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Google Self-Driving Car Project's first vehicle prototype

229 points by justhw 12y ago

manticore_alpha 12y ago
Unfortunately, these things just don't have a cool factor. Here's to hoping Tesla moves forward much more quickly (and regular car manufacturers as well.) It's something Google probably just doesn't "get" - but a lot of people's identities are tied to their cars. It's why we have colors, shapes, brands, options. This car may be "perfect" algorithmically, but it doesn't mean it stirs the soul.
- tachyonbeam 12y ago
  Tesla doesn't quite have the R&D for this yet. They have "autopilot", but it isn't quite as complete/competent. They might want to buy that technology from Google. Either way, the point of Google's self-driving clown car isn't to look cool, it's to get people used to the idea of robotic cars driving around on the streets, successfully not killing people. It's largely PR. They're really doing everyone a favor.
- BukhariH 12y ago
  Google is not a car company. They don't want to compete with professional car designers. What Google wants to do is create a car that is not aggressive in it's design because they want other road users to feel comfortable around a self driving car. I think they learnt from their mistake with Glass, where it was far too alien/futuristic and hence a lot of people rejected it. Whilst this car isn't futuristic at all but rather cute.
  - closetnerd 12y ago
    It's boring. This car says you have no imagination, no spontaneity, you're extremely practical, possibly OCD, with a German sense of humor.
- dougmany 12y ago
  I disagree. I think we find identity in our car because we a pilot them in a similar way we pilot our bodies. As we get less involved in the control of the vehicle, we will care less about how it looks/feels. Taxi cabs are a good example of this.
  - closetnerd 12y ago
    I disagree. Most people driving around are not racing drivers so they're not "one with the car" so they don't treat it like there bodies. They're more likely to treat it as an accessory. More over, I quite enjoy driving so I'm not interesting in relinquishing control of the vehicle.
- twrkit 12y ago
  In < 5 years, when someone opens up his or her Uber by Google app, they won't care about what the vehicle looks like on the outside (much like an Uber customer today!). All that matters is that it shows up promptly, and that it takes them to wherever they want to go safely, quickly, and comfortably. The focus will be on the interior - WiFi, power outlets, cup holders, leather seats - so that the passenger can pleasurably remain nose deep in his or her smartwatch / smartphone / tablet. The emotional attachment won't exist - it's just another service on demand. Not until the market becomes stratified will the luxuriousness of the autonomous vehicle come into play.
- melling 12y ago
  Yes, it's almost like they're designed to be a business solution where "cool" doesn't matter. You know, like to get you from the airport to long-term parking. Maybe a solution for an Uber/Lyft to enter smaller markets?
- thrownaway2424 12y ago
  Tesla doesn't have any technology to speak of. They sell a sled filled with thousands of flashlight batteries. The only thing Tesla has is their car looks cool. So Google doesn't have cool, and Tesla doesn't have technology. Could be some synergy maybe.
  - jsolson 12y ago
    Have you actually driven or in fact spent any time in a Tesla?
    - thrownaway2424 12y ago
      I own two.
  - noobiemcfoob 12y ago
    Single gear electric motor? Revolutionary battery technology? Nope; no technology here.
- greeneggs 12y ago
  It's a taxi. Google doesn't need the design to appeal to individuals, because they aren't selling it to individuals. Instead, they want it to appeal to the cities that they want to partner with. For that purpose, the design is fine. I'd love to see a fleet of these driving around our streets here.
- zanny 12y ago
  Autos will never be sold to consumers. At least the general public. Or at least average people will never buy one. It is a tremendous, insane, unacceptable waste to have autos parked all day. The only way these things make sense is through subscription services where you can summon a car from a fleet whenever you want, so that you can maximize utilization.
  - ghaff 12y ago
    However, the reason for that is that the majority of people keep roughly the same hours. And the current system at least has the advantage that cars are generally near their owners rather than driving additional miles to get to centralized locations. Given various assumptions, utilization could certainly be increased--though we already have the ZipCar and taxi options--but I'm unconvinced that the pay-per-use economics are going to be as compelling as you think.
    - eru 12y ago
      If prices sink low enough during off-peak hours (and surge high enough during peak), people will alter their behaviour. Eg I'd be happy to send a car on an autonomous grocery run during the day.
    - zanny 12y ago
      Except it is a self managing fleet. Autos would not just stay in central locations, they will use current parking infrastructure to distribute themselves. People will have drive ways for a hundred years even if everyone gets rid of the cars - and you'll get 5% off your subscription to let them park autos in your drive way. And the majority is just maximal utilization. Even then, it is drastically less than the total number of vehicles in the system, and the reuse of those vehicles every other hour of the day besides peak hour is only a utilization gain. It will be much cheaper to subscribe to an auto service than own one. In the best case one auto could possibly represent the vehicle usage of a dozen or more people if their driving times align properly. And the worst case is that it is still two or three times the utilization.
sparkzilla 12y ago
This thing looks like a clown car. Perfect for those who think Glass is the height of fashion.
- zzleeper 12y ago
  Indeed. Looks "cute", but cute doesn't sell with cars..
  - krasin 12y ago
    I really doubt they would sell this car to public. And having a cute self-driving test vehicle is better for the way people think about it than a dangerously looking sport car with spoilers and basses.
  - coldpie 12y ago
    Well, I don't think they'll be selling this thing, especially not directly to consumers. This is a research prototype for using on the real road. They're announcing that they now have a complete car in that it meets whatever criteria the law sets for using a car on the public roads. Some time after that, they'll figure out how to market and monetize the technology. I'd be surprised if Google themselves ever got into the car business.
  - toomuchtodo 12y ago
    Surprise, I don't care what the car looks like if I'm paying per trip to get me from A to B. Do you complain about the fashion sense of the BART?
    - JetSpiegel 12y ago
      Aluminium Grey is the new Black.
  - zzleeper 12y ago
    Edit: after seeing the discussion on 25mph and the disarming cuteness, then it makes much more sense. I too don't care about what the car looks like, but then again I don't own one, partly because I don't care about them as much
soyiuz 12y ago
