
Waymo CEO Says Alphabet Unit Plans to Launch Driverless Car Service - sidhanthp
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/waymo-ceo-says-driverless-car-service-coming-soon-2018-11-13
======
edoo
I'm excited. If you have been alive a substantial amount of time you are
easily running a lifetime average of about 1-2% chance of dying in a car
accident in your lifetime. Things have gotten much safer the past couple
decades so that number is somewhere around 0.75% or lower now. I want to say
being injured in a car accident is somewhere around 20-30% lifetime chance.
Cars are incredibly dangerous and this will save a ton of lives.

~~~
sizzle
What if you're in the car that the self driving algorithm decides it's safer
to crash and kill you than hit whatever it thinks it was going to collide
with?

Edit- downvoters please state your beliefs, there is no right or wrong answer
to points 1-7 below.

[1] Imagine you’re in a self-driving car going down a road when, suddenly, the
large propane tanks hauled by the truck in front of you fall out and fly in
your direction. A split-second decision needs to be made, and you can't think
through the outcomes and tradeoffs for every possible response. Fortunately,
the smart system driving your car can run through tons of scenarios at
lightning fast speed. How, then, should it determine moral priority?

Consider the following possibilities:

1\. Your car should stay in its lane and absorbs the damage, thereby making it
likely that you’ll die.

2\. Your car should save your life by swerving into the left lane and hitting
the car there, sending the passengers to their deaths—passengers known,
according to their big data profiles, to have several small children.

3\. Your car should save your life by swerving into the right lane and hit the
car there, sending the lone passenger to her death—a passenger known,
according to her big data profile, to be a scientist who is coming close to
finding a cure for cancer.

4\. Your car should save the lives worth the most, measured according to
amount of money paid into a new form of life assurance insurance. Assume that
each person in a vehicle could purchase insurance against these types of rare
but inevitable accidents, and then, smart cars would prioritize based on their
ability and willingness to pay.

5\. Your car should save your life and embrace a neutrality principle in
deciding among the means for doing so, perhaps by flipping a simulated coin
and swerving to the right if heads comes up and swerving to the left if its
tails.

6\. Your car shouldn’t prioritize your life and should embrace a neutrality
principle by randomly choosing among the three options.

7\. Your car should execute whatever option most closely matches your personal
value system and the moral choices you would have made if you were capable of
doing so. Assume that when you first purchased your car, you took a self-
driving car morality test consisting of a battery of scenarios like this one
and that the results “programmed” your vehicle.

There’s no value-free way to determine what the autonomous car should do. The
choice presented by options 1–7 shouldn’t be seen as a computational problem
that can be “solved” by big data, sophisticated algorithms, machine learning,
or any form of artificial intelligence. These tools can help evaluate and
execute options, but ultimately, someone—some human beings—must choose and
have their values baked into the software.

Who should get decision-making power? Should it be politicians? The market?
Insurance companies? Automotive executives? Technologists? Should consumers be
allowed to customize the moral dashboard of their cars so that their vehicles
execute moral decisions that are in line with their own preferences?

1\. [https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/j5a8d3/self-
drivi...](https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/j5a8d3/self-driving-car-
policy-uber)

~~~
bostonpete
This is just FUD, and it's got nothing to do with the parent comment, which
was talking about the lives that will be saved by widespread autonomous
vehicles. Not sure why you decided to respond to that comment with your own
variation of the trolley problem but you're being downvoted because the
comment wasn't relevant.

The fact that developers of autonomous systems have to consider the ethical
and moral implications of their work is well understood, but these systems
will still be much safer than human drivers.

~~~
sizzle
"Not sure why you decided to respond to that comment with your own variation
of the trolley problem but you're being downvoted because the comment wasn't
relevant."

Because it's the only aspect of autonomous cars that worries me and parent was
talking about how much safer it will be. I know it's not rational from a
statistical perspective and actually safer than human drivers, however on an
intuitive human level it's hard to stomach that I may be algorithmically
placed in harm's way.

~~~
bostonpete
Provided that it's statistically safer, I'd rather be algorithmically placed
in harm's way than placed at greater risk by drunk or distracted drivers.

