Post AkYkuvPTwc04HrXAmG by Stormgren@obsidianmoon.com
(DIR) More posts by Stormgren@obsidianmoon.com
(DIR) Post #AkXv5YY65PVQxCJOmu by azonenberg@ioc.exchange
2024-08-01T23:20:42Z
4 likes, 2 repeats
An ex-coworker now at [redacted autonomous vehicle company] just tried to convince me to come work for them. Obviously I declined.In case it wasn't obvious to anyone else, let me just state in plain English: there is no amount of money that will get me to build self-driving cars for you. The bigger the number the harder I'll decline.I don't even like sharing the road with L2 ADAS equipped vehicles. The last thing I want to do is contribute to making the problem worse.Now, if you wanted me to work on a fully human-controlled EV with no telematics or automation, designed for repairability with a 30+ year target lifespan, and redundant sensing and actuation and triple redundant lockstep CPUs on safety-critical components like ABS? Maybe we can talk.But self-driving cars are probably one step above "DRM'd medical devices that stop working if you don't pay a subscription fee" on my "these should not exist and I will not lift a finger to help you create them" list.
(DIR) Post #AkXv5a3gTSMndS68f2 by azonenberg@ioc.exchange
2024-08-01T23:27:35Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
I'd rather build better bitcoin miners or stock-trading FPGAs than self driving cars, and that says something.
(DIR) Post #AkY5sWaf9js6buV66C by ignaloidas@not.acu.lt
2024-08-02T07:05:28.286Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@azonenberg@ioc.exchange Honestly, looking at autonomous trains and how much control over the environment that requires to achieve safe travel by railway standards, I don't see how you can achieve anything remotely close with cars and car-centric infrastructure (because that would require WAY more investment in infrastructure than any government would spend)
(DIR) Post #AkYYTkvXc2zqVRo98i by azonenberg@ioc.exchange
2024-08-02T02:45:19Z
2 likes, 0 repeats
@alan I would happily work on military/defense stuff as long as it was interesting and didn't require getting a security clearance that would interfere with my F/OSS work (I've turned down several roles that would have needed one).But self driving cars serve purely capitalistic interests and in many cases are actively hazardous to their occupants and other road users.
(DIR) Post #AkYYTlmiQLWzAMgc1Q by azonenberg@ioc.exchange
2024-08-02T02:53:14Z
2 likes, 0 repeats
@alan This is also why I'm more opposed to corporate datamining than government surveillance.NSA, at least on paper, has my best interests at heart. They're looking for foreign terrorists and spies and couldn't care less about the cat gifs I'm sending to a friend. I'm boring and they're not supposed to be looking at me anyway.But corporate spies have a fiduciary obligation to their shareholders to datamine everything they can learn about me and exploit that information to serve their financial ends, typically to my detriment. They're actively seeking to harm me and they certainly aren't legally obligated to ignore me because I'm a US citizen on US soil.
(DIR) Post #AkYYTmDeoB58VvI812 by sun@shitposter.world
2024-08-02T12:25:55.987417Z
5 likes, 2 repeats
@azonenberg @alan I am against government surveillance because the form it has taken is illegal and lawsuits to stop it have all been thrown out on specious procedural grounds ("you don't have standing to sue because you can't prove you were effected and you can't prove you were effected because the programs are secret") just very unamerican all-around and completely demoralizing that everyone rolls over for it.
(DIR) Post #AkYg6HQJwImtyXWOQ4 by sun@shitposter.world
2024-08-02T13:51:20.849830Z
3 likes, 0 repeats
@mapachin @azonenberg @alan one of the express purposes of the NSA is to protect american business, we used NSA to spy on Airbus to advantage Boeing in airline bids in Europe (NSA proved that Airbus was breaking the law, but still)
(DIR) Post #AkYkuvPTwc04HrXAmG by Stormgren@obsidianmoon.com
2024-08-02T00:03:00Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@azonenberg Funny, I had the same feeling about someone encouraging me to apply at a certain low-earth-orbit polluting ISP.Ended up going to a non-profit in R&E instead.
