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> Either manufacturers need to be required to provide important software freedoms to vehicle owners FOSS robot cars seem like a great way to bypass emissions c
by solardev 3y ago
> Either manufacturers need to be required to provide important software freedoms to vehicle owners
FOSS robot cars seem like a great way to bypass emissions controls, safety regulations, and plain common sense. It'd take what, half a day, for some teenager to modify the firmware to double the 0-60 and blow up the battery pack at the same time?
I'd want the opposite: for self-driving firmware to be locked down and hardware signed to heck, with an independent auditing body code-reviewing every update.
> or the manufacturers themselves need to be liable for infractions.
Can't it be both? Split legal responsibility between each consumer and manufacturer. Doesn't have to be 50/50, but personal liability (even capped at a few grand) could make people pay attention and take over when the self-driving doesn't seem to be doing its job. We don't need more drivers on the roads who think their wondercars are infallible and blame everyone else for their accidents.
- lolinder 3y agoThat's a reasonable argument. In that case, I argue that the manufacturer who wrote and signed the firmware should be liable as the operator of the vehicle.
- solardev 3y agoSorry, I edited my comment as you were replying. Do you think it would be possible (and desirable) to split liability, or should it remain solely the manufacturer's?
- lolinder 3y agoSince we're talking about traffic tickets, which are (currently) routine and generally try to avoid the court system as much as possible, I'd say that we need laws that provide no ambiguity, and I'd rather those laws place the blame on the party with the most control.
- kevin_thibedeau 3y agoThis isn't just a matter of ticketing for minor violations with no consequences. These are unregulated robots that have and will continue to kill people.
- gdk 3y agoWhat happens when the manufacturer folds after the first major accident they're found liable for and now the entire remaining fleet doesn't have anyone liable for it? If the regulators step in to remove the vehicles from the road then who makes the consumers whole now that their vehicle, and perhaps livelihood, is gone? I suspect certification is the only reasonable path. If the regulators believe these systems are safe for the road then they should build the framework for establishing that bar. If such a framework is not possible to build then I think that also answers that question.
- ceejayoz 3y agoAn FDIC-style insurance fund, where the manufacturers have to pay in for every vehicle sold, might work here.
- Snow_Falls 3y agoNot the person you relied too, but it should primarily be the manufacturers fault for pushing a dangerous update without adequate testing. However, if say, the new behaviour got in the news and the owner didn't update to the latest, safe update it could be their fault.
- keep_reading 3y ago> It'd take what, half a day, for some teenager to modify the firmware to double the 0-60 and blow up the battery pack at the same time? this is basically why the NHTSA told car manufacturers not to obey Massachusetts' Right to Repair laws. https://www.wbur.org/news/2023/06/14/federal-highway-traffic-mass-telematic-data https://www.wbur.org/news/2023/06/14/federal-highway-traffic...
- Ckirby 3y ago[dead]
- serf 3y ago>FOSS robot cars seem like a great way to bypass emissions controls, safety regulations, and plain common sense. It'd take what, half a day, for some teenager to modify the firmware to double the 0-60 and blow up the battery pack at the same time? generally we don't pen laws in order to save a singular idiot teenager -- more-so the aforementioned teenager bought a product and then ruined it; the teenager already received the punishment for his actions by the destruction of their own property without the need for jurisprudence and complexity. Also : Nearly every major car manufacturer in the world has been caught semi-recently violating emissions standards. Some have violated safety standards. Given that this hasn't been an impasse for the worlds largest companies, why presume that the FOSS equivalents would be worse? Our regulations have failed to constrain the largest companies who are apparently beholden to the most regulation and law the world has ever seen, but somehow FOSS individuals/collectives need to do better than these billion dollar behemoths? Nice. I don't get why people suddenly think that when something is 'dangerous' then it's okay to throw in the towel on personal property ownership and take whatever lend-lease-borrow program is offered in exchange. Cars have always been dangerous, and aside from gross safety and emissions laws, we're allowed to modify them. I don't understand why this changes radically when a vehicle becomes electric, were gas tanks and high pressure fuel injectors suddenly safer than I remember them being? "The stupid teen who burns his house down" certainly applied to things in the past, and we didn't go out of the way to lock down the fuel tank into an inaccessible black box in response, we just dealt with the inherent risk of dangerous equipment and somehow avoided full-blown chaos and calamity through educated precaution and training. Here's what I want: I want the freedom to modify my own property, and when that modification becomes in violation of an agreed upon law I should be punished. Forget all this pre-crime 'what-if' save the children bullshit. Punish offenders and let civilian non-offenders do as they please until such time that they violate a law or standard -- which would be more enforcement than the world is seemingly applying to every other car manufacturer in the world.
- ceejayoz 3y ago> I don't understand why this changes radically when a vehicle becomes electric, were gas tanks and high pressure fuel injectors suddenly safer than I remember them being? That’s not what’s changing. We’d be having the same balancing act discussion of collective safety versus individual rights if self-driving cars were all combustion powered.
- yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago> FOSS robot cars seem like a great way to bypass emissions controls, safety regulations, and plain common sense. It'd take what, half a day, for some teenager to modify the firmware to double the 0-60 and blow up the battery pack at the same time? Hasn't that always been possible? Just because it's in software now I don't see why it's suddenly different
- BobaFloutist 3y ago>FOSS robot cars seem like a great way to bypass emissions controls, safety regulations, and plain common sense. It'd take what, half a day, for some teenager to modify the firmware to double the 0-60 and blow up the battery pack at the same time? People already mod their cars, and there are vast communities of teens and early-twenties following exhaustive video tutorials on how to illegally and unsafely make their car faster and louder. Cars aren't quite FOSS, but they're better documented than most FOSS is.