Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars

#291

Post by dwaltrip » Sat, Apr 15, 2017, 5:49 PM UTC

repsilat wrote: post #285

komali2 wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, did the first word processor you use allow collaborative working on documents available anywhere with an internet connection, constantly backed up to Dropbox servers?

Sure, the internet makes our lives a lot better, but Wordpad sticking regular .rtf files in a vanilla Dropbox folder would provide 80% of the benefit. Realtime same-file editing is convenient, but it's pretty minor really.

It was actually very useful at my last company. We used it in many different kinds of meetings. I think it will pave the way to some interesting collaborative software in the future.

Re: Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars

#292

Post by eddieh » Sat, Apr 15, 2017, 5:54 PM UTC

repsilat wrote: post #254

ghshephard wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My 12th grade computing science instructor (who was admittedly horrible) said that she didn't see much of a future programming computers, because pretty much all of the computer programs that were required had been created, and all that was left was to improve the speed, size of documents allowed, and maybe add a few extra features. This was in Spring, 1987.

And, funnily enough, the word processing tool most often used in my office (Dropbox Paper) is slower, less suited to long documents and has fewer features than the first word processor I used. Still, you can't expect your teacher of 30 years ago to foresee "the future is emojis". People just want different software every few years, because fashion is fickle there's a natural feeling that old stuff is out of date. Sla…

Dropbox has a word processor? My god, Google's offering is bad enough and I hate when coworkers inflict it on me. I hope nobody discovers the Dropbox one.

Re: Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars

#293

Post by charlesism » Sat, Apr 15, 2017, 6:41 PM UTC

georgespencer wrote: post #287

charlesism wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering they need to answer to, try to communicate with, and rely on, a bunch of Computer execs, and moreover execs primarily interested in the project for financial reasons... that's a list of 17 employees who are at high risk of burning out. Like Steve Zadesky before them: http://businessinsider.com/apple-steve-zadesky-quits-2016-1 Re: the Tesla names (biased article, but fun): http://marketwatch.com/story/elon…

> Considering they need to answer to, try to communicate with, and rely on, a bunch of Computer execs, and moreover execs primarily interested in the project for financial reasons... that's a list of 17 employees who are at high risk of burning out. The profile of Jonathan Ive in the New Yorker last year made it pretty clear that he was interested in the car because he hates his car. But tbh: car manufacturers are pr…

Part of me wants to rebut your points, but the tone is a bit of a bummer. Life's too short.

Re: Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars

#294

Post by dmix » Sat, Apr 15, 2017, 7:01 PM UTC

ewalk153 wrote: post #288

selectodude wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Car companies sell plenty of cars in Chicago, New York, Toronto, Boston, Montreal, Minneapolis, Philadelphia, Detroit, Denver, Baltimore, and Pittsburgh.

Exactly! And Montana is a safe place to develop the tech in a lower density/risk environment.

It is not necessary for them to operate at full Montana conditions to have a successful initial business. The nice thing about machine learning is that it gets better and better as more data is collected.

So the rational path here is to launch in moderate temperature areas with beta software and eventually refine the tech to operate in adverse condition areas.

Pushing or expecting perfection from the beginning is how thousands of products have died before launching.

The best way to do product development is getting it out of the door as early as possible (in a reasonably safe state) with a competent subset of early adopter users and if possible in an idealized environment/use case. From there you expand and heavily capitalize marketing.

This is what Facebook did when they launched in Harvard and restricted it to only Ivy-league schools. Before slowly expanding to other universities and then the public at large. They called it the bowling pin strategy.

"If your project doesn't experiment first your entire project will be an experiment" - Joe Armstrong (creator of Erlang)

Re: Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars

#295

Post by dmix » Sat, Apr 15, 2017, 7:03 PM UTC

wsinks wrote: post #284

komali2 wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most major cities in the world? All those major cities that don't get snow and icy roads? Major cities like Chicago, new York, Moscow? Any big city in northern Europe? What about Canada? I think the snow question is a good one.

18-30 million people in Moscow... That's a big market!