http://assets.blog.hemmings.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/totalrecallbooniebug_03_resized.jpg http://assets.blog.hemmings.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/t... Where can I take you sir?
- JetSpiegel 12y ago
  The question is when will self driving cars go beyond that Johnny Cab. Remember, Arnie had to rip the driver off in order to escape human pursuers.
soupcancooloff 12y ago
don't worry guys, its only a matter of time until Uber adds another service called UberGrandma/pa and starts targeting senior citizens with this car. (Google Ventures has a stake in Uber)
nichodges 12y ago
My initial reaction was dismay that Google seemingly didn't consult any decent auto designers on this. But then I wonder if that's actually fine. My kids will likely be baffled by the idea that we attached so much of our own identity to our cars. The financial investment in cars to make a statement about ourselves (over and above getting us from A to B) is immensely irrational. With self driving cars ownership will likely disappear, and be replaced with time sharing. At that point the connection between our view of ourselves, and the car we ride in disappears. I'm not sure that completely excuses the lack of modern car aesthetic here, but it could go some way to explaining it.
- agumonkey 12y ago
  I often wonder how much of it is a human trait. Transportation has many sides, it's a psycho-physiological wonder (push a pedal while sitting, and move faster than running), it's a moving private space, a technical and aesthetic source of pleasure, obviously a social status sign also. Were people as attached to their horses, boats ? was it a rite of passage or just a mundane thing ?
- jmeekr 12y ago
  Good points but some people just enjoy the act of driving and take a lot of pride in customizing their cars to match their tastes. A fundamentally human trait that will of course adjust to changing technology, but won't go away as staunchly as you think.
  - cuu508 12y ago
    so we'll use our "driver's cars" on scenic roads and racetracks. I don't think many people enjoy driving through heavy city traffic.
- kansface 12y ago
  The oatmeal wrote about it: | Google's new fleet was intentionally designed to look adorable... By turning self-driving cars into an adorable Skynet Marshmallow Bumper Bots, Google hopes to spiritually disarm other drivers. I also suspect the cuteness is used to quell some of the road rage that might emerge from being stuck behind one of these things. They're intended as moderate-distance couriers, not open-road warriors, so their max speed is 25 miles per hour. http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car
jasonwilk 12y ago
The way Google seems to be approaching self-driving cars is the right one in my opinion. Self-driving cars will be on-demand, booked through something like Uber and will not be owned by the end-user. I feel that the other car companies working on self-driving car technology for consumers are wasting their time. The main reason I enjoy owning a nice car is that I like driving it. If I wasn't in control of driving my car, what would be the point? Vanity of course has to be considered but in the future, I see self-driving cars which we don't own will the the status quo in cities, and owning a manual operating a car will be either a novelty or something for people outside of major city hubs.
- cmdli 12y ago
  There could be a market for owning self-driving cars outside of major cities. Not everyone has access to a cab-like service now so unless that changes adding some sort of autopilot to regular cars would be useful.
- kayoone 12y ago
  I like being a passenger in a nice car more than in a crap car, so owning a nice self driving car would be a bit like having your own chauffeur and time to do other things while enjoying your car.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- hotgoldminer 12y ago
  The vision should be to replace as many drivered cars as possible with driverless and network the vehicles. I see a future without a need for stop lights.
- bostonpete 12y ago
  I want a self-driving car to free me up to do other things on my hour commute twice a day. Even if it were more cost-effective to rent (which I suspect it would not be given how much I would need to rent), I can think of 2 reasons I'd rather own: - Don't have to worry about availability. Turns out there are a lot of people in my region who go to work in the morning and go home in the evening. - When you spend that much time in your vehicle, it becomes and extension of your personal/living space. I don't want to spend 10 hours a week in a public box that may have a mess or an odor from the person before me.
nodata 12y ago
It looks crap. Google, please don't release that. (OR: Google, I will pay more not to ride in that.)
- closetnerd 12y ago
  Thank you.
vinkelhake 12y ago
To those that get hung up on the design: remember that this car is limited to 25 mph for regulatory reasons. Having a design that is closer to a bumper car than a model S seems fitting with that in mind.
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  > To those that get hung up on the design: remember that this car is limited to 25 mph for regulatory reasons. Which might explain exactly why it looks very similar to many NEVs [0] or Motorized Quadricycles [1], which tend to have similar constraints. [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neighborhood_Electric_Vehicle http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neighborhood_Electric_Vehicle [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorised_quadricycle http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorised_quadricycle
amckenna 12y ago
A lot of people are bashing the car's appearance, but I think people forget that putting the first driverless cars on the road is as much a PR challenge as it is a technological challenge. Truly autonomous driverless cars is a huge shift in the way we have operated for almost 100 years. There will be a lot of caution and resistance from political groups, concerned citizens, entrenched interests, etc. The car that they put forward first needs to be non-threatening, safe, and easy to adopt. Given Google's stake in Uber the car will be part of a fleet that can be summoned by a mobile app, not some product you go out and buy. Because there will be no dealerships and individual owners, they don't care about attracting buyers for the vehicle - it doesn't need a cool factor. What it needs is to be non-threatening and safe so you will feel comfortable getting in one and going for a ride. Additionally, the first car on the roads will just be making in town trips and will be limited to 25mph - no highways or major arterials. This means it makes more sense for the car to be compact, light, and similar to a Smart Car, than a Camry or SUB.
- Toenex 12y ago
  Uber have the right idea here; own the platform, not the infrastructure. Lets face it, a cars spends most of its life stationary, waiting for you to drive it. Not so the autonomous vehicle. Autonomous vehicles are freed from the shackles of parking so why not lease your car to Uber and have it earn money as a cab? The future will be a bad time to get into car parking.
  - thanksgiving 12y ago
