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I think a network of self-driving cars might actually help with that. All the cars can communicate where they are going and could agree to take paths that reduc

I think a network of self-driving cars might actually help with that. All the cars can communicate where they are going and could agree to take paths that reduce traffic and get everyone to their destination faster. EDIT: Also, these features should be coming soon thanks to devices like Automatic and apps like Waze.

rayiner 12y ago
So one of the things I used to work on is software for cognitive radios: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_radio http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_radio. One of potential features of cognitive radio networks is that each node can share information about its local RF environment, to allow the network to make frequency-selection decisions based on global information. It's easy to describe, very hard to implement. Very, very, hard to implement in a way that works every time, like anything that goes in a car must. Heck, we have so far to go even within the scope of the technology we have today. One of the things I've noticed as a heavy Uber user is that drivers tend to get confused when they're first hailed, and again when they pick you up. GPS systems tend not to give you a good fix on your orientation until you're moving,[1] and when you get a hail on the other side of town, they're really not very useful for giving you the optimal "first turn." This is a really simple thing, that's probably worth a lot of money to a company like Uber, that's really hard to get right with existing technology. With distributed decision-making of autonomous vehicles, you're talking about something orders of magnitude more complicated. [1] My wife and I get a kick every time Siri says "proceed to the route." Which is a lot.
saosebastiao 12y ago
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braess%27s_paradox http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braess%27s_paradox How will they decide amongst themselves which one gets the suboptimal route?

rayiner 12y ago

So one of the things I used to work on is software for cognitive radios: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_radio http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_radio. One of potential features of cognitive radio networks is that each node can share information about its local RF environment, to allow the network to make frequency-selection decisions based on global information. It's easy to describe, very hard to implement. Very, very, hard to implement in a way that works every time, like anything that goes in a car must. Heck, we have so far to go even within the scope of the technology we have today. One of the things I've noticed as a heavy Uber user is that drivers tend to get confused when they're first hailed, and again when they pick you up. GPS systems tend not to give you a good fix on your orientation until you're moving,[1] and when you get a hail on the other side of town, they're really not very useful for giving you the optimal "first turn." This is a really simple thing, that's probably worth a lot of money to a company like Uber, that's really hard to get right with existing technology. With distributed decision-making of autonomous vehicles, you're talking about something orders of magnitude more complicated. [1] My wife and I get a kick every time Siri says "proceed to the route." Which is a lot.

saosebastiao 12y ago

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braess%27s_paradox http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braess%27s_paradox How will they decide amongst themselves which one gets the suboptimal route?