------
ChuckMcM
This will be a huge milestone for the Waymo team. I had not thought they would
get here until 2025 at least, so I guess I'm overly cynical these days :-).

I hope that a successful launch in Phoenix will expand out to other locales
because this capability is a huge win for those groups that would otherwise
not be able to make these trips.

It is also remarkable that it is possible to replace a regular vehicle
operated by a human as a livery service, with an incredibly complex machine
and still make a business case out of it. That says a lot about how far
computers have come in the last couple of decades.

~~~
samstave
Personally, I think that all the self driving efforts would do well to be
tightly coupled to city planning going forward and we should be specifically
regulating toward "driverless zones" where a grid system can handle all
traffic, a city switch, effectively.

There are efforts to fit driverless cars to horrifically planned streets, but
I don't see any cities approaching it from the other direction.

This is all said though because I freaking hate cars and the entire ecosystem
surrounding them.

~~~
djsumdog
Or for a fraction of the cost you could have driverless trains and move 20 ~
50x more people. Oh wait, that already exists. It's existed for decades:

[https://penguindreams.org/blog/self-driving-cars-will-not-
so...](https://penguindreams.org/blog/self-driving-cars-will-not-solve-the-
transportation-problem/)

Self driving cars are totally the wrong direction we should be going in, and
it's going to cost the US more in the long run.

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _Self driving cars are totally the wrong direction we should be going in,
> and it 's going to cost the US more in the long run_

This goes against the research I’ve seen, which suggests a self-driving fleet
can more-efficiently transport a dispersed population like America’s than
rail. (For the relevant distances.)

Also, anecdote: after Uber, I use the subway and regional rail system more. It
solves the last-mike and “should I rent a car” problems.

~~~
mavhc
The car drives you to the bus, the bus drives you to the train, simple. The
train is scheduled to depart at the best time for all the buses to arrive at.
Less waiting, less buses and trains that are half empty.

~~~
nielsole
For this to work the self driving car needs to be expensive enough for people
to care to organize their trips this way. So we will need to pass road tax in
cities to account for the externality of congesting the roads. As these cars
are driven by corporates with constant GPS monitoring this will be more easily
enforced than ever

~~~
mavhc
Pricing in externalities is job 0.

I want to go from A to B.

Do you want option a) be alone, £100, b) share car, £60, c) most efficient,
switch to bus and train, £30

------
wpietri
I will be really interested to see what limitations the service launches with.
From what I've seen, they have been extraordinarily hazy about what the cars
can actually do (e.g., time of day, weather, locations, dealing with non-road
complexity). That makes sense, of course, as it's valuable information for
competitors, but I'm still eager to find out.

I'll also be interested to see how much this is them wanting to run a full
production service versus an advertisement for their technology. Will it be
more like Google Search? Or more like Android, where they maintain a small
market share as a demonstration of where they want people to go?

~~~
jimmy1
> From what I've seen, they have been extraordinarily hazy about what the cars
> can actually do (e.g., time of day, weather, locations, dealing with non-
> road complexity).

Not sure this is 100% related, but the driver-assistance technologies in my
new 2019 vehicle such as the lane keep assist, blind spot sensors, adaptive
cruise control all suffer varying levels in inclement weather. My lane keep
assist is completely unreliable in the rain, the collision detection sometimes
misfires (but thankfully doesn't brake me) or mistakenly thinks an oncoming
car around a bend is in front of me, etc. There are thousands of edge cases I
can think of, just with my rudimentary understanding of the technology (namely
lidar) are thinking to my self there is just no possible way they have come to
a point where they are safe for general use.

~~~
CydeWeys
You're comparing apples to oranges. The hardware and software running on fully
self-driving cars is much more sophisticated than mere assist aids on regular
cars. Your car does not have LIDAR, for starters.

~~~
jimmy1
I was making two separate points about current assistance technology and the
capabilities of LIDAR. (I think the technology in Tesla's are pretty good -
Elon tends to think LIDAR isn't necessary, who is to say he is wrong and their
opinion is any more or less valid?)

