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Uber sets self-driving battle at permission, not existence

techcrunch.com

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Re: Uber sets self-driving battle at permission, not existence

#11

Post by Animats »

m0nty wrote: post #8

So Uber are on course to make a huge (multi-billion dollar) loss this year, and on top of that they choose a course of action which could lead to jail-time, might kill someone, and result in massive civil liability. They also make autonomous vehicles look like a half-baked kludge with no real place on the roads and might even cause some regulators to ban them indefinitely. Brilliant.

They're on course for having a car pulled over, the cop asks for their self-driving permit (SFPD probably has briefed their people on this by now), they don't have it, the driver is arrested and the car gets towed to the impound. Routine enforcement.

If it's an accident, it's much worse for Uber.

Re: Uber sets self-driving battle at permission, not existence

#12

Post by peterbonney »

This is ridiculous analysis. If Uber loses (or wins) this DMV "permission" battle they don't magically win the "existence" battle. The state never forfeits its right to challenge whatever it wants to challenge, whenever it wants to challenge it. And if the state loses in court it can even change the law and fight again - no private entity has that power.

To the extent Uber is doing something clever, it probably has something to do with avoiding having to spend $150 for every entity or person that wants to buy a self-driving car and rent it out through Uber. It is certainly not that they have found a brilliant way to sidestep a legal battle with regulators.

Re: Uber sets self-driving battle at permission, not existence

#13

Post by scarmig »

I genuinely do not get Uber's strategy here. Even once self-driving cars are mature, they'll occasionally screw up and sometimes kill someone. And Uber's cars are so incredibly far from mature that operating without legal cover is... just insane. If they kill and hit someone, Kalanick is easily portrayed as a ready-made movie villain. Wantonly ignoring state and local laws in the hopes of getting ahead of the pack, sacrificing the life of cute little toddler Adam to the altar of Mammon?

And it's really not just portrayed: Uber'll deserve any and all punishment thrown at them for this, up to and possibly including the shut down of the company and criminal charges for the people who did this. And Uber'll be setting the cause of self-driving cars back years, maybe even a decade.

This is all incredibly obvious too, and I don't think Uber folks are idiots. Maybe they're getting desperate, and they're willing to eat the risk of the company being destroyed because their business strategy for survival is sensitive to getting to production-ready self-driving cars a year earlier than they would have otherwise?

Re: Uber sets self-driving battle at permission, not existence

#15

Post by MBCook »

Kiro wrote: post #3
cjensen wrote: post #2

Genius? If you hurt someone on the road by doing something explicitly illegal which you have been explicitly warned against doing, you are looking at massive financial liability to victims and potential involuntary manslaughter charges against executives. TechCrunch's suggestion that this is the thin edge of a wedge to get to do self-driving without regulation is preposterous. There is no future reality in which the…

It's about the public's perception as well though.

Public perception:

In the first day their cars were caught running red lights on film. Either the cars are faulty, or cars and the human drivers for 'just in case' are faulty.

Oh, yeah, they've been turning across bike lanes illegally too, the kind of turn that causes most bike accidents with cars in California. They were told about this problem before launch and LAUNCHED ANYWAY. That's another thing they've asked their human drivers to take over for (you know, the ones who ran the light).

Honestly, if someone's job is to sit in an Uber for 6 hours and watch for the car to make a driving mistake... that's a lot of fatigue. They're going to get comfortable and miss A LOT of stuff.

Uber needs a huge slap for this whole thing. They're being very reckless.

Re: Uber sets self-driving battle at permission, not existence

#16

Post by wheelerwj »

scarmig wrote: post #13

I genuinely do not get Uber's strategy here. Even once self-driving cars are mature, they'll occasionally screw up and sometimes kill someone. And Uber's cars are so incredibly far from mature that operating without legal cover is... just insane. If they kill and hit someone, Kalanick is easily portrayed as a ready-made movie villain. Wantonly ignoring state and local laws in the hopes of getting ahead of the pack, s…

This has nothing to do with self driving cars. What is likely gking go happen in the future though is fines will be substantially higher.

Re: Uber sets self-driving battle at permission, not existence

#17

Post by Animats »

rhino369 wrote: post #9
sharemywin wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Although to me there's a big difference between "innovating" on bureaucracy and ignoring "public safety"

Yea the laws uber broke were mostly bad regulations that nobody cared about and ultimately didn't harm anyone (other than in a competition harms incumbents). But beta testing their cars on real streets could lead to disaster. Even from a non-legal PR risk perspective, it's dicey. If one of these things runs over a cute kid, the attempt to skirt the law will backfire. That said challenging the law isn't necessarily sk…

Like minimum wage laws. Right.

Re: Uber sets self-driving battle at permission, not existence

#20

Post by [deleted] »

scarmig wrote: post #13

I genuinely do not get Uber's strategy here. Even once self-driving cars are mature, they'll occasionally screw up and sometimes kill someone. And Uber's cars are so incredibly far from mature that operating without legal cover is... just insane. If they kill and hit someone, Kalanick is easily portrayed as a ready-made movie villain. Wantonly ignoring state and local laws in the hopes of getting ahead of the pack, s…

[deleted]
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