    > The future will be a bad time to get into car parking. Perhaps, this will be the case in the long term. However, until then perhaps we could implement some sort of price surging where rental costs of parking space skyrockets when demands get high. Uber is doing the hard work of making price surging palatable. Everyone else just needs to ride on their coat tails.
    - zevyoura 12y ago
      SF and other cities already have variable, usage based parking fees[0]; I imagine these will only become more widespread. [0] http://sfpark.org/ http://sfpark.org/
LukeB_UK 12y ago
Matthew Inman of The Oatmeal got to have a ride in one and shared his thoughts here: http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car
- brianstorms 12y ago
  It actually looks like a car that would fit in well with the overall design motif of The Oatmeal.
  - zanny 12y ago
    He also owns a Model S. http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla_model_s http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla_model_s
productcontrol 12y ago
Edit: Google staff and fanbois have far too much time to downvote, but less time to articulate why it seems! I tried to use Google's driverless car, but everytime I asked it to search for rival services, it kept driving me to their search and adsales offices. Was a bit weird. Like they told the car to prefer their services first! My eurotrash friends promised to investigate though, so that's nice.
- alimoeeny 12y ago
  Part of the aggressive downvoting comes from people who have actually lost loved ones or lost money and time in road accidents and really really want this technology to get somewhere. If I had downvote powers I would have downvoted you too.
3apo 12y ago
From an economic standpoint, I would be interested to see how many OTC parts this system. That is, does it need a $1000 lidar or would it get a similar performance with a cheap $100 sensor? From a technical point of view, 25mph is very limiting IMO. You probably do not need a very sophisticated controller to navigate at 25. If you reach speeds of 60-70MPH with varying road curvatures, the controller design gets trickier.
- venaoy 12y ago
  I disagree. City driving at 25 mph is a lot more complicated and needs a lot more computing power than highway driving at 60-70 mph. City driving involves: handling the "dead zone" of intersection (square of pavement with no marking), poorly marked roads, pedestrians/cyclists/cars getting in your way, complex turn lanes, etc. By comparison highway driving is a piece of cake: clearly marked lanes, no sharp turns, no intersections, clear entry/exit ramps, all vehicles moving in the same direction, no pedestrians.
  - greeneggs 12y ago
    On city roads, if your car gets confused it can just stop, even without pulling over. This will annoy a lot of people but nobody will die. On a highway, you can't safely just stop. And there are still difficult driving situations. For example, construction zones often have poorly marked lanes (or multiple, contradictory lane markings), construction workers to watch out for, and nowhere to pull over. Exit and entry ramps may be clear, but merging at speed and in traffic is a difficult and unsafe problem. And any failure at highway speeds is far more dangerous than at 25mph.
  - 3apo 12y ago
    What you say is true - city driving is complicated with too many decisions to make, but it does not need a very optimized controller to control the car through those scenarios. Changing a lane at 15-25MPH is far more easier than on a turning highway with merging traffic at 55-60MPH. At that speed the controller would not only need to safely execute the maneuver but also stabilize the vehicle in the event it needs to come to a halt or take an evasive action. Moreover if there is say some uncertainty in the sensor readings at 25mph, that is multiplied by many factors at higher speeds and becomes very significant. Control at higher speeds has more stability issues and can deal with less uncertainty and than at lower speeds.
kandalf 12y ago
Given that as far as I know, roads must be extensively mapped in advance of a self-driving car going on them, there is a nice bonus of doing self-driving cars exclusively through Uber at first. Uber can know the exact route the passenger wants to take in advance, and only send cars to passengers whose routes are already mapped. Furthermore, they can choose to only send them out when the conditions are good (no snow, etc. assuming conditions are still a problem when these go into fuller production). A nice way to roll the cars out incrementally without some of the problems they might otherwise have...
- eru 12y ago
  Good point! People are working on the extensive pre-map requirement, though.
jastanton 12y ago
Google has had much more PR about it's revolutionary tech and that has a LOT going for it. When tesla comes out with their self driving car, if it looks 100x better than this prototype, I still might pick Google. Better aesthetics with comparable functionality will win the majority of time in my book (think Android devices vs Apple devices), however when it comes times to putting my life on the line, I will go with something I feel is safer 100% of the time regardless of how it looks. And like always, Google will dominate with it's superior functionality (backed by their PR over the last couple of years) over any tesla any day.
- millstone 12y ago
  "Much more PR" than what? The only ads for self-driving cards I've seen are Ford's ads for its automatic parallel parking. And far from "dominating," Google is a small player in any market for physical goods in which it competes. They're much more likely to license their technology to other manufacturers than sell it directly to consumers.
  - eru 12y ago
    > "Much more PR" than what? The only ads for self-driving cards I've seen are Ford's ads for its automatic parallel parking. Ads are not the only form of PR. (They are actually some of the weakest.)
bbayer 12y ago
What is the purpose of Google here, to develop a platform that car manufacturers want to integrate or producing driverless cars under Google brand?
kin 12y ago
A lot of people are bashing its appearance. I think it looks cute. So, to each his own on the regard. But seriously guys, this is happening a lot sooner than I thought and I really could not be any more excited to have these on the road.
jvagner 12y ago
Cute, adorable, non-threatening... could have been achieved and still looked.. better, methinks.
Animats 12y ago
They've got to make more progress on the sensors. They still have that overpriced Velodyne HDL-64E scanner (about $100K) on top of the prototype. The new vehicle has a slightly smaller device on top, probably the HDL-32E. Google doesn't seem to be making progress on flash LIDAR or millimeter microwave radar, which are going to be needed for reasonable-cost production vehicles. CMU/Cadillac have a self-driving car. They have a number of long videos taken with a back-seat camera. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXhvQeArwWM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXhvQeArwWM It's good enough that it's been driven around downtown Washington. It doesn't seem to sense turn signals or infer much intent from other-driver behavior. The driver has his hand on the auto/manual switch at all times; clearly there's not much confidence in this thing yet.
bane 12y ago
