to the shift to remote work. Right now this is compounded by very bad policy (saying this as a registered member of the DSA. This is not a left vs. right issue.) We need basic enforcement of laws and provision of city services to allow the city to recover in a reasonable time frame.
- opportune 3y ago
  I think the city is still great - there has been general doomerism about SF for literally half a century at this point: hippies, AIDS, the 90s crime wave, dotcom, gentrification, WFH. A lot of this is motivated more by what SF represents (the American brand of corporate liberalism) than what it is. Crime is worse but not unlivably so. We have wonderful innovations like Facebook, Citizen, Nextdoor, and Ring to thank for the increased spotlight. While tech decamped from the Bay Area during the pandemic, and SF commercial real estate values are in trouble, plenty of companies are still operating here and people do still want to live here. SF offers an urban lifestyle/environment you can’t get elsewhere in the Bay Area which draws young tech workers and hence companies. The crime would have to get much, much worse to threaten this. Others may chime in that it got too much for them, but this is a general trend as people hit their 30s and start families. The bigger threat is if young people don’t even give SF a shot at all.
mcphage 3y ago
> The city is in trouble and it needs the revenue innovation brings. What kind of revenue does self-driving taxis bring? And are the problems you describe above due to a lack of revenue?
- w0m 3y ago
  His comment is more about the false equivalency i think; papering over/distracting from other very real issues by demonizing something flashy but unrelated.
- throwaway9274 3y ago
  You’re talking about an industry that could be responsible for a 5-10% GDP boost, freeing up millions for non-driving labor. The revenues to the city where those companies are based would be in the billions.
  - mcphage 3y ago
    > The revenues to the city where those companies are based Are those companies based in San Francisco itself? Will those revenues outweigh revenues that the city gets from income tax on the drivers?
abeppu 3y ago
What does organic mean? Everything starts with a small group, and of course the first people to act will be labeled activists. Self-driving cars are not organic; they are organized by a tiny group of companies. I think the dumbest thing not mentioned n the video is that when they drive around empty, they're using our roads, contributing to traffic, emitting carbon, and they're not even transporting anything! Who cares if you're safer per mile driven if you're driving miles that serve no purpose other than to demonstrate your ability to drive? I think (a) there should be bans on the vehicles driving empty other than to pick up a passenger, who must be close by and (b) whenever a vehicle blocks an emergency vehicle or transit or inappropriately blocks traffic, that company should be suspended from un-manned operation until they can explain the error and make a plausible argument that they have resolved the issue. If you're trapped in a muni train with 60 others for 20 min bc a vehicle that isn't even transporting anyone refuses to move and their parent company doesn't have an operator close by, that's unacceptable. Until companies demonstrate that they won't disable transit, why shouldn't people disable their vehicles? The driverless cars, wittingly or not, sabotaged transit already; turnabout is fair play.
- stemlord 3y ago
  There also needs to be a person/people on standby to support riders or pedestrians in case of issue. Last thing the world needs is another supportless automated monolith where you're simply fucked if anything happens
- standardUser 3y ago
  > "Who cares if you're safer per mile driven if you're driving miles that serve no purpose other than to demonstrate your ability to drive?" You make a very compelling argument against student drivers. You also seem to miss the MAJOR point that once cars are an on-demand service and not a 4,000lb accessory every adult carries with them everywhere they go, we can finally see a reduction in the vast parking lots that have eaten up most of our urban and suburban spaces.
  - Kye 3y ago
    There's already a solution to this that doesn't involve replacing personal transportation with private interests that control all movement. San Francisco in particular used to be famous for it.
thatfrenchguy 3y ago
