America's Vice President Gets Stuck Behind a Stalled Driverless Robotaxi (abc7news.com) 128
As the Vice President of the United States travelled in a motorcade Saturday to a San Francisco hotel, they ended up stopped behind "a Waymo vehicle that had to be driven away from the motorcade route by police," according to a local newscast (which called it an "only in San Francisco moment").
And that's not all. One local reporter following the vice president's motorcade said "we saw not one but two driverless cars get stuck."
The San Francisco Standard adds that on Friday, California's governor "signed a bill that allows law enforcement to cite driverless car companies for traffic violations."
And that's not all. One local reporter following the vice president's motorcade said "we saw not one but two driverless cars get stuck."
The San Francisco Standard adds that on Friday, California's governor "signed a bill that allows law enforcement to cite driverless car companies for traffic violations."
Well, the taxi grew up in a middle class home (Score:5, Funny)
where cars were proud of doing donuts on their lawns.
Raised by a working single tow truck, it came to understand how difficult it can be to pick up a fair while moving....
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It's a playful reference to the recent presidential debate. You know, to blow off a lil steam since both candidates have such big scary skeletons in their respective closets. Kamala had a pre-prepared speech about growing up in a middle-class home and Donald warned us of pet-eating migrants.
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Excellent (Score:1, Funny)
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Raised by a working single tow truck, it came to understand how difficult it can be to pick up a fair while moving....
It's fare, not fair.
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So you're saying, it's not fair?
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To be fair, picking up an entire fair while moving is much more difficult proposition than picking up a fare. One of those endeavors is likely to fare far better than the other affair.
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I'm sure she just laughed it off....and is still unburdened by the past.
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fair != fare
Unless its a "Renaissance Faire"
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THANK YOU
That was breaking me...
Kamala. Harris. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: Kamala. Harris. (Score:2)
Re: Kamala. Harris. (Score:4, Funny)
You're citing "Da Real Adogg" as your source? Oh man, that's classic.
Thanks for the laugh.
Re: Kamala. Harris. (Score:4, Informative)
Have you seen the picture of Kamala together with her supposedly black grand mother
No but I have seen pictures of Trump posing with Epstein. Hell they were even dinner buddies. https://www.cnbc.com/2024/01/0... [cnbc.com]
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Have you seen the picture of Kamala together with her supposedly black grand mother
No but I have seen pictures of Trump posing with Epstein. Hell they were even dinner buddies. https://www.cnbc.com/2024/01/0... [cnbc.com]
Everyone that was rich and/or powerful visited Epstein at one time for another. Across industries. Across political parties. Across countries.CEO's. Actors. Senators. Congressmen. All of them. I'd lay money some of your favorites celebrities visited. He sought out and cultivated the rich and powerful into his circle. That includes your rich and powerful, not just the ones you don't like.
I still suspect he was, at the heart of it, running a massive blackmail scheme. Which is almost certainly why he had his l
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I'd like to see those lists so that I would know who were his 'clients' for that situation. As i recall, regrettably, the courts have deemed them immaterial to the case and then shredded them, burnt the shredding's, the
Re: Kamala. Harris. (Score:4, Informative)
so he didn't visit the Island
Maybe not the island, but he certainly was at Epstein's home with girls [tumblr.com] almost young enough to be his grand-daughter [tumblr.com]. On top of which, he gave Epstein 14 different phone numbers [tumblr.com] he could be reached at a moment's notice.
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I despise Trump, but those images are fake. We are in the AI age and on Slashdot people should know better and check the veracity of these things:
- https://www.snopes.com/fact-ch... [snopes.com]
- https://newschecker.in/fact-ch... [newschecker.in]
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Just for reference, what color was Trump's grandmother and what relevance is that to his political office?
Re: Kamala. Harris. (Score:5, Funny)
Just for reference, what color was Trump's grandmother and what relevance is that to his political office?
Orange ?
