Without a doubt, they are using this to collect data for a self driving car algorithm.
Google will soon let Pixel phones double as dashcams
191–200 of 258 posts
Re: Google will soon let Pixel phones double as dashcams
#192Earlier quoted context omitted.
The simple answer is that backup cameras are required by regulation for safety, whereas dashcams don't increase safety.
Reversing cameras don't increase safety on my cars, because I still turn my head and use the mirrors. Old habits die hard.
Which is why the car will likely have other sensors that yell at you when you are trying to back out and a small object or person is in your blind spot. My backup camera can just see more than I can from the drivers seat, because it is on the very back of the car, which is very useful when my small hatchback is constantly dwarfed by megatrucks on all sides in every parking lot.
Re: Google will soon let Pixel phones double as dashcams
#193Earlier quoted context omitted.
Dashcams should 100% be required in every car. Too many accidents are a he-said-she-said situation, sometimes without any impartial witnesses.
Better driver training and education is what should be required first. Seeing people on the road makes me think most people don't know about the physics of tailgating or speeding. When I grew up in Germany it was the ADAC driver training, a half day of driving on a long and wide patch of road almost like an airport apron, and doing different manoeuvres and exercises that made me a much much more humble (and slow) dri…
America chose to build itself around cars, which makes it politically untenable to put any non-trivial gate in front of driving, which is why you can pass a half hour "test" once at 16 and be set for life, even as you approach dementia. It's even worse now, because even if we succeed at making automobiles not a necessity for average life, a huge subset of the american population believes they are a core part of their identity.
Re: Google will soon let Pixel phones double as dashcams
#194Earlier quoted context omitted.
Google is in no way interested in traffic safety and that's the reason I despise them for playing around in this field. For example, they encourage active use of the phone while driving by asking you to report and confirm/deny reports of "speed traps". It's similar to Tesla tinkering with self driving and using everyone around us as beta testers.
So what are you implying here with the quotes on "speed traps"? There are very real speed traps on roads, and they endanger drivers in exchange for generating ticket revenue.
One, it's insane to ask drivers to input data while driving.
Two, these are not "speed traps", they are simply officers on the side of the road. These officers are doing a public service looking for cell phone users, and for aggressive speeders.
Re: Google will soon let Pixel phones double as dashcams
#195Wonder if they'll use the footage for streetview or AV training data.
Seems like it would be pretty heavy data usage pushing all that video up over the mobile network.
Pixels have built in "AI" engines or whatever. Maybe they do preprocessing, only store relevant stuff, and then upload when you get back on wifi.
Re: Google will soon let Pixel phones double as dashcams
#196Earlier quoted context omitted.
So what are you implying here with the quotes on "speed traps"? There are very real speed traps on roads, and they endanger drivers in exchange for generating ticket revenue.
> There are very real speed traps on roads, and they endanger drivers in exchange for generating ticket revenue. Not if you drive the speed limit or less. Google endangers drivers (especially other drivers) by implicitly encouraging rapid deceleration at one of these "traps".
Actual speed traps cause rapid deceleration on purpose. There will suddenly be a speed limit sign that is very abrupt or very low or both.
A cop with a radar gun in a normal stretch of road with a reasonable speed limit is not a speed trap.
Though even for """speed traps""" that are just enforcement, if there is a big difference between the average speed and the speed limit then there's probably something wrong with the road design.
Re: Google will soon let Pixel phones double as dashcams
#197Hm, let's see: Do I want to wear out the flash memory in an $800 phone, or get a $150 dash cam? This comment applies to Android phones that wouldn't let this thing write to a micro-SD card, of course.
One problem is that virtually all dash cams use the same sensor that kind of sucks. You're usually not able to make out people's license plates.
My dashcam was priced like a new iPhone but the recording quality is superb, licence plates of a car 10m away is clearly readable.
Re: Google will soon let Pixel phones double as dashcams
#198Don't phones get really hot if you record video for long periods of time? Edit: Whoops - the article mentions that.
I've been curious about why that is, surely it's just pumping data from the camera sensor, through a hardware-encode unit, then straight to flash?
Thermally, mobile phones are not rated or designed for constant work. They want to do stuff only like 1 out of every 10 seconds and are designed to dissipate heat that way. At least the way I understand it. Even if there was nothing being done to the raw frames from the sensor, which hasn't been the case for a while, it's likely the processor would have to do other stuff to manage the resources.
Re: Google will soon let Pixel phones double as dashcams
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
Now they can collect not just yours, but also other people's license plate movements and facial recognition. It's great producing eyes for Google everywhere - which is why the Ring was worth a billion $ for Amazon.
Just found out that my Pixel 7 has, so deeply hidden I don't find it again easily, a check box limiting / allowing access to car data. I didn't turn it on... Well, there is a long weekend coming up, maybe if I find time despite the huge home project backlog to install CalxyOS, I hate it that I cannot trust my phone to not spy on me and my activities despite everything being turned of. After all, some settings changed…
Since the main reason not to use grapheneOS is that it only supports Pixels and you already have one, you might also consider it. Install feels almost suspiciously easy coming from the likes of cyanogenmod.
Re: Google will soon let Pixel phones double as dashcams
#200Earlier quoted context omitted.
Reversing cameras don't increase safety on my cars, because I still turn my head and use the mirrors. Old habits die hard.
You would still have a major blind spot if a child or small animal is directly behind your car. The NHTSA estimated it would save over 70 lives per year (an underestimate), which is invaluable considering the small cost.
True, although I already check behind/around my car before I set off.
I appreciate the motivitions of those who think technology is the answer to accident prevention but now you are discouraging people from developing proper safety habits ("I don't need to check around my car because the cameras/sensors will tell me if I'm going to hit something") and then one day a sensor fails or they are driving a car that doesn't have this technology.
I already see this with my wife who has those little blinker lights in her side mirrors that warn if a car is next to you when you are changing lanes. She doesn't really look anymore, just makes sure the lights aren't blinking. I always turn my head and look; I don't trust the sensors and I also set my side mirrors to cover the typical blind spot.
https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a15131074/how-to-adjus...