> Alongside that vote, the city’s quality of operation has noticeably deteriorated. Encampments are more common, drug intoxication to the point of collapse and physical decay is highly visible. Robberies have become commonplace. These have been mainstay of San Francisco life for at least a decade: some neighborhoods suck and have a ton of homeless folks, and where they are tend to move around (in gentrifying neighborhoods). I remember the first time I moved here almost a decade ago and was shocked with the drugged homeless folks. They're still there. Those protests will go the way of the Google Bus protests: make a lot of noise, before they disappear.
- throwaway9274 3y ago
  > Those protests will go the way of the Google Bus protests: make a lot of noise, before they disappear. Totally agree, I expect they’ll dissipate pretty quickly, because there’s no actual committed support. >These have been a mainstay… Disagree here. Yes, these issues have always been more visible in SF than elsewhere: mild climate, permissive drug laws, and a low income area in the Tenderloin that’s closer to more affluent areas than other major cities. The extent has changed markedly over just the last few years. Police don’t respond to calls. Home invasions don’t result in charges. Physical attacks by the unhoused used to be a concern of suburbanites on a weekend trip, not something residents really factored into realistic risk. Now it’s something folks in my circle who have been here for a very long time witness and in some cases have experienced. I hear you that to a certain extent this has always been here, and I agree. But this is outside of the normal bound of historical SF.
spacKingChamath 3y ago
Death on the streets via drugs, assaults and homelessness but because locals want more "empathetic leaders", that are hard on big business, so the leaders focus on that. Recent SF politicians are not proactive. They are reactive and in the worst way. They use bureaucracy to clog the system and strongly believe the status quo is good enough. Mean while, the urban area continues to decay, albeit slowly thanks to the regions weather and views being sought after. Very similar to national level politics where filibusters and repeals are trying to maintain the status quo or go backwards for the sake of the "better times". All these people are not leaders. They are just people who know how to get theres while they make you think you are getting yours. They don't care for the future at all.
cycomanic 3y ago
Can you give some references of those events I want to read up on this.
- throwaway9274 3y ago
  Sure, let me grab the links from my bookmarks. Adding below as I go: “What if SF never pulls out of its Doom Loop?” - https://www.ft.com/content/71d8013d-9d94-441e-b2d1-3039c04397d6 https://www.ft.com/content/71d8013d-9d94-441e-b2d1-3039c0439... -This one brought the simmering debate to the fore and put pressure on officials, particularly Mayor London Breed and District 5 Supervisor Dean Preston -Preston begins Twitter push against self-driving cars. -“New letter from CA state accuses SF officials of data manipulation. In the 4 @Waymo traffic collisions SF cited to prove driverless cars are less safe, 3 were the Waymos being rear-ended and 1 didn't even involve any cars touching, CA says.” https://twitter.com/annatonger/status/1673403230804385813 https://twitter.com/annatonger/status/1673403230804385813 June 29, 2023 California PUC original letter here: https://docs.cpuc.ca.gov/PublishedDocs/Published/G000/M512/K192/512192053.PDF https://docs.cpuc.ca.gov/PublishedDocs/Published/G000/M512/K... “A viral video of a 'reckless' robotaxi caused an uproar in San Francisco. Police say the internet got it wrong.” https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna89329 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna89329
KennyBlanken 3y ago
> An attempt to portray widespread safety concerns among the populace that do not exist. Guess you didn't watch the video clip then, because they both describe and show the problems. You mean like Uber taxis in the first week of operation in CA were caught repeatedly committing grave traffic violations like running red lights...and killed someone because their software failed to correctly classify an object its sensors picked up in the middle of the road Then there's all the problems with Bolts ignoring police vehicles, randomly stopping in intersections, and mysteriously all getting stuck in one particular street, causing a blocade? Or how about Tesla's "self driving betas" where the cars have been shown to drive at pedestrians standing on street corners, swerve at cyclists, randomly hit the brakes, and drive at traffic islands/poles?
Kye 3y ago
So what you're saying is the organizers are the modern equivalent to Luddites, and the campaign to smear them the same way is in full force. Got it.