Kill the infidels! Or nonchristians! Or YOU! (Score:2)
I'm still digesting A Thousand Brains by Jeff Hawkins, but he said some quite interesting stuff about the propagation of bad memes. I'm pretty sure he deliberately focused on the example of flat earthers to avoid religion and politics. His perspective involved three steps: (1) Focusing on 'personal evidence'. That's like looking around and seeing that the earth looks flat, but I would extend it to 'do your own research' or 'read your holy book by yourself' (for the Evangelical and Moslem and Scientologist
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How old do you think Donald Trump is? His parents were born in 1905 and 1912. His father (Fred Trump) was born in NYC to a German family, but DJT's paternal grandfather (Frederick Trump) was banished from Germany in 1904 for evading the draft; Frederick died in 1918, leaving his widow Elizabeth to continue his real estate investments. DJT's mother was born (Mary Anne MacLeod) in Scotland to a Scottish family. There were no Nazis or Nazi-adjacent members of the family; Fred Trump denied his German herita
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Perhaps because the article isn't about her. Or maybe they're trying to avoid hurting the feelings of those who believe Mike Pence is still VP. It's policy at some news outlets never to refer to his administration in the past-tense.
Re:Kamala. Harris. (Score:4, Funny)
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I thought it was strange she was referred to as they.
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Just thought it was strange that the name of "America's Vice President" wasn't mentioned in the summary. Hopefully, she'll fade away into the ether of past happenings, and we can be unburdened by what has been.
You include "unburdened by what has been" like it's some kind of own against her, I'm honestly baffled as to why you think it's an own.
The meaning is clear enough, so that's not it. It's a slightly unusual sentence construction, but that's just how you make speech interesting. Maybe she's repeated it a few times, but who hasn't used specific phrases a few times?
As far as I can tell the only reason you think it's some kind of own is because you and other right wingers keep declaring it to be so.
Motorcade ... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Motorcade ... (Score:5, Insightful)
No, but cell phone and other frequencies jamming done around motorcade might I would assume...
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This is an unusual driving circumstance to say the least. And unfortunately the waymo choked.
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+1
This is an unusual driving circumstance to say the least. And unfortunately the waymo choked.
I think Waymo failed closed - stopped operations before it could potentially harm anyone.
Re:Motorcade ... (Score:5, Insightful)
I think Waymo failed closed - stopped operations before it could potentially harm anyone.
Except now someone with a desire to harm a president or vice-president has a new tool they might be able to take advantage of. If you can immobilize the person, you've got a much better chance of getting access to them.
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I think Waymo failed closed - stopped operations before it could potentially harm anyone.
Except now someone with a desire to harm a president or vice-president has a new tool they might be able to take advantage of. If you can immobilize the person, you've got a much better chance of getting access to them.
So let's ban TRAFFIC CONES ... since those are known to immobilze these self-driving cars. /s
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They frequently seem to stop for no apparent reason. At least, frequently enough that I've observed it.
And no traffic cones were spottted?
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If you look at the news footage, you can see the way the car is stopped is really weird. It seems to have stopped half way into a U-turn made in a weird spot. This story really needs details as to what the situation was that got the car into that position in the first place. It may indeed very well have been caused by unconventional circumstances related to the motorcade.
In addition to that, I'd say that there probably is a case to be made for cars like these to restart operations when they think they have
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How often does this affect human drivers though? I've seen them get stuck when trying to move aside for ambulances, for example. The end up blocking traffic.
We need those stats to say if this is really significant, or just another edge case that Waymo could improve to be even better than the average human driver.
Re: Motorcade ... (Score:2)
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Re:Motorcade ... (Score:4, Interesting)
Is jamming a good idea? Seems like if you wanted to attack the motorcade, you could use the fact that it has jamming as a signal to detonate/target designator.
The company I work for actually makes a GPS jamming detector that triggers a camera to take a photo of the vehicle with the jammer in it, because they are often stolen or smuggling.
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The car with the jammer doesn't have the VIP inside. The jamming range is designed to trigger whatever IEDs are on the route before the vehicle approaches.
