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Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

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Re: Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

#291

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Are you seriously suggesting that protesting is an execution worthy offense?

Not at all. But getting run over is certainly the reasonably foreseeable consequence of your actions. It’s not victim-blaming to suggest that people are ultimately responsible for their own safety, and they ought to take precautions.

Re: Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

#292
post #189

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> Cars with remote summons features today basically just crawl forward a few metres to help you get out of a parking spot. Smart summon on a M3 (what the article is talking about) can back out and navigate parking lots... although horribly and slowly. But it's not just a straight line.

One time someone did this in a Costco parking lot from 2 rows away from me and my parked car. It pulled out of its spot 3 spaces away from my car, started doing a u-turn that would've had it hit my car in order to drive through the row of parking spots. I was standing in front of my car wondering where the eff the driver was (obviously it was smart summon but in the heat of the moment...). Lots of families go to Cost…

when someone in a car hits a child they do not go to jail

Re: Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

#293

I think the personal freedom and privacy implications of self driving cars with centralized communication are rarely talked about. What happens when your vehicle decides you can't travel to an area of civil unrest (for your safety), or refuses to drive you to the gun store?

GM cars have phoned home for well over a decade now. Self driving features tend to also be extra optional features that cost more.

So what? People can choose to have connected vehicles if they want. I choose to avoid them and the newest gm vehicle I have owned was a 1997 Saturn. My personal choices and decisions are a product of my values and beliefs, and I intend on avoiding the potential for remote intervention as long as possible.

Re: Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

#294
post #284

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While I agree with you 100%. High level self driving is impossible on a technical level too imo, there's too many aspects of human perception, processing, and intuition that aren't possible to emulate or account for in, what machine learning really boils down to, a statistical model. There will always be novel situations that you can't simply math your way out of that a human could navigate effortlessly.

Córy Doctorow wrote a collection of short stories (or a single short stories with a variety of smaller chapters - depending on how you look at it) called Car Wars - https://craphound.com/news/2016/11/23/car-wars-a-dystopian-s... It was originally hosted http://this.deakin.edu.au/culture/car-wars though is no longer available there. https://web.archive.org/web/20170105065118/http://this.deaki... has it. As much as the…

I'm gonna check these stories out!

I'm with you on the seeing the sausage made. I work in software development and algorithm research (though in a completely unrelated, but much better funded and cutting edge field) and the idea that we're anywhere close to truly level 3 autonomous driving, let alone 4 or 5, is laughable.

I love technology enhanced features, like radar cruise control, lane detection, etc. But only as extra sensory input for the driver, not replacement.

Re: Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

#295
post #287

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The "main issue" is that Tesla is even able to assist the bailiffs in this manner. If a remote party can, by design, lock you out of your car and take control of it without your consent, do you even really own the vehicle in the first place? Others have argued "well, you don't own the car, the bank does", but unless Tesla is somehow unable to do this with cars not owned by a lienholder, that's kinda beside the point…

I agree with you, but he same is true for physical keys. A car dealership can create a working key to steal/repossess your car in much the same way. We really need to move to strong crypto.

If you don't own the car outright, why would an entity with a lien on the vehicle not also have access to such "strong crypto" legally? This is an issued with a secured loan, presumably in a crypto world the repossession would be allowed by "smart contract" if the borrower defaulted.

Re: Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

#296

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Ha. Though my guess is, once self-driving is reliable enough to do that, the economics of car ownership are going to flip completely. It won't make sense anymore to have a car that spends most of its time sitting unused in your garage.

People keep saying this, but I don't get it. The majority of your possessions spend most of their time sitting idle. Even if I just look at the higher value ones: my riding lawnmower gets used for a couple of hours every few weeks, my garden tractor/snowblower even less frequently, then I've got a trailer, a truck, miscellaneous tools, etc. I could rent every single one of these, but don't because the economics don't…

The lynchpin in these arguments is that you'll somehow be able to summon a vehicle on a moments notice and all your usage will still be less expensive than personal ownership. The cost will be low because no humans are involved...

Except it didn't work for ZipCar or the rental agencies that have added hourly options -- sure it's not bad, but is it really pushing people out of car ownership? No...