(DIR) Post #AkYkv4tag2QphqgqSO by Brokar@mastodon.social
2024-08-02T09:55:08Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@azonenberg What made me really hickup regarding EV was not the self-driving capability but the fact that the manufacturer has complete control over the vehicle you're driving. There was a report of a car chase, police chasing a Tesla, and the police basically called Tesla and they then remotely turned off the engine, enabling the police capture the guy.I will never drive a car which can be controlled remotely and i'm not in charge. And i will never pay for a subscription to use seat heaters.
(DIR) Post #AkYkv65KFtPfOXBjO4 by clacke@libranet.de
2024-08-02T12:22:17Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@Stormgren @azonenberg R & E = Research & Experimentation?It's the first time I hear the term!
(DIR) Post #AkYkvFJTwd5I12sfCa by lars@mastodon.social
2024-08-02T09:03:11Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@azonenberg "Now, if you wanted me to work on a fully human-controlled EV with no telematics or automation, designed for repairability with a 30+ year target lifespan, and redundant sensing and actuation and triple redundant lockstep CPUs on safety-critical components like ABS? Maybe we can talk."Focus on making it affordable and creating a reliable distribution and service network, and you're describing my dream car.Where do we sign up to contribute to make it a reality?
(DIR) Post #AkYkvOrURYdRd7rRxY by Stormgren@obsidianmoon.com
2024-08-02T12:41:52Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@clacke @azonenberg research and education.
(DIR) Post #AkZ6pUeQCjXKq5Kxl2 by azonenberg@ioc.exchange
2024-08-02T18:44:26Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@sun @alan @mapachin Yeah but that also doesn't make me, a private individual in the US, at all interesting to them.In my threat model US corps > foreign corps > foreign spooks > US spooks in terms of how likely they are to actually be actively spying on me in a manner detrimental to my interests.
(DIR) Post #AkZ6pVRLGqfVHoE20e by sun@shitposter.world
2024-08-02T18:50:50.169701Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@azonenberg @alan @mapachin I understand it doesn't personally affect you (or me) but just that I don't want it to exist by the time I get around to threatening some big business's profits and become interesting to them.
(DIR) Post #AkZ79u7vCBm5dtrsrg by azonenberg@ioc.exchange
2024-08-02T18:53:38Z
2 likes, 0 repeats
@sun @alan @mapachin The point of the post I thought you were commenting on (sorry) was that I'm far more concerned about corp than gov surveillance.My own country's spooks aren't (on paper) supposed to be spying on me. Foreign spooks probably don't care as I don't think I'm a national security threat to anyone.But corps have a fiduciary duty to data mine everything they can learn about me to serve their bottom line. usually to my detriment.
(DIR) Post #AkZ7B2YbKyi04utBAW by sun@shitposter.world
2024-08-02T18:54:44.572988Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@azonenberg @alan @mapachin I understand, I was being rude and kind of derailing and I apologize.
(DIR) Post #AkZ7vlCnfTcHsDyAtM by mischievoustomato@rebased.taihou.website
2024-08-02T19:03:09.743580Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
considering your lifespan, it'll still exist anyway
(DIR) Post #AkZuoJSjJTgZYaUzwm by clacke@libranet.de
2024-08-03T04:10:32Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@PhilSalkie @azonenberg I used to work at an automobile safety company where some of the products were things like automatic lane-keeping. I didn't work directly on the products, I was there to fix their build system.They were working on full autonomy, and in theory had it, but were working under the assumption that nobody will allow fully autonomous cars on the roads until they are 10× safer than human drivers, and that wouldn't be happening until 2030 at the earliest.