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Makes sense. If it’s autonomous and you need to arrest a passenger it makes sense that it would coast to a stop.
Re: Motorcade ... (Score:2)
But that's SOP taught to meat-sack drivers as well. You see emergency vehicle lights approaching, you pull over if possible. And stop. It would make sense if Waymo programmed this behavior into their cars.
Well guess driverless cars are done (Score:3)
Which effectively makes every driverless car a continuous unlimited liability for its manufacturer.
no the rider / (renter) will get the bill + an adm (Score:4, Funny)
no the rider / (renter) will get the bill + an admin fee just like what happens with rented cars.
Re: no the rider / (renter) will get the bill + an (Score:3)
That would be a great way to tank repeat business.
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Let's say it only happens to 5% of riders, they can probably do without them. Some of those 5% might even come back anyway, if they don't have any other options. With cheap cars disappearing and public transport non-existent, it's not too far off where I live.
People love trying to apply technical fixes to governance problems. Much less friction than fixing the governance. Plus the techbros from Waymo will take you out to lunch.
Re: no the rider / (renter) will get the bill + a (Score:3)
That's true, but those 5% will mention it to other people. Not the kind of word of mouth a company wants.
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bulloney
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Re:Well guess driverless cars are done (Score:4, Insightful)
Just a cost of doing business.
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Which effectively makes every driverless car a continuous unlimited liability for its manufacturer.
Only if the manufacturer remains the registered owner/keeper. Otherwise it's someone else's unlimited liability.
And that's why autonomous cars are not just around the corner, it won't drop you off and go park itself for the simple reason that someone has to be liable for it. Lorry drivers aren't going to be put out of a job by AI because not only is someone liable for the vehicle, but also a huge financial liability for the load, which likely needs to be somewhere that isn't blocking an intersection beca
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If you're driving 1000 cars at once, it won't take long to accumulate 6 points on your license...
what would of happened if the beast needed to ram (Score:2)
what would of happened if the beast needed to ram it off the road?
Too much Hollywood, I suppose (Score:4, Interesting)
If I were on the motorcade's secret service detail and a barricade like that happened, I'd be thinking someone was trying to slow things down to take a shot.
And I wouldn't be particularly nice about getting that car out of the way.
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MOVE YOU CAR!
the real Hollywood would having an real driver in (Score:2)
the real Hollywood would having an real driver in the seat would remove the speed caps on the self mode. Allowing to rev up to max speed with the driver having all control locked out
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Reality is very disappointing.
Neither of those attempts were well planned enough that they should have had a hope of even starting to happen in the first place. Once in progress they should have been stopped before anything serious happened.
While most of the threats of violence seem to come from the right and maybe the secret service wasn't worried because the guy they were 'protecting' was the right's leader... the left isn't exactly unable to produce violent radicals. Relaxing their protection was stupi
Re: Too much Hollywood, I suppose (Score:2)
Unpaid Beta Testers (Score:5, Insightful)
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Because they wanted to be able to post “FIRST!!” Millennials. Am I right?
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I believe the people were against it but were overruled by the state.
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They are also unpaid beta-testers of novel Socialistic and Communistic government policies & programs
Really? Which programs are communistic?
American electeds (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:American electeds (Score:4, Insightful)
It's a security issue. Shutting down streets helps the Secret Service spot would-be assassins and, hopefully, deters most of the angry disgruntled amateurs (i.e. anyone but a professional assassin).
As for "massive gas guzzler," in 10 years it will be a massive electric-energy-guzzler. Mass, when properly placed, is useful in stopping bullets.
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I like the idea of the top of the executive being stuck in real life like the rest of us, to keep them grounded.
Practically speaking, if you don't give them special transportation privileges you're A) opening them to easier assassination attempts and B) wasting everyone's time anyway. We always complain our politicians aren't doing enough - if they're held up in traffic that's time they aren't working for all of us.
