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Robotaxis 'do not belong in the city of Los Angeles,' lawmaker says

techcrunch.com

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Re: Robotaxis 'do not belong in the city of Los Angeles,' lawmaker says

#31

Post by yowzadave »

wincy wrote: post #26
guil177 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never understood the longterm logic of protecting jobs by not using tools. Any tools goal is to reduce work.

There was a big kerfuffle in the D&D community the other day about an artist using AI art tools to augment his drawing in one of the new books. Guy had his whole process documented and just used AI as a final postprocess step. I can’t help but notice how bland the art in D&D books looks vs what I’m seeing daily on AI art groups. I’ll be glad when the dust settles as it’s really limiting what’s possible since Steam is…

The reason AI-generated art looks better to you is because it is cribbing from better (human) artists. Maybe D&D should just hire better artists directly?

Re: Robotaxis 'do not belong in the city of Los Angeles,' lawmaker says

#32

Post by gruez »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #24
guil177 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never understood the longterm logic of protecting jobs by not using tools. Any tools goal is to reduce work.

The whole point of robot taxis is to eliminate the job “driver” “Driver” happens to be the most popular job in the United States What exactly is hard to understand here?

>“Driver” happens to be the most popular job in the United States

...which still only work out to 1-2%

Re: Robotaxis 'do not belong in the city of Los Angeles,' lawmaker says

#33

Post by zip1234 »

wincy wrote: post #26
guil177 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never understood the longterm logic of protecting jobs by not using tools. Any tools goal is to reduce work.

There was a big kerfuffle in the D&D community the other day about an artist using AI art tools to augment his drawing in one of the new books. Guy had his whole process documented and just used AI as a final postprocess step. I can’t help but notice how bland the art in D&D books looks vs what I’m seeing daily on AI art groups. I’ll be glad when the dust settles as it’s really limiting what’s possible since Steam is…

Honestly, there are so many places where art absolutely is terrible. If AI generation can make higher quality art more accessible to more areas then it is a huge win.

Re: Robotaxis 'do not belong in the city of Los Angeles,' lawmaker says

#34

Post by leoedin »

edgyquant wrote: post #22
Etheryte wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really, hectic traffic and nonexistent roads aren't a superset of organized traffic and good roads. If you take a human driver from a country with hectic traffic and put them in one with organized traffic they'll struggle and vice versa, the same would hold here. Being skilled in one doesn't really help you out in the other.

This sounds like your opinion and doesn’t seem accurate to me at all.

I think the parent is right. Every country has different traffic laws anyway - but driving in a developing country is often fundamentally different.

In Vietnam the effective priority of vehicles is "biggest first". A neural net trained in that environment won't be very useful in the UK, where priority is defined by road markings and street signs.

Re: Robotaxis 'do not belong in the city of Los Angeles,' lawmaker says

#35

Post by dv_dt »

rob74 wrote: post #27
paulette449 wrote: post #8

The article infers, not unreasonably IMO, that the support for this push comes neither from citizens nor fellow lawmakers but from labor unions with whom the lawmaker (Councilmember Hug Soto-Martínez) is closely aligned. > "This has everything to do with making sure that the streets of Los Angeles are safe ... It’s also about making sure that we protect jobs" > "During the Q&A that followed, TechCrunch asked if any c…

That sounds a bit short-sighted TBH. I am all for protecting "licensed" taxis from Uber et al, but the (long-shot) goal of robotaxis is providing a level of service that can't be provided with human drivers because it would be too expensive. If using robotaxis becomes cheaper than owning a car, that would get rid of most of the cars parked 95% of the time that are clogging up streets all over the world.

It’s not clear to me that reliable autonomous driving wouldn’t instead clog up the streets with continuously roving robot taxis or parked autonomous vehicles that came from an even longer commute distance (because it’s easy to work or sleep during the robot drives).

Re: Robotaxis 'do not belong in the city of Los Angeles,' lawmaker says

#36

Post by zztop44 »

paulette449 wrote: post #8

The article infers, not unreasonably IMO, that the support for this push comes neither from citizens nor fellow lawmakers but from labor unions with whom the lawmaker (Councilmember Hug Soto-Martínez) is closely aligned. > "This has everything to do with making sure that the streets of Los Angeles are safe ... It’s also about making sure that we protect jobs" > "During the Q&A that followed, TechCrunch asked if any c…

I’m not saying that’s not true. But the push to have them also doesn’t feel wholly organic. Robotaxis feel like one of those new technologies that we’re gonna have whether we like it or not, because enough very rich people want us to have them.

And I’m not saying we can or should try to delay the inevitable either. But the people who are pushing these timelines are basically the same people who just finished up spending tens (hundreds?) of billions of dollars making the food delivery industry worse, more expensive, and probably less profitable overall.

Re: Robotaxis 'do not belong in the city of Los Angeles,' lawmaker says

#37

Post by adolph »

cameronh90 wrote: post #23
micromacrofoot wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

no way, most people have some incentive to avoid murdering another, because it will likely ruin or severely interrupt their lives - a robotaxi killing someone will result in an insurance payout, the company won’t even be shut down

We know from decades of safety research that threatening to ruin people's lives doesn't prevent accidents. All it does is make people lie about why the accident happened.

It's an ouroboros of perverse incentives: too much and people will lie, cheat and fail to stop and give aide; too little and people don't care.

Re: Robotaxis 'do not belong in the city of Los Angeles,' lawmaker says

#39

Post by zach »

I agree, robotaxis do not belong in LA, at least culturally.

The collective suffering of working-class commuters ascending and descending the income gradient on packed freeways is the thing that powers LA, like children’s screams powered the city in Monsters, Inc. Robotaxis can never replace that.

Re: Robotaxis 'do not belong in the city of Los Angeles,' lawmaker says

#40

Post by wincy »

yowzadave wrote: post #31
wincy wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a big kerfuffle in the D&D community the other day about an artist using AI art tools to augment his drawing in one of the new books. Guy had his whole process documented and just used AI as a final postprocess step. I can’t help but notice how bland the art in D&D books looks vs what I’m seeing daily on AI art groups. I’ll be glad when the dust settles as it’s really limiting what’s possible since Steam is…

The reason AI-generated art looks better to you is because it is cribbing from better (human) artists. Maybe D&D should just hire better artists directly?

Frank Frazetta is a little busy being dead right now, so unfortunately he’s all booked up.
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