vore 3y ago

What does an activist group putting cones on robotaxis have to do with homeless encampments and public drug use?

throwaway9274 3y ago
Scapegoating tech makes for a popular distraction from the increasingly dire real world issues facing the city. Let me give a concrete example. Two weeks ago nine people were shot at a street fair in the Mission. It appears tied to organized gang activity. The SF papers ran with a story about “self-driving car obstructs emergency response” more prominently placed than the actual shooting. The Fire Chief personally debunked the story, but it was syndicated across online outlets, and remains un-retracted.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago

> An attempt to portray widespread safety concerns among the populace that do not exist It’s a good example of a totem. On one side, activists can use the media uptake to show traction in their anti-tech crusade, intentionally muddying attention and support. On the other side, a separate group uses the first to show San Francisco is crumbling and anti-innovation. Neither need any relation to facts, just exist in respect of each other; in their engagement within themselves and with one another, their convictions gain strength.

mighmi 3y ago

> The city is in trouble What are your thoughts on the city's future? I've seen a lot of doomerish articles of late, many did seem to leave during Covid etc. however I still know many who happily look to buy property or relocate to the city right now. Do you believe the core innovation drive is in trouble, threatening it becoming a new Detroit? (Or even just the city itself, while the suburbs continue to boom and do well in the future as the city collapses - like Metrodetroit?)

throwaway9274 3y ago
It’s a good question. I believe SF will rebound as a city, and that it remains the indispensable center of the global technology ecosystem. My level of certainty is such that I’m personally betting my livelihood and savings on it by building a startup here. It’s really hard to uproot an ecosystem where multiple stakeholders are co-located (founders, developers, ML engineers, VCs, accelerators, executives experienced with tech business models) and move them elsewhere. The specific cultural factors around openness to experience, centrality to internet culture, and global orientation are difficult to find or replicate in other cities. But the short term disruptions are going to be painful due to the shift to remote work. Right now this is compounded by very bad policy (saying this as a registered member of the DSA. This is not a left vs. right issue.) We need basic enforcement of laws and provision of city services to allow the city to recover in a reasonable time frame.
opportune 3y ago
I think the city is still great - there has been general doomerism about SF for literally half a century at this point: hippies, AIDS, the 90s crime wave, dotcom, gentrification, WFH. A lot of this is motivated more by what SF represents (the American brand of corporate liberalism) than what it is. Crime is worse but not unlivably so. We have wonderful innovations like Facebook, Citizen, Nextdoor, and Ring to thank for the increased spotlight. While tech decamped from the Bay Area during the pandemic, and SF commercial real estate values are in trouble, plenty of companies are still operating here and people do still want to live here. SF offers an urban lifestyle/environment you can’t get elsewhere in the Bay Area which draws young tech workers and hence companies. The crime would have to get much, much worse to threaten this. Others may chime in that it got too much for them, but this is a general trend as people hit their 30s and start families. The bigger threat is if young people don’t even give SF a shot at all.

mcphage 3y ago

> The city is in trouble and it needs the revenue innovation brings. What kind of revenue does self-driving taxis bring? And are the problems you describe above due to a lack of revenue?

w0m 3y ago
His comment is more about the false equivalency i think; papering over/distracting from other very real issues by demonizing something flashy but unrelated.
throwaway9274 3y ago
You’re talking about an industry that could be responsible for a 5-10% GDP boost, freeing up millions for non-driving labor. The revenues to the city where those companies are based would be in the billions.
- mcphage 3y ago
  > The revenues to the city where those companies are based Are those companies based in San Francisco itself? Will those revenues outweigh revenues that the city gets from income tax on the drivers?

abeppu 3y ago

What does organic mean? Everything starts with a small group, and of course the first people to act will be labeled activists. Self-driving cars are not organic; they are organized by a tiny group of companies. I think the dumbest thing not mentioned n the video is that when they drive around empty, they're using our roads, contributing to traffic, emitting carbon, and they're not even transporting anything! Who cares if you're safer per mile driven if you're driving miles that serve no purpose other than to demonstrate your ability to drive? I think (a) there should be bans on the vehicles driving empty other than to pick up a passenger, who must be close by and (b) whenever a vehicle blocks an emergency vehicle or transit or inappropriately blocks traffic, that company should be suspended from un-manned operation until they can explain the error and make a plausible argument that they have resolved the issue. If you're trapped in a muni train with 60 others for 20 min bc a vehicle that isn't even transporting anyone refuses to move and their parent company doesn't have an operator close by, that's unacceptable. Until companies demonstrate that they won't disable transit, why shouldn't people disable their vehicles? The driverless cars, wittingly or not, sabotaged transit already; turnabout is fair play.

stemlord 3y ago
There also needs to be a person/people on standby to support riders or pedestrians in case of issue. Last thing the world needs is another supportless automated monolith where you're simply fucked if anything happens
standardUser 3y ago
> "Who cares if you're safer per mile driven if you're driving miles that serve no purpose other than to demonstrate your ability to drive?" You make a very compelling argument against student drivers. You also seem to miss the MAJOR point that once cars are an on-demand service and not a 4,000lb accessory every adult carries with them everywhere they go, we can finally see a reduction in the vast parking lots that have eaten up most of our urban and suburban spaces.
- Kye 3y ago
  There's already a solution to this that doesn't involve replacing personal transportation with private interests that control all movement. San Francisco in particular used to be famous for it.

