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George Hotz cancels his Tesla Autopilot-like ‘comma one’

electrek.co

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Re: George Hotz cancels his Tesla Autopilot-like ‘comma one’

#151

Post by DanBC »

6stringmerc wrote: post #142
BurningFrog wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you read the letter, it's a lot more than "answering a few questions". He gets two weeks to provide an enormous amount of detailed information about the product, I assume under threat of legal consequences if any of it contains an error, interspersed with lots of reminders that they can and will close down his business if they feel like it.

Yeah it seems a lot of the community here thinks that if he just threw together a few bullet points in an email response the NHTSA would sit back, say "Okay, great have fun!" and not, you know, make a big deal out of it. I, uh, disagree.

I more thinking "why the hell doesn't he have the answers already?"

Re: George Hotz cancels his Tesla Autopilot-like ‘comma one’

#152

Post by msane »

web007 wrote: post #135
msane wrote: post #101

I'm just amazed at what a bad name that is. "Comma One" ... Did they never think that it would be called the The Coma One after even the slightest inevitable incident? Or that a segment of people will be innocently misspelling it as "Coma" everywhere? and how quickly it could catch on? It's so obvious it seems almost Freudian ...

It's not a great name, but I'd give him the benefit of the doubt and assume it's "all things AI". Think classification language, like "Car, Self-Driving". They could be "Car, AI" and "Assistant, AI". Less charitably, it's step one toward Tres Commas.

I can imagine overhearing the mass market consumers: "Oh, the name is inspired from classification language ... "

Re: George Hotz cancels his Tesla Autopilot-like ‘comma one’

#153

Post by stale2002 »

mikeash wrote: post #44
daveloyall wrote: post #34

The commenters on that twitter thread are critical of geohot for "rolling over easily". I don't think we should presume that the guy who defied Sony, AT&T, Apple, and the DCMA is doing any such thing. Maybe he discovered a flaw in the design of comma AI or something.

Then maybe he should have said so. Criticizing him based on his own description of why it's canceled is entirely reasonable. He got a letter from the NHTSA and immediately said he was done because he didn't want to deal with it. He's either rolling over for them or he's lying about his motivations, either way it's not good.

Well, it is not really cancelled. He's moving to China.

Re: George Hotz cancels his Tesla Autopilot-like ‘comma one’

#154

Post by 6stringmerc »

jacquesm wrote: post #143
6stringmerc wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look, I don't want to belabor the point but a laundry list of shit to submit isn't as easy as copy-paste from one document to another unless you don't actually care about answering the question and want to get mired in back and forth of "more information needed" or "answer unsatisfactory" when the only grading criteria (NHTSA) is behind closed doors. A lot of people here are assuming just by turning in "some answers"…

You're missing the point entirely: knowing that somewhere down the line you will have to have answers to questions like these is an integral part of releasing a bunch of software and a device to transform a regular car into a self driving car if you are serious about the project in the first place. If this list surprises you then you probably shouldn't be in the self driving car business.

No, you are. I'm pointing out that documentation that is satisfactory to a large bureaucratic entity is not as simple as the majority of the chorus here seems to think. I think it's perfectly reasonable to expect a company selling a public product to undergo scrutiny, sure, and I can sense that his operation is - probably wisely - thinking they're not robust enough to satisfy the hurdles.

That doesn't mean his product is shit or dangerous. It just means that the incredible amount of time and effort required to respond - and still without any guarantees that's the end of the inquiry - may be a huge time sink and a distraction from the primary objective of product development.

I've worked in many fields with entities from local, county, state, and federal RFPs/RFIs/SOQs/etc and even if you're the best in the business and have proof it's not always easy to patch it together in a format desired in a timeline that's desired and call it done.

Re: George Hotz cancels his Tesla Autopilot-like ‘comma one’

#155

Post by mikeash »

stale2002 wrote: post #153
mikeash wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then maybe he should have said so. Criticizing him based on his own description of why it's canceled is entirely reasonable. He got a letter from the NHTSA and immediately said he was done because he didn't want to deal with it. He's either rolling over for them or he's lying about his motivations, either way it's not good.

Well, it is not really cancelled. He's moving to China.

He said "The comma one is cancelled." I interpret the followup as being that they're doing other products and doing those other products in other markets. Maybe he just meant they'll do it in China instead, but I can only go off what he says here.

Re: George Hotz cancels his Tesla Autopilot-like ‘comma one’

#156

Post by oldmanjay »

Analemma_ wrote: post #46
idlewords wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just outsiders who take this view.

I was hoping you'd show up in this thread ;) It's definitely not just outsiders as you (and I) can attest; I went with that line of argument to try and convey some sense of urgency about the problem. It's easy to dismiss internal dissent about SV libertarian groupthink as not important, but "outsiders" have the potential to bring the party to an end if they collectively get really grumpy about what we're doing. I tho…

Here's something I always wonder about humans; Why is it only groupthink when you disagree with it?

Re: George Hotz cancels his Tesla Autopilot-like ‘comma one’

#158

Post by abduhl »

jtmarmon wrote: post #97
patcheudor wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not mission critical, rather life critical. I've worked on several life critical systems as a security researcher, helping to develop controls in tightly controlled environments to keep people safe. Work on software controlled switches in industrial machines mostly. As I've followed these developments and those of Google and Tesla I've been wondering at times if I live in some alternate universe. The level of diligen…

i understand where you're coming from, but there is a counter argument to what you're saying, which is that although there may be some dangers to things like the comma one and tesla autopilot, their release may save more lives than they edanger, having a net positive to humans. humans are pretty bad at driving

This is an ends justify the means argument. How many lives have been saved TO DATE with self driving cars? How many lives will be saved IN THE FUTURE with self driving cars?

What is the acceptable casualty rate to get from where we are now to where you think we will be in the future. Is your family an acceptable casualty? If not, then why is mine?

Re: George Hotz cancels his Tesla Autopilot-like ‘comma one’

#159

Post by mikeash »

hartator wrote: post #120
gavman wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. The NHTSA memo seems extremely reasonable to me. If you're going to put to market a product where the smallest malfunction could easily kill many people (both those using your product and those around them), answering a couple regulation questions seems like a small hurdle to pass. Nothing here is saying "we want to shut you down", it's saying "we want to make sure you pass the most basic safety standards".…

I feel $21,000 fine per day sounds pretty like "we want to shut you down". He never presented comma.ai as an autopilot but as a very smart line assist and adaptive cruise control.

The fine is only if they fail to provide the requested information by the deadline given. The information requested is not that great and the deadline is entirely reasonable, so the fine is very much not "we want to shut you down," just "we want you to provide this information."

Re: George Hotz cancels his Tesla Autopilot-like ‘comma one’

#160

Post by scott_s »

BurningFrog wrote: post #131
Analemma_ wrote: post #16

He's currently throwing a temper tantrum on Twitter, and all because the NHTSA wanted to ask him a few questions about the product (you can see it here: https://www.scribd.com/document/329218929/2016-10-27-Special... ). Like, how dare the government try to have basic standards for multi-ton hunks of metal hurtling down the highway without human input. I've been trying to convince people lately that Silicon Valley isn…

If you read the letter, it's a lot more than "answering a few questions". He gets two weeks to provide an enormous amount of detailed information about the product, I assume under threat of legal consequences if any of it contains an error, interspersed with lots of reminders that they can and will close down his business if they feel like it.

I don't see a problem with that. In fact, I want government regulators to do that. He should have anticipated this process, and been working with them since the beginning.
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