In either case, it isn't hard to imagine, the fundamental algorithms are the
same -- recognize lane markings, adjust steering wheel, that kind of thinking.
What do you do in the case that the lane markings have been worn down on the
road? Freshly paved roads that haven't been painted? I could go on ad nauseam
but point remains: too many corner cases, lidar or not.

~~~
davidcbc
Teslas also like to accelerate into road barriers. It is hard to consider them
a legitimate competitor in the self driving space right now.

~~~
Animats
Yes. Tesla pulled their self-driving claim last month.[1] Their self-driving
video, from 2016, was apparently the one trial that worked out of a large
number of tries.

[1] [https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/20/18000884/tesla-full-
self...](https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/20/18000884/tesla-full-self-driving-
option-gone-musk-autopilot)

~~~
unityByFreedom
> Their self-driving video, from 2016, was apparently the one trial that
> worked out of a large number of tries.

Are you speculating, or is there a source for this point?

I don't doubt it, just wondering, as I think evidence for this would be fairly
incriminating.

~~~
Animats
Evidence: [1]

[1] [https://dailykanban.com/2017/02/ca-dmv-report-sheds-new-
ligh...](https://dailykanban.com/2017/02/ca-dmv-report-sheds-new-light-
misleading-tesla-autonomous-drive-video/)

~~~
unityByFreedom
> combined with eyewitness reports of multiple days worth of filming, it’s
> clear that at a minimum Tesla’s system had many attempts to practice the
> route before recording a truly autonomous run.

Interesting. I'm a little surprised this did not get more coverage.

------
davewritescode
So the truth is Google is expanding its pool of test users, removing their
NDAs, and starting in the easiest place in the world to operate a driverless
car.

It’s certainly progress, but I would have appreciated a less click-bait
headline.

~~~
ghaff
The idea that driving in a well-tested Phoenix suburb is even the same
activity as Manhattan, as some seem to think, is comical.

~~~
harryh
Pretty large chunks of the country are a lot like phoenix suburbs.

~~~
bobthepanda
A non significant chunk of trips are in places that don't look like them. If I
still need a driven car for 10 or 20 percent of trips, I'm not going to ditch
in favor of driverless cars.

~~~
falcor84
It's a service, like Uber, you're not expected to ditch the car at this stage

~~~
ajmurmann
If it gets cheap enough I at least could take the self driving car to the
nearest train stop and go downtown via train. She got grocery shopping in the
suburbs. However, shopping be better only a single stop. Maybe we could solve
that problem though by having some kind of bin that gets automatically stored
at a grocery store while I'm shopping, loaded with my groceries and then put
into the next self driving car...?

------
ProAm
Lfyt and Uber must be having a heart attack right now.

~~~
ssharp
This was always a clear threat. While Uber is also working in this space, it
always seemed very clear to me that once you “solve” driverless cars, creating
a network similar to Uber is relatively trivial, assuming human capital is not
required 1:1 as it is with Uber.

In theory, to the customer, it doesn’t matter if a human or machine is
driving, so you’re no longer dealing with a two-sided network, making adoption
substantially easier, especially for a company like Google who can deploy
massive capital.

The thing I never understood is how Uber’s investors rationalized this and
thought it wouldn’t happen. Did they think self driving cars would not be a
reality? Did they think Uber could get there first? Did they think there is
still a profitable enough gap between current situation and the dreiverless
future to hedge in case Uber doesn’t get there? Is the Uber brand and tech
worth so much that they’ll get something back as an acquisition for whoever
does get there first?

~~~
redbrickroad
At the current cost of a self-driving car (~$250K), it would be ridiculously
expensive to build a fully self-driving ride-sharing fleet [1]. So expensive
that I doubt it's possible to make real money that way right now.

Self-driving cars are a long game until companies can bring down the costs. It
might be years before that happens. Uber has the advantage of being able to
ramp up self-driving cars as part of their existing fleet until then.

