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China just approved flying taxis – no pilot needed

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Re: China just approved flying taxis – no pilot needed

#21

Post by femiagbabiaka »

JCattheATM wrote: post #15
_kava wrote: post #11

It is both amazing and sad to see China is literally in the future compared to the US in terms of infrastructure and social development. A trip to one of the major cities in China made it clear to me that they are ahead of the world right now. The amount of tech and the level of integration are unbelievable. In comparasion, the streets of SF, one of the crown jewels of the US technosphere, are just so "normal" I find…

> social development. How are they ahead in this regard? Tech is one thing, but social credit scores and the level of censorship seem regressive rather than progressive to me.

Given that permanent residents in the U.S. seem to have lost all of their free speech rights, and citizens aren’t far behind, I think we can call that precise issue a truce for now. Definitely other human rights/freedoms we still have over them at the moment.

Re: China just approved flying taxis – no pilot needed

#22

Post by decremental »

femiagbabiaka wrote: post #21
JCattheATM wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> social development. How are they ahead in this regard? Tech is one thing, but social credit scores and the level of censorship seem regressive rather than progressive to me.

Given that permanent residents in the U.S. seem to have lost all of their free speech rights, and citizens aren’t far behind, I think we can call that precise issue a truce for now. Definitely other human rights/freedoms we still have over them at the moment.

[dead]

Re: China just approved flying taxis – no pilot needed

#23

Post by vbezhenar »

_kava wrote: post #11

It is both amazing and sad to see China is literally in the future compared to the US in terms of infrastructure and social development. A trip to one of the major cities in China made it clear to me that they are ahead of the world right now. The amount of tech and the level of integration are unbelievable. In comparasion, the streets of SF, one of the crown jewels of the US technosphere, are just so "normal" I find…

Can you tell me more? I visited Shenzhen few months ago and wasn't that astonished. Pretty normal city. Well, I was surprised about few things, like overall lack of traffic jams in the 17-million city, roads seems to be well planned, but I could just be lucky. And that's me coming from Kazakhstan, which is not exactly first-world country. Life seems kind of the same, taxi apps, map with reviews, delivery guys, etc.

Actually I'd argue that Chinese IT is slightly behind Kazakhstan, because their localization is so bad. Baidu maps does not provide English translation at all, and that seems the only proper maps for China. Most WeChat apps I tried also were Chinese-only. I'm pretty sure that every major website and application is well translated to English in my country, Chinese people seems to care very little about English, which makes it particularly hard for international visitors. I literally had to screenshot some app over and over, pasting it to Google Translate to be able to register in the some metro app, so I could actually buy tickets with app and not cash.

Also motorcycle people were absolutely crazy about road rules, like they don't care at all about anything. Auto road, pedestrian road, red light, opposite direction, anything works for them. I was seriously concerned about someone hitting me, which didn't happen, but few times it was close. Car people, on the opposite, were pretty disciplined. May be cameras don't work for motorcycles?

Re: China just approved flying taxis – no pilot needed

#24

Post by TulliusCicero »

> These vehicles are expected to redefine how cities tackle traffic congestion and pollution

Counterpoint: no they're not.

These sorts of very large drones may well become more popular, but they're not gonna become widespread enough to impact traffic congestion. The realistic target is becoming a moderately more popular version of helicopters for the sufficiently affluent.

Re: China just approved flying taxis – no pilot needed

#25

Post by stickfigure »

_kava wrote: post #11

It is both amazing and sad to see China is literally in the future compared to the US in terms of infrastructure and social development. A trip to one of the major cities in China made it clear to me that they are ahead of the world right now. The amount of tech and the level of integration are unbelievable. In comparasion, the streets of SF, one of the crown jewels of the US technosphere, are just so "normal" I find…

This seems to be a matter of preference. I feel awe when I visit charming old European cities with great walkability. "Modern" is great for aeroplanes but overrated for cities.