Lots of people are point at this being Uber's future "auto-car". Here's an alternative idea: - You can buy this car. It costs $100,000. But that's okay. - When you aren't actively using it, you tell it to go "Uber mode" and pick up and drive people around as part of the "Uber Network of Cars" - You split the fee with Uber/Lyft/whoever. They get 30%, you get 70%. If the average ride pays you $7, over 5 years that's like 8 rides your car has to "sell" per day to be effectively "free" to you (except for financing, insurance, etc.). - At the end of the workday, Google Now summons your car to pick you up in front of your office and whisk you home. - After dropping you off at home, your car goes back onto Uber mode and does night-time service (if you opt-in). You could probably pay your car off much earlier than 5 years with more rides/higher average ride fare, after which your car is making you money. Clever people will use this extra to finance more cars to run small fleets and effectively live without working.
- TranquilMarmot 12y ago
  Google Now summons your car to pick you up in front of your office... ...and, upon entering, you're met with a horrific scene of blood, urine, and feces left behind by the previous person the car picked up. You sigh as you clean up the mess, "At least it feels like I'm living in the future now..." But, most likely, the cars will keep track of who is riding in them and you could hunt down whoever made the mess and make them clean it up. Or maybe it has cameras installed? Talk about an invasion of privacy! Plus it's not like they ever signed a waiver saying they WOULDN'T shit in the car.
  - dragonwriter 12y ago
    > Google Now summons your car to pick you up in front of your office... ...and, upon entering, you're met with a horrific scene of blood, urine, and feces left behind by the previous person the car picked up. Well, self-cleaning cars don't take a whole lot of new technology. But, sure, that's one of the reasons that I think that self-driving taxis, while clearly one of the long-term applications, probably aren't the first use of self-driving cars. And, particularly, the personally-owned self-driving vehicle whose owner is the primary user but rents it out on the off hours use is, while it might be something people try early on in the self-driving vehicle era, likely to not be a big thing even after self-driving taxis are. > Or maybe it has cameras installed? Conveyances used by the public often do, yes. I would rather expect this.
yRetsyM 12y ago
I thought this was quite a good commentary on it: http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car
danblick 12y ago
What's with the side-view mirrors?
billsossoon 12y ago
Reminds me of the Cozy Coupe [1] I had as a child. Perhaps that's not by accident. The fear is that these machines will be unsafe, either to their passengers or to other cards on the road. Making it cute my reduce the perceived threat level. [1]: http://www.littletikes.com/content/ebiz/shop/invt/612060/612060_cozy-coupe-30th-anniversary-edition_xalt5.jpg http://www.littletikes.com/content/ebiz/shop/invt/612060/612...
jedunnigan 12y ago
I don't have a firm enough understanding of how the LIDAR and laser's work in these vehicles, but it occurs to me that it might be possible for a malicious actor to confuse the cars and cause accidents. That's concerning.
- icelancer 12y ago
  This is true now with our current optical recognition devices. Try shining a laser in your eyes while you drive.
  - jedunnigan 12y ago
    Don't bother with the laser, just drive down the street and pass a car with HID headlights that aren't pointed directly towards the ground. At least in that situation your response will be to slow down (and hopefully the people behind you will see your brake lights). But if someone can manipulate a LIDAR signal to confuse the car into thinking the road ahead is clear when it is not, well then the attack becomes much different.
- ericd 12y ago
  Those LIDARs are a spinning array of lasers measuring time of flight for each laser as it spins. Each of ~64 lasers forms one scan line all around itself, and by taking all the scan lines together, they form a rough picture of the 3D structure of the surroundings. You can filter out aberrant inputs in software.
  - jedunnigan 12y ago
    Interesting, thanks!
brc 12y ago
What, exactly, are the mirrors for?
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  FTFA: "Our safety drivers will continue to oversee the vehicle for a while longer, using temporary manual controls as needed while we continue to test and learn." So, they need all the driver-used mirrors, etc., that any manually-operated vehicle has (plus, the applicable safety regulations probably still require them, since, while provisions allowing self-driving cars to operate exist in some jurisdictions, I don't think that exceptions to the usual equipment requirements, particularly the federal ones, for them actually exist yet.)
click170 12y ago
One of the aspects of this that I've been getting concerned about is the invasion of privacy that they will pose, especially if it's one or a handful of companies owning an operating the autonomous vehicles. It's true that if you carry a cell phone you already carry a personal tracking device and offer this information up freely to your cellular provider, but I'm interested in reducing instead of increasing the amount of information I'm leaking in that way. What kind of information will these cars track? They'll have to track who rides in them for accountability purposes, which I already find troubling. Your average cabby isn't going to be compiling a profile about you based on where you catch rides to. Who has access to the information such as who rides in which cars? Is this available via an open API? I'm already peeved at companies like FitBit which hold my data ransom, is this going to be another of those situations? There's a lot of privacy questions that I feel aren't being adequately addressed, but I still look forward to the possibilities this will bring. The privacy questions are answerable and any problems should be correctable.
dogeye 12y ago
Nobody who has used Adwords believes Google will ever make a self driving car.
- ericd 12y ago
  It's a lot easier to work on a greenfield project than to change an existing, extremely heavily used project. And, different group. I see their modified self-driving Lexus SUVs driving around Mountain View all the time.
pinaceae 12y ago
i guess it has a strong appeal to the hardcore android crowd. people that get excited about utility, but have no sense at all for style. not a bad thing, mind you, but it is already obvious that it will take a company that gets style, like Tesla and yes, Apple, to make this appealing to people on the other side of the spectrum. people who cannot unsee ugliness, assymetry and disproportion. personnally i just hope roads stay open for motorcycles in the future. self-driven transportation can be massive fun.
davidw 12y ago
I wonder if these things could be used in potentially 'easier' niches like long-haul trucking: you'd create a loading/unloading port near the freeway, and send the truck to another port across the country. Naturally, I don't know anything about trucking, and you'd want to be really sure something so big and bulky is safe, but the idea would be, rather than "do everything a car does all at once" to do something relatively simple.

