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Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

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Re: Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

#461

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

harmmonica wrote: post #247

As a somewhat regular user of Waymo, these types of conversations seem like they're going to be more and more in the (sorry!) rearview mirror because we won't own the car nor the cameras that are recording the world as we "drive" around. That's not to say that we should give up fighting for some level of privacy even when we don't own the cars, but seems more likely that legislation would be passed that forces the ve…

> This commentary assumes self-driving cars are here to stay and become the de facto way we drive instead of driving ourselves.

This seems like an extremely myopic "tech bubble" take to me. I'm trying to find a way to put this so that it doesn't sound like an attack, but have you been to suburban or rural areas outside of places like SF, NYC or Phoenix? Being reliant on third party transportation, on roads the are often in disrepair with poor signage, is a nonstarter for probably most of the US population.

Re: Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

#462

Post by deergomoo »

try_the_bass wrote: post #367
tway_GdBRwW wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

because maybe the point is "The basic premise of democracy is that the citizens/ordinary people are trusted as the ultimate source of the law, and the law is to serve them, not them to serve the law." Nice twist to the premise at the end, but no, the point is that the person got punished for using sound and reasonable judgement in a situation where the regulation (not law) was ill thought out.

"Sound and reasonable judgement" to save a couple seconds? That still just seems like rationalization of bad behavior. You're right that the basic premise of democracy is that citizens can be trusted as the source of the law, but it seems to me that this particular citizen can't actually be trusted? I mean, they're demonstrating a lack of integrity, are they not?

You're talking about someone who, from their description, slowed down to something like 0.1mph instead of absolute zero. At 3am, in an empty road. How is that bad behaviour, lack of integrity, and a sign someone can't be trusted?

Re: Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

#463

Post by kelnos »

try_the_bass wrote: post #367
tway_GdBRwW wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

because maybe the point is "The basic premise of democracy is that the citizens/ordinary people are trusted as the ultimate source of the law, and the law is to serve them, not them to serve the law." Nice twist to the premise at the end, but no, the point is that the person got punished for using sound and reasonable judgement in a situation where the regulation (not law) was ill thought out.

"Sound and reasonable judgement" to save a couple seconds? That still just seems like rationalization of bad behavior. You're right that the basic premise of democracy is that citizens can be trusted as the source of the law, but it seems to me that this particular citizen can't actually be trusted? I mean, they're demonstrating a lack of integrity, are they not?

> That still just seems like rationalization of bad behavior.

I think the issue is that you're taking as fact that "in order to be safe, you must come to a full stop at a red light before turning right", and that not doing so is, indisputably, "bad behavior". I dispute that. I think in many situations it is just as safe to nearly-but-not-completely come to a full stop before continuing, and it's entirely fine behavior.

The law has some difficulty encoding that. (Not that it's impossible, but it's difficult, and enforcement perhaps gets weirder if you try.)

Let's take a related example: jaywalking. In many places, you can get a ticket for crossing the street somewhere where there isn't a crosswalk, or crossing against a red light or a don't-walk sign. I was taught as a child how to look both ways and only cross when and where it's safe to do so. I don't need a sign or stripes on the road to tell me that (though I do appreciate those things as hints and suggestions). Hell, in some places (Manhattan comes to mind), if you don't jaywalk, everyone around you will look at you funny and get annoyed with you.

California, recognizing this, finally eliminated most jaywalking laws a year and half ago[0]. You can only get cited here if you've failed to do what your parents told you, and you're crossing when it's not safe to do so.

Stopping fully at a red light before turning right is, IMO, similar enough. For many (most?) intersections, you're only going to be a teeny tiny fraction of a percent safer coming to a full stop. So why bother?

[0] Let's also remember that jaywalking laws exist only because car manufacturers wanted them. Walking in the street!? How absurd! Streets are only for our beautifully-produced cars! Not you grubby plebeian pedestrians. Away with you!

Re: Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

#464

Post by kelnos »

monkeywork wrote: post #319
askvictor wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Were you in that much of a hurry to not be able to wait 30 seconds for the traffic light?

That is a discussion that can be had between the offender and the police officer, also depending what you are driving (ie a motorcycle) often traffic lights may not detect you and you can be sitting there forever. Put it this way would you feel comfortable having your phone just passively watching you and anytime you break any law that is on the books it calls the cops on you? If you can see that as over reaching you…

> That is a discussion that can be had between the offender and the police officer

Once you've been pulled over, a police officer is unlikely to change their course of action based on anything you say to them. Especially in this case, of not coming quite to a full stop at a red light before turning right. The cop knows it was safe to do so. They just want the ticket revenue or to fill up their quota for the month. Or they're just having a bad day and want to harass someone who can't fight back. Or, if I'm being charitable, they're an incessant rule-follower who doesn't understand how reality works.

Re: Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

#465

Post by kelnos »

laweijfmvo wrote: post #248
mft_ wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m struggling to understand your point, or to imagine many examples which support it. I agree that brief minor parking infringements may occasionally make people’s lives more efficient; but I can’t think of any examples where traffic lights and speed limits need to be routinely disregarded?