Ride sharing similarly hasn't worked to push people out of car ownership either -- it's just killed traditional taxi services by compensating drivers less and eliminating the flag down monopoly some cities have maintained (a taxi medallion in Boston/NYC used to be worth hundreds of thousands... no one wants them now)

All these share options work for low use scenarios like the city dweller who wants a weekly trip to a shopping center, but for the daily commuter/driver it won't ever make sense... and it'll never make sense for those that need to keep things in their car like child seats, diapers, a walker, tools, etc...

Bike/Scooter shares haven't eliminated personal ownership either because of the scarcity issue at peak times.

Re: Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

#297
post #198

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I'm pretty strongly of the position that high levels of self-driving are impossible for artificial intelligences to attain, because they're built by corporations. Driving is VERY risky, and involves an irreducible assumption of both risk and liability on behalf of the driver. Humans are natural risk-takers. Corporations are not; and any artificial intelligence a corporation produces is always, at some level of meanin…

From Tesla's release of their full self-driving beta and its performance in a recent CGP Grey video where it successfully navigates the most dangerous road in America[1] I think a lot of people are going to have to eat their hats on this stance very soon. I consider myself bullish on this tech, and I have worked closely with autonomous robotics, but I didn't expect it this soon. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d…

I own a Tesla and it's the best car I've ever owned. However, the FSD software is garbage, I'd sooner trust a drunk human over the Tesla FSD any day of the week.

Re: Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

#298
post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "main issue" is that Tesla is even able to assist the bailiffs in this manner. If a remote party can, by design, lock you out of your car and take control of it without your consent, do you even really own the vehicle in the first place? Others have argued "well, you don't own the car, the bank does", but unless Tesla is somehow unable to do this with cars not owned by a lienholder, that's kinda beside the point…

I agree with you, but he same is true for physical keys. A car dealership can create a working key to steal/repossess your car in much the same way. We really need to move to strong crypto.

In my mind there's a significant difference between a dealership using their knowledge of the car to assist with repossession, and a manufacturer demonstrating that you never really had control of your own car in the first place.

It just feels like a betrayal. Your car is loyal to the manufacturer, not to you. It will act in a manner directly opposed to your best interests as the owner if company that sold it to you orders it. I understand that's true for most software these days, but that doesn't make me any happier about it, and it really feels worse when the software in question is inextricably tied to and in control of an expensive piece of physical hardware that you purchased.

Re: Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

#299
post #228

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No, there are consumer protection laws in most, if not all, states that require a period of notification and discussion prior to repossession. When a car is repossessed it should never be a surprise to the "owner."

With respect, I've seen the suprise element happen too often for it to be considered rare (possibly different country, different legalities, but still, it's a global company. Mail goes to the wrong address, e-mail ends up in spam (looking at you, Google), a pin code is lost, meaning you need time to identify yourself or etc etc etc and you're basically lucky or not as to you you're dealing with as to how it gets reso…

I agree that I should not have used the word "never" in my comment. Thanks for pointing that out. Perhaps "unlikely" would be better. You are correct that sometimes stuff just happens, but after volunteering with a financial counseling program, I do think most people know when they have stopped making payments and most banks make lots of calls and send several letters before they go grab the property. There are exceptions of course, such as third tier used car dealerships which push the laws to the limit to make the repossession happen as quickly as possible. Sadly, people with the most fragile financial situations are much more likely to deal with the most predatory lenders.

Many people living on the edge financially are so stressed that they have trouble prioritizing things in what would seem to be a logical choice to someone on the outside. What is often not understood is that honest (and early) conversations with lenders can frequently lead to adjusted terms to help people get through a difficult period. Without that conversation, they lose transportation access which leads to reduction in job opportunities, and then the whole thing starts to spiral. Very difficult.

Re: Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

#300
post #232

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There was _a_ conspiracy, or at least Wikipedia refers to it as such: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_consp... . That is to say, there's enough there to suggest that this wasn't the free market answering solely to consumer demand.

Regardless of whether or not there was a conspiracy, I think the last 100 years of private vehicle ownership in the US have shown that solely due to the convenience, it would have happened anyway.

A bad equilibrium is still an equilibrium. That is not evidence that there aren't better ones.
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