thatfrenchguy 3y ago

> Alongside that vote, the city’s quality of operation has noticeably deteriorated. Encampments are more common, drug intoxication to the point of collapse and physical decay is highly visible. Robberies have become commonplace. These have been mainstay of San Francisco life for at least a decade: some neighborhoods suck and have a ton of homeless folks, and where they are tend to move around (in gentrifying neighborhoods). I remember the first time I moved here almost a decade ago and was shocked with the drugged homeless folks. They're still there. Those protests will go the way of the Google Bus protests: make a lot of noise, before they disappear.

throwaway9274 3y ago
> Those protests will go the way of the Google Bus protests: make a lot of noise, before they disappear. Totally agree, I expect they’ll dissipate pretty quickly, because there’s no actual committed support. >These have been a mainstay… Disagree here. Yes, these issues have always been more visible in SF than elsewhere: mild climate, permissive drug laws, and a low income area in the Tenderloin that’s closer to more affluent areas than other major cities. The extent has changed markedly over just the last few years. Police don’t respond to calls. Home invasions don’t result in charges. Physical attacks by the unhoused used to be a concern of suburbanites on a weekend trip, not something residents really factored into realistic risk. Now it’s something folks in my circle who have been here for a very long time witness and in some cases have experienced. I hear you that to a certain extent this has always been here, and I agree. But this is outside of the normal bound of historical SF.

spacKingChamath 3y ago

Death on the streets via drugs, assaults and homelessness but because locals want more "empathetic leaders", that are hard on big business, so the leaders focus on that. Recent SF politicians are not proactive. They are reactive and in the worst way. They use bureaucracy to clog the system and strongly believe the status quo is good enough. Mean while, the urban area continues to decay, albeit slowly thanks to the regions weather and views being sought after. Very similar to national level politics where filibusters and repeals are trying to maintain the status quo or go backwards for the sake of the "better times". All these people are not leaders. They are just people who know how to get theres while they make you think you are getting yours. They don't care for the future at all.

cycomanic 3y ago

Can you give some references of those events I want to read up on this.

throwaway9274 3y ago
Sure, let me grab the links from my bookmarks. Adding below as I go: “What if SF never pulls out of its Doom Loop?” - https://www.ft.com/content/71d8013d-9d94-441e-b2d1-3039c04397d6 https://www.ft.com/content/71d8013d-9d94-441e-b2d1-3039c0439... -This one brought the simmering debate to the fore and put pressure on officials, particularly Mayor London Breed and District 5 Supervisor Dean Preston -Preston begins Twitter push against self-driving cars. -“New letter from CA state accuses SF officials of data manipulation. In the 4 @Waymo traffic collisions SF cited to prove driverless cars are less safe, 3 were the Waymos being rear-ended and 1 didn't even involve any cars touching, CA says.” https://twitter.com/annatonger/status/1673403230804385813 https://twitter.com/annatonger/status/1673403230804385813 June 29, 2023 California PUC original letter here: https://docs.cpuc.ca.gov/PublishedDocs/Published/G000/M512/K192/512192053.PDF https://docs.cpuc.ca.gov/PublishedDocs/Published/G000/M512/K... “A viral video of a 'reckless' robotaxi caused an uproar in San Francisco. Police say the internet got it wrong.” https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna89329 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna89329

KennyBlanken 3y ago

> An attempt to portray widespread safety concerns among the populace that do not exist. Guess you didn't watch the video clip then, because they both describe and show the problems. You mean like Uber taxis in the first week of operation in CA were caught repeatedly committing grave traffic violations like running red lights...and killed someone because their software failed to correctly classify an object its sensors picked up in the middle of the road Then there's all the problems with Bolts ignoring police vehicles, randomly stopping in intersections, and mysteriously all getting stuck in one particular street, causing a blocade? Or how about Tesla's "self driving betas" where the cars have been shown to drive at pedestrians standing on street corners, swerve at cyclists, randomly hit the brakes, and drive at traffic islands/poles?

Kye 3y ago

So what you're saying is the organizers are the modern equivalent to Luddites, and the campaign to smear them the same way is in full force. Got it.