Facebook succeeded for years by starting with Ivy league schools before expanding to other US universities, then all western mainstream users, then expanded internationally.

Expecting them to get it right everywhere at launch time is a bad idea.

Re: Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars

#296

Post by dmix » Sat, Apr 15, 2017, 7:06 PM UTC

Tepix wrote: post #280

awalton wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dear falcolas, If you really need to understand why car companies will not take your advice, you should look at their sales numbers. Car companies don't sell many cars in Montana. They sell a lot of cars in urban concrete jungles and suburbs like those that exist in California and basically every major city. Solve one major city (especially one with hills like San Francisco), and you've likely solved most major citie…

US cities are easy. Try Naples, Italy.

They can try Naples after they make a billion dollars in US cities. That's always how this stuff works. I've learned that the hard way living in Canada kilometres from the US but having totally different timelines for access to technology. Sometimes it's out of company ignorance but sometimes it makes sense from both a business and marketing perspective.

Re: Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars

#297

Post by dmix » Sat, Apr 15, 2017, 7:08 PM UTC

rsync wrote: post #276

Waterluvian wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes! Come to Canada and try out your tech. California is so soft.

God it is so true. There's such an amazing cultural comparison to be made between I-70 over Vail pass (in Colorado) and I-80 over Donner pass in California. Vail pass rarely closes and is open for vehicle traffic in blizzard-like conditions - but you're on your own. You'd better be well prepared and be the competent driver of a well-maintained, capable 4WD vehicle. And so, in a blizzard, Vail pass will be nearly empt…

This comment gets made in every single self driving car thread. These companies are full of the smartest engineers in the world. They know conditions are different outside of California. But that doesn't mean they shouldn't be focused on California right now.

Re: Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars

#298

Post by username223 » Sat, Apr 15, 2017, 7:10 PM UTC

andai wrote: post #223

andai wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

hahahaha

Since I can no longer delete this, I'll just say, I genuinely thought it was a joke! Is there a way to express appreciation of humor on HN without getting down voted? (Obviously 'lol' / 'haha' are looked down upon here)

For what it's worth, it was intended as a joke, and I didn't vote on your comment either way. If I appreciate someone else's joke here, I'll usually just upvote it.

PS -- If anyone actually does this, e.g. by strapping an old SGI Indy and its 90s webcam to their ride, please post photos here!

Re: Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars

#299

Post by godzillabrennus » Sat, Apr 15, 2017, 7:14 PM UTC

falcolas wrote: post #262

Dear Car Companies: If you would really like to advance the state of the art for self driving technology, I invite you come up to the mid-west, especially in the winter months, and make your toys work under those conditions. Working up here will push your technology quite far, with snow, slush, worn away lane markers, cold temperatures, wind, potholes, washboard roads, ice, clogged sensors, blocked GPS, and any numbe…

Did you see the Ohio transportation bill that just passed?

Kasich proudly mentions he signed it to create barriers to driving automation.

There are parts of the Midwest that are more inhospitable to driving automation than just the weather.

Re: Apple receives permit in California to test self-driving cars

#300

Post by snovv_crash » Sat, Apr 15, 2017, 7:18 PM UTC

true_religion wrote: post #202

snovv_crash wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not worried about their technical capabilities. I'm worried about a company culture that blames the customer when the product is misused or doesn't meet industry standards in some way. Things they have gotten away with in the phone and computer market will kill people in the automotive market.

Not meeting industry standards, with respect to cars, is illegal . Mis-using vehicles while operating on the road is illegal . Cars are far more tightly regulated both for end-users and for manufacturers.

What I'm getting at is that Apple likes to restrict their devices to work very well in the narrow designed use case, and make the non-designed use case very cumbersome.

However, people use cars across broad use cases. Some just commute, but some drive in snow, some need to ford small streams in emergencies, some need to install roof racks, and some want car-seats for infants.

I don't see Apple designing for broad use cases, because it isn't in their culture. And that will be a problem, because cars are not toys that you can choose not to use without large consequences.