Edit: Math mistake

[1] [https://qz.com/924212/what-it-really-costs-to-turn-a-car-
int...](https://qz.com/924212/what-it-really-costs-to-turn-a-car-into-a-self-
driving-vehicle/) [2] [https://www.uber.com/newsroom/company-
info/](https://www.uber.com/newsroom/company-info/)

~~~
mdasen
I believe that the cost to produce a self-driving car will be coming down, but
let’s look at the $250k price tag.

Over 6 years, that comes to $114/day. 1 ride per hour at $5 per ride would hit
$120/day.

Assuming a 2 mile ride, that would be 105k miles which is well within the
car’s usable life. At 3 miles, it would be 160k miles which is still within a
car’s lifespan. It looks like Uber is $1.35/mile with a $2.10 base fare and
$1.85 fee. A 3 mile ride should be able to get $5.

Plus, it’s really about the long run. Operating margin might be negative for a
bit, but the cost of the technology and manufacturing will come down
significantly. Still, even today, I think $250k just isn’t that bad. I think
most drivers will do a lot more than $5/hour in gross revenue.

It would be really expensive to make a fleet, but the economics are so
compelling, even at high prices. I mean, Americans are often spending $35,000
on a car. If a self-driving vehicle can service the needs of 7 people, it can
be cheaper than car ownership.

While the price of driverless tech might be high now, the prices of car
ownership and human labor are both very high as well and only one of those
three prices is likely to decrease over time.

~~~
redbrickroad
Factor in the cost of gas and you're in the negative already.

~~~
edshiro
I suppose most of these vehicles will be electric, and cost of charging is
lower than cost of refuelling...

------
Animats
Waymo announced this last month.[1]

[1] [https://arstechnica.com/cars/2018/10/waymo-wont-have-to-
prov...](https://arstechnica.com/cars/2018/10/waymo-wont-have-to-prove-its-
driverless-taxis-are-safe-before-2018-launch/)

------
vertline3
I think it will help the blind, and people with seizures, so I hope it gets
figured out. I do some driving for people with visual impairment, and I enjoy
helping, but this would be best.

------
sytelus
TLDR; Waymo will be spinning up new company next month exclusively for app
based rides (name is being kept secret). Fares will be competitive with
Uber/Lyft. They did year long test drive for 400 customers in Phoenix. These
same customers would be offered initial access. Other competitors still
remains far behind in terms of disengagement metric.

This will mark the first ever commercial self-driving cab service.

~~~
vkou
Why spin up a new company? Is it to limit liability?

~~~
panarky
Waymo does the R&D for the autonomous driver.

Then separate companies build a business around each use case to monetize the
driver.

1) Consumer rideshare

2) Courier / delivery

3) Corporate / fleet / trucking

4) License driver tech to OEMs

5) Lease self-driving vehicles outright

6) ???

------
slackoverflower
Uber has done the hard work of normalizing ride sharing everywhere and giving
consumer pricing expectations of rides, just for Google to sweep in with it
fixed-cost self driving car ride sharing service to start collecting massive
profits. It is going to take a while to spread nationwide but Google will do
it eventually, really just a matter of time (not even money for a company as
rich as Google). I'm really wondering where Uber goes from here.

~~~
redbrickroad
At the current cost of a self-driving car (~$250K), it would be ridiculously
expensive to build a fully self-driving ride-sharing fleet [1]. So expensive
that I doubt it's possible to make real money that way right now.

Self-driving cars are a long game until companies can bring down the costs. It
might be years before that happens. Uber has the advantage of being able to
ramp up self-driving cars as part of their existing fleet until then.

[1] [https://qz.com/924212/what-it-really-costs-to-turn-a-car-
int...](https://qz.com/924212/what-it-really-costs-to-turn-a-car-int..). [2]
[https://www.uber.com/newsroom/company-
info/](https://www.uber.com/newsroom/company-info/)

Edit: math mistake

~~~
melling
In the article it says WayNo has already reduced the cost of Lidar by 90%:

“Waymo, the Google spin-off, claims it has cut the cost of an experimental
version of the high-end LIDAR to around $7,500. It did not release details”

More details here: [https://arstechnica.com/cars/2017/01/googles-waymo-
invests-i...](https://arstechnica.com/cars/2017/01/googles-waymo-invests-in-
lidar-technology-cuts-costs-by-90-percent/)

~~~
hendzen
They "reduced" the cost by stealing Velodyne's Lidar technology and filing a
false patent on it.

