I mean, yeah of course they do
Uber wants to turn its drivers into a sensor grid for self-driving companies
31–40 of 152 posts
Re: Uber wants to turn its drivers into a sensor grid for self-driving companies
#32> The insight driving the program, Naga said, is that the limiting factor for AV development is no longer the underlying technology. “The bottleneck is data,” he said. “[Companies like Waymo] need to go around and collect the data, collect different scenarios. You may be able to say: in San Francisco, ‘At this school intersection, I want some data at this time of day so I can train my models.’ The problem for all these companies is access to that data, because they don’t have the capital to deploy the cars and go collect all this information.”
You can’t be the CTO of Uber wanting to do AVs, and get the data collection requirement shockingly wrong.
Waymo’s bottleneck has never been data. When they want data about a school intersection in SF at a certain time of day, they just... synthetically generate it and simulate: https://waymo.com/blog/2026/02/the-waymo-world-model-a-new-f...
Waymo is able to deploy with less (but targeted and high quality) data collection by having world class simulation capabilities. Not that they haven't collected huge amounts of data as it's no doubt important (I've heard their onboard storage is transferred and emptied every few days), it's just not a bottleneck. They have the most efficient operation in the AV industry.
The best example of why data collection isn’t the bottleneck is Tesla. They boast about billions of miles of data, yet they’re struggling to put out fully autonomous vehicles.
Re: Uber wants to turn its drivers into a sensor grid for self-driving companies
#33I asked an Uber driver, formerly a taxi driver in LA, how he felt about the fact that his driving data was being used to build his replacement. He said he “didn’t care and besides what was he going to do about it anyway, it’s going to happen no matter what” I asked if he had ever heard of collective bargaining or knew about unions and he said no. I think we’re only about another generation before the only purpose for…
> I asked if he had ever heard of collective bargaining or knew about unions and he said no. collective bargaining or unions do not prevent technological progress, but merely retard it in the hopes that their members can benefit at the cost of progress for everyone else. Look at dock workers and how they tried to prevent automation with unions.
Dock workers are really the best example. We should have been automating at least a decade ago. I don’t know why folks would think unions or collective bargaining should be used to prevent automation. You will just lose on the medium to long term.
Reminds me of when dockworkers resisted the shift to cargo containers. Those ports ultimately lost business in the end.
Re: Uber wants to turn its drivers into a sensor grid for self-driving companies
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Wake me up when a serious truck or car manufacturer starts rolling them out en masse, then I might start to get worried about it I think enough people haven’t been in a Waymo to realise that the technology is basically here, and that we’re like 10 to 20 years of doubling away from AVs doing tens of millions of trips a day in America. By the time anyone has invested in true mass production of AVs, we’ll already be s…
I've been to san francisco before, it doesn't even snow there
> it doesn't even snow there
My Subaru can lane keep in a Wyoming blizzard. There isn’t some unsolved technical problem with snow for any system with radar, i.e. anyone who isn’t Tesla.
Keep in mind that like a fifth of Americans and half of humans live somewhere is rarely or never snows.
Re: Uber wants to turn its drivers into a sensor grid for self-driving companies
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
There’s no “becoming” It’s here and it’s been here for decades - it’s just finally impossible to ignore or wave away Gig workers are self-chattelizing because there is no floor to the depravity that society will accept, and an endless supply of people who will chattelize themselves for a moment of pleasure
> for a moment of pleasure The pleasure of being an Uber driver? Wouldn’t the better analogy be survival for most gig workers?
The majority of people have absolutely no foundational belief for their actions
it is simply how do I get more money sex property attention etc…
There are no monks door dashing
Re: Uber wants to turn its drivers into a sensor grid for self-driving companies
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
There’s no “becoming” It’s here and it’s been here for decades - it’s just finally impossible to ignore or wave away Gig workers are self-chattelizing because there is no floor to the depravity that society will accept, and an endless supply of people who will chattelize themselves for a moment of pleasure
> an endless supply of people who will chattelize themselves for a moment of pleasure Or perhaps they "chattelize" to survive? There's not much pleasure to be had from gig work apart from the freedom to perhaps choose your own hours and perhaps be free of a human boss. Both of which are quite the opposite of chattelizing, in the short term.
Define survival first and we can have a conversation
They have birthday parties and loving embraces in deprived ghettos that have community solidarity
The most beautiful human interactions I’ve ever seen are in the absolute most deprived poor places including when I was working in the fucking Balad hospital in 2010
Virtue does not come from work
Re: Uber wants to turn its drivers into a sensor grid for self-driving companies
#37[flagged]
Re: Uber wants to turn its drivers into a sensor grid for self-driving companies
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
> for a moment of pleasure The pleasure of being an Uber driver? Wouldn’t the better analogy be survival for most gig workers?
The majority of people have absolutely no foundational belief for their actions it is simply how do I get more money sex property attention etc… There are no monks door dashing
Are you serious? So when I drive Uber to pay rent and feed myself, it is actually because I want sex and attention?
Might want to remove the "Wizard" from your bio, it'd be far more accurate.
Re: Uber wants to turn its drivers into a sensor grid for self-driving companies
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
> an endless supply of people who will chattelize themselves for a moment of pleasure Or perhaps they "chattelize" to survive? There's not much pleasure to be had from gig work apart from the freedom to perhaps choose your own hours and perhaps be free of a human boss. Both of which are quite the opposite of chattelizing, in the short term.
Define survival first and we can have a conversation They have birthday parties and loving embraces in deprived ghettos that have community solidarity The most beautiful human interactions I’ve ever seen are in the absolute most deprived poor places including when I was working in the fucking Balad hospital in 2010 Virtue does not come from work
I won't debate the definition of survival with a "tired old" developer (oh sorry, "founder") who's idea of virtue is summed up in their own quote regarding creating yet another app for the Apple/Google chattel system:
"I rarely get to see my kids. That's a risk you have to take."
Re: Uber wants to turn its drivers into a sensor grid for self-driving companies
#40The world is heading to a very dark place!