(DIR) Post #AkZuvEaLqPgcSSMdt2 by clacke@libranet.de
2024-08-03T04:11:52Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
They were struggling with things like "we have to pass this certification, but if we optimize for stopping for the fake child, we will be worse at stopping for a real-world child". They were taking the ethical issues seriously.Then Musk suddenly went and released fully autonomous driving while pretending that's not what he was doing, bypassing legal issues and safety issues and putting all blame on the human driver. It was *worse* than what other companies had, and from what I gather it is *worse* than human drivers, not better, and certainly not 10× better.At this point I am not convinced that autonomous cars will ever be safer than humans. Certainly not autonomous cars built by commercial companies competing in a time-to-market race to the bottom. Anyone taking safety seriously will be out-competed.It's just move fast and break things plus deadly traffic incidents.@azonenberg @PhilSalkie
(DIR) Post #AkZvKvyBgAHmFglfhg by clacke@libranet.de
2024-08-03T04:16:31Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
To make truly safe and effective autonomous cars, I believe the traffic environment has to change, to accomodate the cars. Special markings, signage, separation, etc. In the end, human drivers will have to be banned.At some point in this transition, we might as well have gone for more efficient rail-bound PRT instead of trying to fit automated traffic into our made-for-humans, mixed-with-humans traffic environment.@azonenberg @PhilSalkie
(DIR) Post #AkaBfTNclicyvkTuU4 by azonenberg@ioc.exchange
2024-08-03T04:21:17Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@clacke @PhilSalkie Autonomous vehicles in closed environments like rails or tunnels are completely plausible, but I don't see them ever being viable in the general case especially in the kind of lower density / rural areas I spend a lot of my time in.Last time we had a major snow storm, the public works department ran out of road-closed signs to block off all of the steep hills they lacked the manpower to plow. There's zero chance of them ever getting the resources needed to make and maintain robot-readable markings everywhere.What we're going to get in the meantime is half-baked solutions made by the same people who think LLMs are going to replace human writers and scientists and who knows what else.And who are running it all on hardware built by the lowest bidder without any effort put into reliability.It is indeed "move fast and break things". The cars are moving fast and they're breaking things.
(DIR) Post #AkaBo5NlMS236oeYq0 by clacke@libranet.de
2024-08-03T07:20:53Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
> As a passenger, I feel safer when the driver has FSD engaged.@PhilSalkie But you do want the driver?@azonenberg
(DIR) Post #AkaiOh4DvMOiwd0uKO by forthy42@mastodon.net2o.de
2024-08-03T13:19:04Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@azonenberg @clacke @PhilSalkie A lot of data for roads and autonomous cars should be in a public accessible GIS. What speed is where, where are road construction sites, what has been plowed and what not (updated in realtime by the snowplow and the weather radar, which knows how much snow is coming down).Trying to drive an autonomous car like a human does is silly.However, since humans driving kill thousands each year, self driving has a low bar. If 10 times better, it's good enough.
(DIR) Post #AkaiOhfnfeSIpAautk by clacke@libranet.de
2024-08-03T13:23:54Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
If 10 times better, it's good enough.@forthy42 I agree, but currently it's not even better, but people still use it. Because they can.@PhilSalkie @azonenberg
(DIR) Post #AkaiOkMPgBjL9uXyb2 by claudius@darmstadt.social
2024-08-03T12:32:08Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@azonenberg I'll buy the privacy respecting electric car immediately! If I needed a car tomorrow, I honestly wouldn't feel comfortable buying anything on the market right now, because of the way telemetry and logging works in all cars 😕
(DIR) Post #AkalKCij6u8FWvVeGe by lnxw37j1@gnusocial.jp
2024-08-03T13:53:46Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@clacke Yet another area where you should write something about your background and ideas / perceptions in a long-form, longer lived, searchable format.
(DIR) Post #AkalKDUEGI85uFjaJE by clacke@libranet.de
2024-08-03T13:58:34Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@lnxw37j1 I prefer to hint at my origin story, and then you can exaggerate it in your own mind through no fault of mine. 🤣
(DIR) Post #Akc6X5mUVw0hy6DW5I by forthy42@mastodon.net2o.de
2024-08-03T14:44:21Z
1 likes, 1 repeats
@clacke @azonenberg @PhilSalkie One of the dangers of computerizing anything is that people overestimate the capability. The computer told us, so it must be correct.