229 points by justhw 12y ago

Unfortunately, these things just don't have a cool factor. Here's to hoping Tesla moves forward much more quickly (and regular car manufacturers as well.) It's something Google probably just doesn't "get" - but a lot of people's identities are tied to their cars. It's why we have colors, shapes, brands, options. This car may be "perfect" algorithmically, but it doesn't mean it stirs the soul.

tachyonbeam 12y ago
Tesla doesn't quite have the R&D for this yet. They have "autopilot", but it isn't quite as complete/competent. They might want to buy that technology from Google. Either way, the point of Google's self-driving clown car isn't to look cool, it's to get people used to the idea of robotic cars driving around on the streets, successfully not killing people. It's largely PR. They're really doing everyone a favor.
BukhariH 12y ago
Google is not a car company. They don't want to compete with professional car designers. What Google wants to do is create a car that is not aggressive in it's design because they want other road users to feel comfortable around a self driving car. I think they learnt from their mistake with Glass, where it was far too alien/futuristic and hence a lot of people rejected it. Whilst this car isn't futuristic at all but rather cute.
- closetnerd 12y ago
  It's boring. This car says you have no imagination, no spontaneity, you're extremely practical, possibly OCD, with a German sense of humor.
dougmany 12y ago
I disagree. I think we find identity in our car because we a pilot them in a similar way we pilot our bodies. As we get less involved in the control of the vehicle, we will care less about how it looks/feels. Taxi cabs are a good example of this.
- closetnerd 12y ago
  I disagree. Most people driving around are not racing drivers so they're not "one with the car" so they don't treat it like there bodies. They're more likely to treat it as an accessory. More over, I quite enjoy driving so I'm not interesting in relinquishing control of the vehicle.
twrkit 12y ago
In < 5 years, when someone opens up his or her Uber by Google app, they won't care about what the vehicle looks like on the outside (much like an Uber customer today!). All that matters is that it shows up promptly, and that it takes them to wherever they want to go safely, quickly, and comfortably. The focus will be on the interior - WiFi, power outlets, cup holders, leather seats - so that the passenger can pleasurably remain nose deep in his or her smartwatch / smartphone / tablet. The emotional attachment won't exist - it's just another service on demand. Not until the market becomes stratified will the luxuriousness of the autonomous vehicle come into play.
melling 12y ago
Yes, it's almost like they're designed to be a business solution where "cool" doesn't matter. You know, like to get you from the airport to long-term parking. Maybe a solution for an Uber/Lyft to enter smaller markets?
thrownaway2424 12y ago
Tesla doesn't have any technology to speak of. They sell a sled filled with thousands of flashlight batteries. The only thing Tesla has is their car looks cool. So Google doesn't have cool, and Tesla doesn't have technology. Could be some synergy maybe.
- jsolson 12y ago
  Have you actually driven or in fact spent any time in a Tesla?
  - thrownaway2424 12y ago
    I own two.
- noobiemcfoob 12y ago
  Single gear electric motor? Revolutionary battery technology? Nope; no technology here.
greeneggs 12y ago
It's a taxi. Google doesn't need the design to appeal to individuals, because they aren't selling it to individuals. Instead, they want it to appeal to the cities that they want to partner with. For that purpose, the design is fine. I'd love to see a fleet of these driving around our streets here.
zanny 12y ago
Autos will never be sold to consumers. At least the general public. Or at least average people will never buy one. It is a tremendous, insane, unacceptable waste to have autos parked all day. The only way these things make sense is through subscription services where you can summon a car from a fleet whenever you want, so that you can maximize utilization.
- ghaff 12y ago
  However, the reason for that is that the majority of people keep roughly the same hours. And the current system at least has the advantage that cars are generally near their owners rather than driving additional miles to get to centralized locations. Given various assumptions, utilization could certainly be increased--though we already have the ZipCar and taxi options--but I'm unconvinced that the pay-per-use economics are going to be as compelling as you think.
  - eru 12y ago
    If prices sink low enough during off-peak hours (and surge high enough during peak), people will alter their behaviour. Eg I'd be happy to send a car on an autonomous grocery run during the day.
  - zanny 12y ago
    Except it is a self managing fleet. Autos would not just stay in central locations, they will use current parking infrastructure to distribute themselves. People will have drive ways for a hundred years even if everyone gets rid of the cars - and you'll get 5% off your subscription to let them park autos in your drive way. And the majority is just maximal utilization. Even then, it is drastically less than the total number of vehicles in the system, and the reuse of those vehicles every other hour of the day besides peak hour is only a utilization gain. It will be much cheaper to subscribe to an auto service than own one. In the best case one auto could possibly represent the vehicle usage of a dozen or more people if their driving times align properly. And the worst case is that it is still two or three times the utilization.

sparkzilla 12y ago

This thing looks like a clown car. Perfect for those who think Glass is the height of fashion.

zzleeper 12y ago
Indeed. Looks "cute", but cute doesn't sell with cars..
- krasin 12y ago
  I really doubt they would sell this car to public. And having a cute self-driving test vehicle is better for the way people think about it than a dangerously looking sport car with spoilers and basses.
- coldpie 12y ago
  Well, I don't think they'll be selling this thing, especially not directly to consumers. This is a research prototype for using on the real road. They're announcing that they now have a complete car in that it meets whatever criteria the law sets for using a car on the public roads. Some time after that, they'll figure out how to market and monetize the technology. I'd be surprised if Google themselves ever got into the car business.
- toomuchtodo 12y ago
  Surprise, I don't care what the car looks like if I'm paying per trip to get me from A to B. Do you complain about the fashion sense of the BART?
  - JetSpiegel 12y ago
    Aluminium Grey is the new Black.
- zzleeper 12y ago
  Edit: after seeing the discussion on 25mph and the disarming cuteness, then it makes much more sense. I too don't care about what the car looks like, but then again I don't own one, partly because I don't care about them as much

soyiuz 12y ago

http://assets.blog.hemmings.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/totalrecallbooniebug_03_resized.jpg http://assets.blog.hemmings.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/t... Where can I take you sir?

