Live data from Hacker News

When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

medium.com

81–90 of 95 posts

Re: When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

#81
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're very right. At a quick glance, this thing is going to need power, probably from the car battery. You don't want it to catch fire and kill the occupants, so there's going to be R&D in power supplies, material etc, along with regulation and testing.

Sure, if there never was something before hooked to a car battery. Or if the material would have to be kryptonite. $86 Million is just a way way way to high number for such a project. Of course the 57 lines here won't do it in production and I acknowledge a certain need for R&D but this number is just too high.

Reading plates is likely a small fraction of overall costs. Consider, with 220 people cars in a trial your going to need someone to write a manual / answer help desk questions / etc. which have nothing to do with the actual device but do add costs.

As to the device it needs to do more than just read licence plates. It must compare them with something which means it needs to get over the air updates for a list of licence plates. So, now you need some back end system to get important lists of licence plates from various other systems. As to the device, how much coverage does it get aka does it need multiple cameras.

And on it goes.

Re: When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A knife in the hands of a psycho is much more dangerous than you might think. If he's at close enough range a shooting reaction is correct.

You don't need to shoot to kill. You only need to disable a attacker, not kill him. "German Police shoot a knife wielding man in the leg in self defense" https://www.liveleak.com/view?i=cfe_1440199540&comments=1

Anybody that shot a handgun at the range will tell you that hitting a small moving target like a leg is not a guaranteed shot even by an experienced shooter (add stress, low visibility etc and this becomes even trickier).

If you come at cops with a knife I think it's "reasonable" they shoot you. What is not reasonable in the case of US cops is that they seem to shoot even non dangerous people and get away with it.

Re: When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

#83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A knife in the hands of a psycho is much more dangerous than you might think. If he's at close enough range a shooting reaction is correct.

You don't need to shoot to kill. You only need to disable a attacker, not kill him. "German Police shoot a knife wielding man in the leg in self defense" https://www.liveleak.com/view?i=cfe_1440199540&comments=1

This is also very true, and it makes a difference.

Re: When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

#84

Any project in a heavily regulated environment is not measurable that way. The cost comes from compliance, audits, paperwork. Trials, PoCs, etc. You also need to prove security and a long term lifecycle for the solution. Those open source packages - are they being updated? Who validates patches? etc etc. Those are moats, once you're able to deliver the above, you're set for a long time. Good luck!

Oh come on. Not all heavy-handed regulation would pass a cost-benefit analysis. Nor does it cost 80 million to run some POCs and QA on a project like this. At nearly 400,000 AUD per vehicle, the question should be what better opportunities to help people did the Australian Govt pass up in order to engage this project?

Once you start taking into account audit and recordkeeping requirements, you will quickly run into that figure.

Re: When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

#85
post #14

Any project in a heavily regulated environment is not measurable that way. The cost comes from compliance, audits, paperwork. Trials, PoCs, etc. You also need to prove security and a long term lifecycle for the solution. Those open source packages - are they being updated? Who validates patches? etc etc. Those are moats, once you're able to deliver the above, you're set for a long time. Good luck!

You're very right. At a quick glance, this thing is going to need power, probably from the car battery. You don't want it to catch fire and kill the occupants, so there's going to be R&D in power supplies, material etc, along with regulation and testing.

Or you know, make the software for smartphone?

Re: When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

#86
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Tuttle? His name's Buttle. There must be some mistake." "Mistake? Ha ha, we don't make mistakes." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OalIW1yL-k

But the bureaucrat(?) did say "Buttle".

Well I don't want to spoil the movie. Brazil is worth a watch.

Re: When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't need to shoot to kill. You only need to disable a attacker, not kill him. "German Police shoot a knife wielding man in the leg in self defense" https://www.liveleak.com/view?i=cfe_1440199540&comments=1

Anybody that shot a handgun at the range will tell you that hitting a small moving target like a leg is not a guaranteed shot even by an experienced shooter (add stress, low visibility etc and this becomes even trickier). If you come at cops with a knife I think it's "reasonable" they shoot you. What is not reasonable in the case of US cops is that they seem to shoot even non dangerous people and get away with it.

And yet UK police don't tend to shoot people with knives.

Re: When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

#88
When reaching 90% completion, like an MVP, those remaining 10% will take much longer. I also get angry when tax money is seemingly being wasted. What should you do though ? Offer to do it for free ? I'm a developer and I like building stuff, I do not like selling stuff. Thankfully there are people that actually like selling, so I suggest finding such a partner and be prepared to spend five years completing the last 10% and hopefully make some money.

Re: When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

#89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A knife in the hands of a psycho is much more dangerous than you might think. If he's at close enough range a shooting reaction is correct.

You don't need to shoot to kill. You only need to disable a attacker, not kill him. "German Police shoot a knife wielding man in the leg in self defense" https://www.liveleak.com/view?i=cfe_1440199540&comments=1

Shooting is using deadly force. Shooting a suspect to intentionally avoid fatal wounds is a TV myth (most episodes of Quinn Martin's "The FBI" ended in this way, for example).

Every LEO in the country is taught to shoot only when deadly force is necessary and to shoot for the center of mass (and continue shooting until the suspect is down).

Shooting with intent only to inflict an immobilizing but not-life-threatening wound is inherently wrong and has been held actionable by the courts. If the LEO had the luxury and time to even consider such a tactic, then aim and fire, then by definition no innocent life was in imminent danger, and therefore the use of deadly force was excessive.

And if you take another look at your source, you'll see that there is no stated intent to only wound the suspect in that German case.

A good study of such situations is the Massad Ayoob book In the Gravest Extreme.

Re: When an experiment with existing technology does a “good enough” job

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh come on. Not all heavy-handed regulation would pass a cost-benefit analysis. Nor does it cost 80 million to run some POCs and QA on a project like this. At nearly 400,000 AUD per vehicle, the question should be what better opportunities to help people did the Australian Govt pass up in order to engage this project?

I think the point was that the costs are justified by the burden of meeting regulatory requirements, not the benefit of the regulation.

That is understood. My point was that this kind of spending on a project like this should beg the question, "what better opportunities did govt pass up to engage this project," rather than responding w/ complacency; i.e. 'that's just the cost once you factor in compliance.'
Post reply on HN