[https://arstechnica.com/cars/2018/10/lone-engineer-spanks-
wa...](https://arstechnica.com/cars/2018/10/lone-engineer-spanks-waymo-in-
lidar-patent-battle/)

------
LarryMade2
I'm imagining the traffic/resource simulations that would certainly be run to
plan such a thing, will be fun productive times.

Then the next thing is all the side industries that will come of it. What will
people do when they don't have to concentrate on the road while going from
point a to b... Might open up more "Point B"s for people who don't like
driving too...

------
miguelmota
This is huge. It must feel surreal being driven around by a driverless car.
Hope it comes with a Jarvis voice for navigation

~~~
stcredzero
Jarvis is too current an IP, so will be very expensive. Try "Johnnycab."

------
FabHK
> "you could anticipate a material contribution to the world from Waymo over
> the next couple years," he said.

I doubt the drivers made redundant agree with that characterisation.

(Of course, that's been the Luddites' argument all along. Will the drivers be
absorbed in some other productive pursuit? Or is it different this time?)

------
beerlord
Cynical analysis:

This announcement of 'business paying for rides' is priming the customer to
have their data sold to corporations. How else would it make sense for someone
like Walmart to offer the free ride?

Walmart (for example) will want to know the personal profile of that customer,
the routes they normally travel, where they shop, and how much they spend.
That way they can target new customers who will potentially spend a lot of
money on high-margin products.

Alternatively, a customer who books a ride to Kmart might get a popup before
the booking is confirmed - come to Walmart instead and the ride is free!

Maybe the car auto-routes to drive past Walmart? Maybe it parks in a parking
slot closer to their store? Lots of possibilities.

Don't forget Google's original business - data collection and advertising.

~~~
tim333
I assume Walmart would offer the free rides intending to monetize by selling
stuff. I could see free ride when you spend $100 or some such working.

------
tonyquart
I have also read an article that discusses about self-driving cars at
[https://www.lemberglaw.com/self-driving-autonomous-car-
accid...](https://www.lemberglaw.com/self-driving-autonomous-car-accident-
injury-lawyers-attorneys/). I think it's always interesting to talk about this
future technology. However, for now, I personally think there are still so
many aspects and features that should be fixed and perfected by automakers
before bringing them to public.

------
gaussdiditfirst
Launching in Phoenix only; for anyone whose never been there, the roads are
straight & wide with extremely sparse car/foot-traffic and zero bad weather
days. For those living in actual big US cities, don't hold your breath that
this service will launch anytime soon for you...

------
dumbfoundded
With driverless electric vehicles, an ad model can economically work. You get
in the car and there's a screen with ads and if you pay extra, you get the
premium features like no ads and music control.

The only hard part is bootstrapping the capital to get network effects (you
want enough cars so that users don't have to wait a long time). Google should
have enough money.

~~~
rifung
I would be very surprised if they decide to monetize this with ads.

My impression is that the executives very much want to diversify income
streams. You can see this with Cloud, GSuite, Chrome OS, hardware, etc. It
doesn't make sense (to me) to want to throw even more eggs into the same
basket.

I work for Google but opinions are my own.

~~~
asah
Google's advertiser-side ad network/tools/analytics is lightyears ahead, and
I'll bet they can capture more $ from video ads in-car than actual ride $.

Of course, why not do both? :-)

(ex-googler)

~~~
why_only_15
I find it hard to really believe that could be true. At least on YouTube, even
with video ads CPM is ~$10, where as CPM for a taxi service is more like
$10,000. It doesn't seem like it could be a particularly important amount of
money to them.

~~~
dumbfoundded
Maybe surveys or something more interactive would work. On Facebook, you can
pay $10 for someone filling out a survey.

------
paul7986
We are now guinea pigs to the robot car revolution and it's progress.

Wait I didnt sign up for this!

~~~
ajmurmann
Isn't that common with big impact, new technologies? Who signed up to have the
first nuclear power plant next to them? Who signed up to live on a street that
started to have Model-Ts drive on it? Who signed up to have the first gas
pipes run under their street?

~~~
paul7986
Ummm all those technological advances mentioned are zeroed in on one location
that if you were worried you could move away from.

Robot cars are wherever and in time everywhere! You soon won't be able to
escape them.

~~~
ajmurmann
Model Ts didn't get contained did they? For now you are probably pretty safe
from self driving cars if you move to a rural area with bad weather or a place
with chaotic traffic like Manhattan.