JetSpiegel 12y ago
The question is when will self driving cars go beyond that Johnny Cab. Remember, Arnie had to rip the driver off in order to escape human pursuers.

soupcancooloff 12y ago

don't worry guys, its only a matter of time until Uber adds another service called UberGrandma/pa and starts targeting senior citizens with this car. (Google Ventures has a stake in Uber)

nichodges 12y ago

My initial reaction was dismay that Google seemingly didn't consult any decent auto designers on this. But then I wonder if that's actually fine. My kids will likely be baffled by the idea that we attached so much of our own identity to our cars. The financial investment in cars to make a statement about ourselves (over and above getting us from A to B) is immensely irrational. With self driving cars ownership will likely disappear, and be replaced with time sharing. At that point the connection between our view of ourselves, and the car we ride in disappears. I'm not sure that completely excuses the lack of modern car aesthetic here, but it could go some way to explaining it.

agumonkey 12y ago
I often wonder how much of it is a human trait. Transportation has many sides, it's a psycho-physiological wonder (push a pedal while sitting, and move faster than running), it's a moving private space, a technical and aesthetic source of pleasure, obviously a social status sign also. Were people as attached to their horses, boats ? was it a rite of passage or just a mundane thing ?
jmeekr 12y ago
Good points but some people just enjoy the act of driving and take a lot of pride in customizing their cars to match their tastes. A fundamentally human trait that will of course adjust to changing technology, but won't go away as staunchly as you think.
- cuu508 12y ago
  so we'll use our "driver's cars" on scenic roads and racetracks. I don't think many people enjoy driving through heavy city traffic.
kansface 12y ago
The oatmeal wrote about it: | Google's new fleet was intentionally designed to look adorable... By turning self-driving cars into an adorable Skynet Marshmallow Bumper Bots, Google hopes to spiritually disarm other drivers. I also suspect the cuteness is used to quell some of the road rage that might emerge from being stuck behind one of these things. They're intended as moderate-distance couriers, not open-road warriors, so their max speed is 25 miles per hour. http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car

jasonwilk 12y ago

The way Google seems to be approaching self-driving cars is the right one in my opinion. Self-driving cars will be on-demand, booked through something like Uber and will not be owned by the end-user. I feel that the other car companies working on self-driving car technology for consumers are wasting their time. The main reason I enjoy owning a nice car is that I like driving it. If I wasn't in control of driving my car, what would be the point? Vanity of course has to be considered but in the future, I see self-driving cars which we don't own will the the status quo in cities, and owning a manual operating a car will be either a novelty or something for people outside of major city hubs.

cmdli 12y ago
There could be a market for owning self-driving cars outside of major cities. Not everyone has access to a cab-like service now so unless that changes adding some sort of autopilot to regular cars would be useful.
kayoone 12y ago
I like being a passenger in a nice car more than in a crap car, so owning a nice self driving car would be a bit like having your own chauffeur and time to do other things while enjoying your car.
deleted 12y ago
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hotgoldminer 12y ago
The vision should be to replace as many drivered cars as possible with driverless and network the vehicles. I see a future without a need for stop lights.
bostonpete 12y ago
I want a self-driving car to free me up to do other things on my hour commute twice a day. Even if it were more cost-effective to rent (which I suspect it would not be given how much I would need to rent), I can think of 2 reasons I'd rather own: - Don't have to worry about availability. Turns out there are a lot of people in my region who go to work in the morning and go home in the evening. - When you spend that much time in your vehicle, it becomes and extension of your personal/living space. I don't want to spend 10 hours a week in a public box that may have a mess or an odor from the person before me.

nodata 12y ago

It looks crap. Google, please don't release that. (OR: Google, I will pay more not to ride in that.)

closetnerd 12y ago
Thank you.

vinkelhake 12y ago

To those that get hung up on the design: remember that this car is limited to 25 mph for regulatory reasons. Having a design that is closer to a bumper car than a model S seems fitting with that in mind.

dragonwriter 12y ago
> To those that get hung up on the design: remember that this car is limited to 25 mph for regulatory reasons. Which might explain exactly why it looks very similar to many NEVs [0] or Motorized Quadricycles [1], which tend to have similar constraints. [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neighborhood_Electric_Vehicle http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neighborhood_Electric_Vehicle [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorised_quadricycle http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorised_quadricycle

amckenna 12y ago

A lot of people are bashing the car's appearance, but I think people forget that putting the first driverless cars on the road is as much a PR challenge as it is a technological challenge. Truly autonomous driverless cars is a huge shift in the way we have operated for almost 100 years. There will be a lot of caution and resistance from political groups, concerned citizens, entrenched interests, etc. The car that they put forward first needs to be non-threatening, safe, and easy to adopt. Given Google's stake in Uber the car will be part of a fleet that can be summoned by a mobile app, not some product you go out and buy. Because there will be no dealerships and individual owners, they don't care about attracting buyers for the vehicle - it doesn't need a cool factor. What it needs is to be non-threatening and safe so you will feel comfortable getting in one and going for a ride. Additionally, the first car on the roads will just be making in town trips and will be limited to 25mph - no highways or major arterials. This means it makes more sense for the car to be compact, light, and similar to a Smart Car, than a Camry or SUB.

