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Waymo Via

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Re: Waymo Via

#61

Post by cryptoz »

Uhhrrr wrote: post #51

Are they selling this? If not, why waste effort making a page for it?

You see HN comments all the time telling startups to put up a page before their product is ready. It's super common advice. Here are a few offhand reasons I can suggest it's not a waste even if the product is not for sale.

Marketing. Lead times for delivery contracts are probably long. Expanding your marketing, making your target audience aware of the product ahead of time, is useful. It makes future sales cycles easier, as your potential customers may already know about your new product.

Hype. Self-driving cars and trucks already have lots of hype, but not usually for the big 18wheeler delivery style. Waymo may need to increase not just awareness but also excitement.

Testing for product-market fit. While a purchaser won't make a decision based on this page alone, Waymo can make some decisions and learn some things based on people's reactions to this.

I could keep going, there are thousands of reasons that making a page for a product or service not yet for sale can be a good idea and not a waste.

Re: Waymo Via

#63

Post by ska »

umeshunni wrote: post #31
justicezyx wrote: post #11

Everyone (Pony.ai started trucking as well) is converging to trucking as the canonical use cases. Let's see how this affect the existing self-driving firms.

In hindsight, trucking seems on the more obvious usecase for autonomous vehicles rather than daily commutes or ridesharing. 1. Most time spent and miles driven are on freeways rather than city streets. Last mile can still be done via human drivers meeting at an off-freeway ramp hub. 2. The cost and availability of labor is a significant damper on trucking. Remember during the oil boom in Alberta, Canada, how truckers…

> In hindsight

In foresight too. This has been part of the conversation since the very beginning; pointing out that the most likely initial targets for "real" commercial use at scale was long haul trucking, with people for either end. Usually predicated by heavy machinery in places like mines, where variants are already done.

Re: Waymo Via

#64

Post by silvestrov »

BigBubbleButt wrote: post #55
gretch wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can already do this to humans pretty much just as easily, I just need some orange cones Then what? You have 20 palettes of dog chew toys or asian pears....? Some of the goods have serial/tracking numbers. The reason people don't rob 18 wheelers or trains is because it's not a good criminal enterprise

I have not thought much about robbing trucks before, but I disagree this is the same as a manned truck. I think it's much more like the difference between robbing a house that is empty and a house while the owners are home. Most burglaries happen when nobody is home. Why would trucks be any different? Besides that, it is (likely) easier to trick an unmanned truck into stopping as OP mentioned. A person would easily r…

The problem is not doing the robbery itself. It's doing it again and again and again without being discovered/traced.

Serial killers have it easy: they can bury the body. You can't bury goods you need to fence. At some point there will be a pattern.

Re: Waymo Via

#65

Post by BigBubbleButt »

silvestrov wrote: post #64
BigBubbleButt wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have not thought much about robbing trucks before, but I disagree this is the same as a manned truck. I think it's much more like the difference between robbing a house that is empty and a house while the owners are home. Most burglaries happen when nobody is home. Why would trucks be any different? Besides that, it is (likely) easier to trick an unmanned truck into stopping as OP mentioned. A person would easily r…

The problem is not doing the robbery itself. It's doing it again and again and again without being discovered/traced. Serial killers have it easy: they can bury the body. You can't bury goods you need to fence. At some point there will be a pattern.

I'm not saying robbing trucks is easy. I'm saying if I were to choose between robbing a manned truck vs an unmanned truck, I would definitely rob the unmanned truck.

Re: Waymo Via

#66

Post by throwaway55554 »

ckmiller wrote: post #41

I competed in the DARPA Urban Challenge, back in 2007. While we were watching the finalists trying to sort out the world's first fully-automated traffic jam, the conversation turned to how easy it is to manipulate these vehicles. Imagine a remote stretch of highway frequented by automated 18-wheelers. All that's required to bring the truck to a screeching halt is a bedsheet and some decent timing, at which point the…

Trucks are usually stolen and not unloaded in the middle of the highway. The theft is then alerted to law enforcement including weigh stations.

Re: Waymo Via

#67

Post by SigmundA »

ckmiller wrote: post #41

I competed in the DARPA Urban Challenge, back in 2007. While we were watching the finalists trying to sort out the world's first fully-automated traffic jam, the conversation turned to how easy it is to manipulate these vehicles. Imagine a remote stretch of highway frequented by automated 18-wheelers. All that's required to bring the truck to a screeching halt is a bedsheet and some decent timing, at which point the…

Two things I don't get in the current focus on self driving:

1. Urban navigation. Obviously the end game, but just exit to exit interstate navigation would be a much better near term goal and greatly benefit truck drivers along with anyone doing a road trip.

2. Unmanned. I would think it would be a long time before you would have unmanned trucks going down the highway. Seems much more obvious to have a driver / custodian in the truck for the foreseeable future until everyone is very comfortable with the reliability of the tech and its ability to cope with situations like you describe. Meanwhile for truck drivers to get around mandatory rest periods due to self driving assistance would be a huge win for the industry even if they are still manning the truck.

Re: Waymo Via

#70

Post by qntmfred »

quaquaqua1 wrote: post #33
dangus wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that Bloomberg and Yang share any sort of common philosophy is laughable.

That's awkward, why did Yang tweet and go on TV saying how awesome Bloomberg's operation was?

Is it not possible for Yang to acknowledge the scale and capability of Bloomberg's operation without it being considered an endorsement of some kind??
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