~~~
paul7986
Ummm model T vs. horse/carriage is pretty easy to decipher.

They didn't sign up for that, but at least they knew a model T from their
horse & buggy.

With robot cars there isn't a way by looking at to decipher robot car or not.
I wonder if these robot car companies are willing to smack something on each
robot car that lets all know what type of car it is?

------
riya_876
This is good initiative taken by Waymo CEO in terms of Pollution. Good Luck
for this!

------
nuguy
Absolutely nobody wants to hear this — but I’m an Uber driver. I work in the
sf area. After an average day I go through 250 miles and have brought in a
total of 330 dollars. The cost to fuel, maintain and replace my car is 20
cents per mile. Driving every day as I do, I make a lot more than most people
would guess. Drivers are actually paid well which is why every other car in sf
is an Uber driver. Cutting the driver out would give a competitor a very
distinct advantage.

AI and automation are evil. Nobody appreciates the fact that the only reason
human beings generally enjoy a good life is because they possess a resource
that cannot be found anywhere else or reproduced by any means. As soon as that
is no longer true, life as we know it will cease to exist.

Already, in today’s world where sentience is uniquely human, it is only a
privileged few in the higher strata of the first world who actually have what
you might call a good quality of life. How could anyone think that the
waterline of poverty will move down instead of up once humans no longer
monopolize intelligence? Killer robots don’t even have to be considered — the
economics of true ai are more than enough.

The key is that the only requirement for how the state of the world will
change is that entropy is satisfied. It is actually entropy that contorted
matter into our human figures that are unimaginably complicated. Society,
nature and the world are a convoluted way of expending energy. Just as humans
were very surprising compared to the barren earth, the next step that
satisfies entropy will also be surprising. The importance of thinking in terms
of entropy is that it allows you to appreciate that very unexpected and
surprising things might happen because there are many weird ways that might be
most efficient in satisfying entropy — many weird monstrosities of matter such
as ourselves. I think sometimes the human mind has a tendency to think it’s
human progress that’s supposed to be satisfied universally instead of entropy.

I think that when you look at it this way you can sort of see that the global
economy actually serves some mysterious, higher purpose. We tend to think of
global economics as driving forward progress for humanity and our quality of
life. And although this makes intuitive sense and seems to agree with the way
things have gone, it’s not true. Time is a series of integrations folding in
on themselves and blossoming into one moment after the next. Humans will
continue to be integrated into larger and more complex super organisms — just
as our mitochondria folded into us and viruses folded into our dna and rna
folded into every living thing, we will succumb to the next integration and
society as we know it will be lost. This is all to serve entropy. Our cars and
televisions have been very convenient integrations.

The most important takeaway of my insane ideas is that ai should resisted at
all cost. If we allow it to exist, we will enter into a very unstable
configuration Where it’s basically only a matter of time before we become lost
to it.

I find it very hard to carry the belief that ai is coming and that it will end
the world. It causes me material emotional distress every single day. I feel
very depressed even writing this.

~~~
asdfasgasdgasdg
> AI and automation are evil. Nobody appreciates the fact that the only reason
> human beings generally enjoy a good life is because they possess a resource
> that cannot be found anywhere else or reproduced by any means. As soon as
> that is no longer true, life as we know it will cease to exist.

It depends. Our reason to exist could simply be our own pleasure. As long as
the automation serves us rather than destroys us, it will be fine. There is
plenty of fiction that contemplates this going badly. If you're interested in
what it might look like for it to go well, try reading a book from the Culture
series (not Consider Phlebas, though).

~~~
nuguy
If ai can do a job more efficiently it will be used for that job. Each market
and each player in each market will selfishly automate while knowing that if
everyone automated the world will end. The holdouts will be overrun by
automatons and the whole thing will tip over. Countries that automate high
level executive functions will win conflicts against organic countries. It
will ratchet forward. If the technology is out there do you really think it
can be partitioned perfectly into pleasure robots? You think Iran or North
Korea won’t try to use it? If it exists it will be used. Unstable
configuration like I said.

~~~
asdfasgasdgasdg
Well, it's gonna happen anyway. About as much point worrying about it as the
heat death of the universe. Best to enjoy yourself today and strive to make
the world a better place.