Toenex 12y ago
Uber have the right idea here; own the platform, not the infrastructure. Lets face it, a cars spends most of its life stationary, waiting for you to drive it. Not so the autonomous vehicle. Autonomous vehicles are freed from the shackles of parking so why not lease your car to Uber and have it earn money as a cab? The future will be a bad time to get into car parking.
- thanksgiving 12y ago
  > The future will be a bad time to get into car parking. Perhaps, this will be the case in the long term. However, until then perhaps we could implement some sort of price surging where rental costs of parking space skyrockets when demands get high. Uber is doing the hard work of making price surging palatable. Everyone else just needs to ride on their coat tails.
  - zevyoura 12y ago
    SF and other cities already have variable, usage based parking fees[0]; I imagine these will only become more widespread. [0] http://sfpark.org/ http://sfpark.org/

LukeB_UK 12y ago

Matthew Inman of The Oatmeal got to have a ride in one and shared his thoughts here: http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car

brianstorms 12y ago
It actually looks like a car that would fit in well with the overall design motif of The Oatmeal.
- zanny 12y ago
  He also owns a Model S. http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla_model_s http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla_model_s

productcontrol 12y ago

Edit: Google staff and fanbois have far too much time to downvote, but less time to articulate why it seems! I tried to use Google's driverless car, but everytime I asked it to search for rival services, it kept driving me to their search and adsales offices. Was a bit weird. Like they told the car to prefer their services first! My eurotrash friends promised to investigate though, so that's nice.

alimoeeny 12y ago
Part of the aggressive downvoting comes from people who have actually lost loved ones or lost money and time in road accidents and really really want this technology to get somewhere. If I had downvote powers I would have downvoted you too.

3apo 12y ago

From an economic standpoint, I would be interested to see how many OTC parts this system. That is, does it need a $1000 lidar or would it get a similar performance with a cheap $100 sensor? From a technical point of view, 25mph is very limiting IMO. You probably do not need a very sophisticated controller to navigate at 25. If you reach speeds of 60-70MPH with varying road curvatures, the controller design gets trickier.

venaoy 12y ago
I disagree. City driving at 25 mph is a lot more complicated and needs a lot more computing power than highway driving at 60-70 mph. City driving involves: handling the "dead zone" of intersection (square of pavement with no marking), poorly marked roads, pedestrians/cyclists/cars getting in your way, complex turn lanes, etc. By comparison highway driving is a piece of cake: clearly marked lanes, no sharp turns, no intersections, clear entry/exit ramps, all vehicles moving in the same direction, no pedestrians.
- greeneggs 12y ago
  On city roads, if your car gets confused it can just stop, even without pulling over. This will annoy a lot of people but nobody will die. On a highway, you can't safely just stop. And there are still difficult driving situations. For example, construction zones often have poorly marked lanes (or multiple, contradictory lane markings), construction workers to watch out for, and nowhere to pull over. Exit and entry ramps may be clear, but merging at speed and in traffic is a difficult and unsafe problem. And any failure at highway speeds is far more dangerous than at 25mph.
- 3apo 12y ago
  What you say is true - city driving is complicated with too many decisions to make, but it does not need a very optimized controller to control the car through those scenarios. Changing a lane at 15-25MPH is far more easier than on a turning highway with merging traffic at 55-60MPH. At that speed the controller would not only need to safely execute the maneuver but also stabilize the vehicle in the event it needs to come to a halt or take an evasive action. Moreover if there is say some uncertainty in the sensor readings at 25mph, that is multiplied by many factors at higher speeds and becomes very significant. Control at higher speeds has more stability issues and can deal with less uncertainty and than at lower speeds.

kandalf 12y ago

Given that as far as I know, roads must be extensively mapped in advance of a self-driving car going on them, there is a nice bonus of doing self-driving cars exclusively through Uber at first. Uber can know the exact route the passenger wants to take in advance, and only send cars to passengers whose routes are already mapped. Furthermore, they can choose to only send them out when the conditions are good (no snow, etc. assuming conditions are still a problem when these go into fuller production). A nice way to roll the cars out incrementally without some of the problems they might otherwise have...

eru 12y ago
Good point! People are working on the extensive pre-map requirement, though.

jastanton 12y ago

Google has had much more PR about it's revolutionary tech and that has a LOT going for it. When tesla comes out with their self driving car, if it looks 100x better than this prototype, I still might pick Google. Better aesthetics with comparable functionality will win the majority of time in my book (think Android devices vs Apple devices), however when it comes times to putting my life on the line, I will go with something I feel is safer 100% of the time regardless of how it looks. And like always, Google will dominate with it's superior functionality (backed by their PR over the last couple of years) over any tesla any day.

millstone 12y ago
"Much more PR" than what? The only ads for self-driving cards I've seen are Ford's ads for its automatic parallel parking. And far from "dominating," Google is a small player in any market for physical goods in which it competes. They're much more likely to license their technology to other manufacturers than sell it directly to consumers.
- eru 12y ago
  > "Much more PR" than what? The only ads for self-driving cards I've seen are Ford's ads for its automatic parallel parking. Ads are not the only form of PR. (They are actually some of the weakest.)

bbayer 12y ago

What is the purpose of Google here, to develop a platform that car manufacturers want to integrate or producing driverless cars under Google brand?

kin 12y ago

A lot of people are bashing its appearance. I think it looks cute. So, to each his own on the regard. But seriously guys, this is happening a lot sooner than I thought and I really could not be any more excited to have these on the road.

jvagner 12y ago

Cute, adorable, non-threatening... could have been achieved and still looked.. better, methinks.

Animats 12y ago

They've got to make more progress on the sensors. They still have that overpriced Velodyne HDL-64E scanner (about $100K) on top of the prototype. The new vehicle has a slightly smaller device on top, probably the HDL-32E. Google doesn't seem to be making progress on flash LIDAR or millimeter microwave radar, which are going to be needed for reasonable-cost production vehicles. CMU/Cadillac have a self-driving car. They have a number of long videos taken with a back-seat camera. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXhvQeArwWM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXhvQeArwWM It's good enough that it's been driven around downtown Washington. It doesn't seem to sense turn signals or infer much intent from other-driver behavior. The driver has his hand on the auto/manual switch at all times; clearly there's not much confidence in this thing yet.

bane 12y ago

Lots of people are point at this being Uber's future "auto-car". Here's an alternative idea: - You can buy this car. It costs $100,000. But that's okay. - When you aren't actively using it, you tell it to go "Uber mode" and pick up and drive people around as part of the "Uber Network of Cars" - You split the fee with Uber/Lyft/whoever. They get 30%, you get 70%. If the average ride pays you $7, over 5 years that's like 8 rides your car has to "sell" per day to be effectively "free" to you (except for financing, insurance, etc.). - At the end of the workday, Google Now summons your car to pick you up in front of your office and whisk you home. - After dropping you off at home, your car goes back onto Uber mode and does night-time service (if you opt-in). You could probably pay your car off much earlier than 5 years with more rides/higher average ride fare, after which your car is making you money. Clever people will use this extra to finance more cars to run small fleets and effectively live without working.