From what I remember of my CA driver’s license test (had to re-take the written test when I moved to CA), there is no actual speed limit in CA. The speed limit is “whatever conditions deem safe”. Maybe OP meant something like that?

No, that's not true (CA driver here too). The "whatever conditions deem safe" bit is something that can reduce the legal speed below the posted speed limit. It can never raise it above the posted limit.

Even with no posted speed limit, there is an implicit limit in CA (differs based on the type of road and surrounding locale), and "conditions" can again only reduce that.

Re: Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

#466

Post by kelnos »

jdietrich wrote: post #159
rbalicki wrote: post #6

Genuine question: What is stopping some small percent of drivers from installing cameras and using ML to identify cars driving dangerously (e.g. speeding, running reds, changing multiple lanes at once, etc.), and when their license plate is identifiable, finding and informing their insurance company? If even a small subset of users did this, and insurers did something with this information, it would substantially dis…

Here in the UK, the police actively encourage the public to submit dashcam footage of motoring offences. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-64386371 https://www.honestjohn.co.uk/news/driving-1/2021-02/one-in-f...

Oof, conditioning people to tattle on their neighbors. That's never gone horribly wrong... /s

Re: Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

#467

Post by cdirkx »

chris-orgmenta wrote: post #460
threecheese wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am hoping for an urban camouflage fashion revolution as a response to more pervasive monitoring: https://www.axios.com/2019/09/07/fooling-facial-recognition-... Public access to object recognition models may be important.

Does gait recognition (and body tics / unique movement style) not make this moot? My sense is that facial recognition is a stop-gap and soon to be superseded, because the tech is there for more holistic 'reads' of a person - And that those subtle things that we humans can't see are actually plain as day and as clear as a fingerprint. If we cover our face, then the data collected on gait etc. will be more than enough.…

A couple of years ago there were news articles that the pentagon has a "lasers that can identify people in a crowd from 200m away based on their heart rate signatures".

No idea if that's true or overblown, but it doesnt seem unlikely that such technology becomes possible in the future.

Re: Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

#468

Post by kelnos »

rbalicki wrote: post #286
rbalicki wrote: post #6

Genuine question: What is stopping some small percent of drivers from installing cameras and using ML to identify cars driving dangerously (e.g. speeding, running reds, changing multiple lanes at once, etc.), and when their license plate is identifiable, finding and informing their insurance company? If even a small subset of users did this, and insurers did something with this information, it would substantially dis…

Responses here seem to not take into account: - elasticity of laws. If all of a sudden every well-to-do law-abiding doctor, engineer and lawyer gets a fine on their daily commute for speeding 5 mph over the limit, there's going to instantly be a lot of pressure to change the speed limit to something reasonable. - the amount of absolutely insane, dangerous behavior on the highways (people weaving in and out at 100 mph…

> If your car is regularly being driven by your brother at 100mph, it's still your insurance that's going to pay if he gets in an accident.

Not if your brother isn't listed as an insured party on your insurance. The insurance company will tell you to pound sand in that case. And if your brother is on your insurance, and you're paying for it and giving him a free ride, that's on you.

> And while that's sad, maybe private sousveillance is better than anarchy. People can have differing opinions.

::raises hand:: We shouldn't accept either. Private surveillance is not the solution to anarchically poor enforcement.

Re: Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

#469

Post by concordDance »

rbalicki wrote: post #263
pmichaud wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Setting aside the obvious dystopian next steps, I think the main problem with automated traffic law enforcement is that our laws are quite bad in the sense that they rely on enforcement being loose and somewhat subjective to even work at all. The speeds on various roads, the timing of traffic lights, the places one can park and for how long, etc, are not carefully planned or thought out enough to actually work if eve…

I would think that once enforcement becomes automated (and thus applies to those with resources, who currently get away with it), there would be a lot of pressure on the legislature (by those who currently get away with it) to make the rules better. Legislatures can move fast, but only when they're motivated. e.g. if every NYC taxi suddenly got a ticket every time they stopped in the street to pick up a passenger, th…

> there would be a lot of pressure on the legislature (by those who currently get away with it) to make the rules better.

Making perfect rules is basically impossible, they'd be millions of pages long to fully capture all the caveats and exceptions. The world is fractals complex and so we rely on intelligent prosecutors and police not bothering to pursue things that are illegal but fine.

It's just not worth it to try and make perfect laws.

Re: Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla

#470

Post by concordDance »

askvictor wrote: post #284
repeekad wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You clearly haven’t received a letter in the mail for $250 because a camera saw you barely not fully stop for a red light right turn at 3am with zero traffic A human in the loop needs to be the first line of defense, if an officer isn’t willing to be in the field to issue the ticket and show up in court to defend it then there shouldn’t be a ticket in the first place, full stop

Were you in that much of a hurry to not be able to wait 30 seconds for the traffic light?

Regardless of whether he can wait 30 seconds there is no good reason to impose that cost. Its just randomly making someone's life worse for literally no gain. Time is our most precious and finite commodity and should not be wasted.
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