Re: China just approved flying taxis – no pilot needed

#27

Post by viccis »

JCattheATM wrote: post #15
_kava wrote: post #11

It is both amazing and sad to see China is literally in the future compared to the US in terms of infrastructure and social development. A trip to one of the major cities in China made it clear to me that they are ahead of the world right now. The amount of tech and the level of integration are unbelievable. In comparasion, the streets of SF, one of the crown jewels of the US technosphere, are just so "normal" I find…

> social development. How are they ahead in this regard? Tech is one thing, but social credit scores and the level of censorship seem regressive rather than progressive to me.

> Tech is one thing, but social credit scores and the level of censorship seem regressive rather than progressive to me.

I can't stress enough how you need to do your own research on this stuff. American propaganda has depicted China as a ruthless peasant state for decades, and it's only in recent years that news like this has opened peoples' eyes to the fact that that all was a cover for the fact that they've passed us in recent decades.

https://merics.org/en/comment/chinas-social-credit-score-unt...

tl;dr: The "social credit score" is mostly myth. From the article:

>By 2019, China’s central authorities were stating explicitly that they were not happy with the idea. They issued formal clarifications that scores could not be used to penalize citizens and that only formal legal documents could serve as grounds for penalties.

Compare this to the US, in which things like DUIs on your background can be used to deny you Constitutional rights. There's no nothing exceptional about how they're doing things over there when it comes to this.

Re: China just approved flying taxis – no pilot needed

#28

Post by kaycebasques »

yoyo458 wrote: post #16

It doesn't mention how much noise does it make. Even though it's electric, drones are usually damn noisy and annoying, and something of this size can't possibly be any better.

This is my main concern as well. The article [1] that perihelions linked to says that the approved vehicle is produced by EHang and the model is called EH216-S. A quick search yielded this Reddit thread [2] which suggests the noise level is 80dB.

[1] https://www.flyingmag.com/china-approves-passenger-operation...

[2] https://www.reddit.com/r/ehangstock/comments/mmz42r/for_anyo...

Re: China just approved flying taxis – no pilot needed

#29

Post by arthurofbabylon »

I’m currently in a part of the world where helicopter delivery is so cheap and common that locals are complaining. “It should be more expensive…” someone told me last autumn.

The helicopters (and drones!) are loud and annoying. Until these problems are solved, locals will resist converting all airspace into the equivalent of a loud, high-speed roadway.

Re: China just approved flying taxis – no pilot needed

#30

Post by _kava »

vbezhenar wrote: post #23
_kava wrote: post #11

It is both amazing and sad to see China is literally in the future compared to the US in terms of infrastructure and social development. A trip to one of the major cities in China made it clear to me that they are ahead of the world right now. The amount of tech and the level of integration are unbelievable. In comparasion, the streets of SF, one of the crown jewels of the US technosphere, are just so "normal" I find…

Can you tell me more? I visited Shenzhen few months ago and wasn't that astonished. Pretty normal city. Well, I was surprised about few things, like overall lack of traffic jams in the 17-million city, roads seems to be well planned, but I could just be lucky. And that's me coming from Kazakhstan, which is not exactly first-world country. Life seems kind of the same, taxi apps, map with reviews, delivery guys, etc. A…

For me, I guess it was the experience with the public transport, the cleanliness of the city, the way everything was built to interact with your phone seamlessly and automatically once you have the local apps(at the cost of privacy, I am fully aware), and the dazzling look of it all. Everything is new and shiny and feel safe. And not just the sterile kind of clean, but one that has a vibrant life under it.

Yes, the english localization is trash. But I mean, I am in China, I am happy enough they even have some english available. I speak some other Asian languages and not sure if it was obvious, but the US also have trash translation to those languages here too.

Maybe that was the biggest difference. I can read a bit of chinese so my experience was more "the way it was meant to be" I guess? I assume it can disappoint if you expect just an upscaled Western experience there. China is big enough they don't need to cater to rich foreigners. I knew the feeling well enough when I first came to the US so I am not surprised. But maybe it is a novel experience to Westerners.

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