TranquilMarmot 12y ago
Google Now summons your car to pick you up in front of your office... ...and, upon entering, you're met with a horrific scene of blood, urine, and feces left behind by the previous person the car picked up. You sigh as you clean up the mess, "At least it feels like I'm living in the future now..." But, most likely, the cars will keep track of who is riding in them and you could hunt down whoever made the mess and make them clean it up. Or maybe it has cameras installed? Talk about an invasion of privacy! Plus it's not like they ever signed a waiver saying they WOULDN'T shit in the car.
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  > Google Now summons your car to pick you up in front of your office... ...and, upon entering, you're met with a horrific scene of blood, urine, and feces left behind by the previous person the car picked up. Well, self-cleaning cars don't take a whole lot of new technology. But, sure, that's one of the reasons that I think that self-driving taxis, while clearly one of the long-term applications, probably aren't the first use of self-driving cars. And, particularly, the personally-owned self-driving vehicle whose owner is the primary user but rents it out on the off hours use is, while it might be something people try early on in the self-driving vehicle era, likely to not be a big thing even after self-driving taxis are. > Or maybe it has cameras installed? Conveyances used by the public often do, yes. I would rather expect this.

yRetsyM 12y ago

I thought this was quite a good commentary on it: http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car

danblick 12y ago

What's with the side-view mirrors?

billsossoon 12y ago

Reminds me of the Cozy Coupe [1] I had as a child. Perhaps that's not by accident. The fear is that these machines will be unsafe, either to their passengers or to other cards on the road. Making it cute my reduce the perceived threat level. [1]: http://www.littletikes.com/content/ebiz/shop/invt/612060/612060_cozy-coupe-30th-anniversary-edition_xalt5.jpg http://www.littletikes.com/content/ebiz/shop/invt/612060/612...

jedunnigan 12y ago

I don't have a firm enough understanding of how the LIDAR and laser's work in these vehicles, but it occurs to me that it might be possible for a malicious actor to confuse the cars and cause accidents. That's concerning.

icelancer 12y ago
This is true now with our current optical recognition devices. Try shining a laser in your eyes while you drive.
- jedunnigan 12y ago
  Don't bother with the laser, just drive down the street and pass a car with HID headlights that aren't pointed directly towards the ground. At least in that situation your response will be to slow down (and hopefully the people behind you will see your brake lights). But if someone can manipulate a LIDAR signal to confuse the car into thinking the road ahead is clear when it is not, well then the attack becomes much different.
ericd 12y ago
Those LIDARs are a spinning array of lasers measuring time of flight for each laser as it spins. Each of ~64 lasers forms one scan line all around itself, and by taking all the scan lines together, they form a rough picture of the 3D structure of the surroundings. You can filter out aberrant inputs in software.
- jedunnigan 12y ago
  Interesting, thanks!

brc 12y ago

What, exactly, are the mirrors for?

dragonwriter 12y ago
FTFA: "Our safety drivers will continue to oversee the vehicle for a while longer, using temporary manual controls as needed while we continue to test and learn." So, they need all the driver-used mirrors, etc., that any manually-operated vehicle has (plus, the applicable safety regulations probably still require them, since, while provisions allowing self-driving cars to operate exist in some jurisdictions, I don't think that exceptions to the usual equipment requirements, particularly the federal ones, for them actually exist yet.)

click170 12y ago

One of the aspects of this that I've been getting concerned about is the invasion of privacy that they will pose, especially if it's one or a handful of companies owning an operating the autonomous vehicles. It's true that if you carry a cell phone you already carry a personal tracking device and offer this information up freely to your cellular provider, but I'm interested in reducing instead of increasing the amount of information I'm leaking in that way. What kind of information will these cars track? They'll have to track who rides in them for accountability purposes, which I already find troubling. Your average cabby isn't going to be compiling a profile about you based on where you catch rides to. Who has access to the information such as who rides in which cars? Is this available via an open API? I'm already peeved at companies like FitBit which hold my data ransom, is this going to be another of those situations? There's a lot of privacy questions that I feel aren't being adequately addressed, but I still look forward to the possibilities this will bring. The privacy questions are answerable and any problems should be correctable.

dogeye 12y ago

Nobody who has used Adwords believes Google will ever make a self driving car.

ericd 12y ago
It's a lot easier to work on a greenfield project than to change an existing, extremely heavily used project. And, different group. I see their modified self-driving Lexus SUVs driving around Mountain View all the time.

pinaceae 12y ago

i guess it has a strong appeal to the hardcore android crowd. people that get excited about utility, but have no sense at all for style. not a bad thing, mind you, but it is already obvious that it will take a company that gets style, like Tesla and yes, Apple, to make this appealing to people on the other side of the spectrum. people who cannot unsee ugliness, assymetry and disproportion. personnally i just hope roads stay open for motorcycles in the future. self-driven transportation can be massive fun.

davidw 12y ago

I wonder if these things could be used in potentially 'easier' niches like long-haul trucking: you'd create a loading/unloading port near the freeway, and send the truck to another port across the country. Naturally, I don't know anything about trucking, and you'd want to be really sure something so big and bulky is safe, but the idea would be, rather than "do everything a car does all at once" to do something relatively simple.