I do think they ought to invest in teleconferencing, though. Most of what they're doing doe
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How does what the US president gets compare to what the leaders of, say, France or Canada or Australia or the UK or Germany or Italy or Spain or any number of other similar western countries and does the US actually need to go as hard as it does on this?
Although I guess when you have a country with more guns than people and its generally legal to walk down the street carrying a gun you do need to go harder than in places where gun ownership is heavily restricted and its flat out illegal to have a gun in pub
Not sure whether to laugh or cry (Score:2)
Would've been "uber"-funny if the President of Waymo got stuck behind a driverless Waymo taxi though. Talk about karma.
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Her name is Kamala, not Karma, you insensitive clod!
Traffic Citations (Score:4)
So California passed a law allowing driverless cars but didn't bother including in that law how traffic citations would be handled?
Now I'm doubly glad the governor is apparently vetoing everything.
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Illegal to operate a vehicle on a public road without a valid drivers licence?
Laws (Score:5, Informative)
It's almost like I know what I'm talking about because it's part of my job.
https://www.californiacarlaws.... [californiacarlaws.com]
"California was the third state to permit self-driving vehicles on state roads back in 2012, after Nevada and Florida."
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But you only bitch about California.
Theme (Score:2)
Well it would be weird to complain about the autonomous driving laws in South Dakota when this thread is about California.
I'm curious (Score:5, Interesting)
If a human driver had blocked the presidential motorcade, even by honest negligence, wouldn't the secret service have swarmed the car and hauled their ass in jail simply because the move looked threatening?
I'm pretty sure two driveless blocking the motorcade can easily be construed as the beginning of an attack on the VP too. So my question is: which Waymo exec got arrested?
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I bet they would consider it if the car were remote-controlled.
Re:I'm curious (Score:4, Insightful)
If I were the VP's security, I'd be highly suspicious of a stopped vehicle of any kind - especially unmanned - in the direct path of the motorcade I was protecting and wouldn't approach it at all and would instruct the driver to initiate emergency driving measures to turn and flee.
There's no telling at all who was in control of the vehicle and what was in it, at that point. And it would be the perfect way to stop the motorcade for... gosh... I don't know... someone else to take action against a VP they disapprove off when we've had two attempted assassinations of former presidents in the last few months.
This is a security failing, and a Waymo failing.
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If I were the VP's security, I'd be highly suspicious of a stopped vehicle of any kind - especially unmanned - in the direct path of the motorcade I was protecting and wouldn't approach it at all and would instruct the driver to initiate emergency driving measures to turn and flee.
May I ask how one instructs the (non-existent) driver of an unmanned vehicle to "initiate emergency driving measures to turn and flee"?
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And that little taxi... (Score:2)
Er (Score:1)
As the Vice President of the United States travelled in a motorcade Saturday to a San Francisco hotel, they ended up stopped behind "a Waymo vehicle that had to be driven away from the motorcade route by police," according to a local newscast (which called it an "only in San Francisco moment").
I hear that some of those wascally wepubwicans even claim to know who "they" is!! The Vice President of the United States!
They are trying to say that it is person who already has power and a record that can be looked at, instead of a beacon of change!
Can you believe the audacity?
So? (Score:2)
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Classic ruse (Score:2)
I'm not saying this is the case in what happened in TFA. But I am saying that this illustrates a possible scenario where SDCs could be remotely hijacked to do precisely what happened here, and an attack of some sort (murder, kidnapping, hijacking, etc) could happen.
I staunchly believe that SDCs a
Good analogy for driverless cars... stuck (Score:2)
This is the current state of driverless cars. Unfortunately they frequently get confused and just stop. I guess that's better than just plowing ahead and crashing but probably not ready for prime time.
And Then They Wonder... (Score:2)
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I'm sorry, but I don't think of this as a valid excuse for a rear-end collision.
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The story was probably written by ChatGPT. The actual link uses her name multiple times.
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Or just Harris would do. It really does some awkward not to mention her name.
But ... but ... then Harris wouldn't have sprung fresh from the head of Zeus! She'd have a history and a record we could look at!