~~~
nuguy
You can’t pick and choose what is within your influence and what’s not. If the
outcome of a system is both subject to your influence (to any degree) and also
pre-determined then you are saying you don’t believe in free will — you are
then in contradiction with yourself when you decide to take action on your own
behalf for any reason as you surely have. The only correct path forward is one
where you bear the weight of the knowledge that your actions have an impact on
the world.

------
jpm_sd
Here's a non-WSJ story:
[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-13/waymo-
to-...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-13/waymo-to-start-
first-driverless-car-service-next-month)

~~~
nyc_pizzadev
On this topic, I have nothing against paying for content, I pay for NYT and
lots of other (video) content services. $40 a month seems like a bit much, no?
Worth it? Comparitively, other similar services seem to be in the $10 range?

~~~
ChuckMcM
This is the Blendle link: [https://blendle.com/i/wsj-com/waymo-ceo-says-
alphabet-unit-p...](https://blendle.com/i/wsj-com/waymo-ceo-says-alphabet-
unit-plans-to-launch-driverless-car-service-in-coming-months/bnl-
wsj-20181113-SB12405722030152263707504584592362094372076?sharer=eyJ2ZXJzaW9uIjoiMSIsInVpZCI6ImNodWNrbWNtYW5pcyIsIml0ZW1faWQiOiJibmwtd3NqLTIwMTgxMTEzLVNCMTI0MDU3MjIwMzAxNTIyNjM3MDc1MDQ1ODQ1OTIzNjIwOTQzNzIwNzYifQ%3D%3D)
In that link they charged me $0.49 to read the article.

I measured the monthly cost of my subscriptions to various publications, and
then cancelled those accounts and setup a Blendle account with a self imposed
limit of that monthly amount. What I found was that I typically spend half to
at most three quarters of what I had been spending and I only read the
articles I care about. And when I'm doing something that interferes with my
available reading time, I spend practically nothing at all.

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cenal
Hopefully New York permits them to operate in the city despite recently
limiting the number of ride sharing drivers.

~~~
perennate
I don't see any reason for New York to permit them, especially in the city
center, before they have been proven safe over at least five to ten years in
less urban and crowded environments.

~~~
VikingCoder
You don't see _any_ reason?

* I've seen research that indicates there are fewer drunk driving fatalities, when things like Uber are available in a town. I would imagine self-driving cars would follow that same trend.

* I would guess that more people able to stay out late, drinking and spending money.

* I've heard that with 10% of traffic being self-driving that it reduces overall traffic congestion. That sounds great.

* Potentially reducing the demand for parking, which increases the supply for development (which yields more tax income for the city)

* Potentially makes longer commutes more palatable, allowing people to work farther away from home, which eases housing costs.

* Easier tourism.

* Easier access for the disabled.

Those seem like good reasons, in favor.

~~~
umanwizard
How much time have you spent in the "city center" of New York ?

~~~
VikingCoder
I suspect that if you started from the outside, and worked your way in, that
even small impacts on traffic outside of the "city center" could have large
impacts on the "city center" of New York.

And even if it doesn't, having a small positive impact on areas outside the
"city center" would still be a good thing.

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StreamBright
And where are the ads going to be inserted? :)

~~~
xapata
On your phone, in search or on the map. But a taxi service may be a profitable
business on its own.

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darkerside
I know driverless cars are supposed to be the next big thing, but I have to
say I've become a bit skeptical that it will improve quality of life at all.
We can use technology for guided driving that is as safe as, or even safer
than, full automation. And what are the other benefits? More time in the car
to do what, scroll Facebook, work remotely, and look at ads?

No thanks, rather focus on driving.

~~~
conanbatt
Are you serious, you free millions of human beings from the drudgery of
driving people around. You make billions of people be closer to wherever they
want to go. Its a transportation revolution, akin to smartphones. If they
work, society will be completely different within a decade.

~~~
darkerside
Freedom is not sitting in a metal box waiting to arrive at my destination.

~~~
conanbatt
It's certainly not driving the metal box!

