Uber's Self-Driving Truck Company Completes A 120-Mile Beer Run

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Now this is the kind of self-driving car story I think we can all get behind! In fact, if self driving technology never progressed further than delivering food and beer, I'd be cool with that.

If you're in Colorado and grab a can of Budweiser, it's possible that you might be sipping beer delivered by Uber's autonomous truck company. Today, Otto confirmed that on October 20th, it "completed the world's first shipment by a self-driving truck," a delivery that involved transporting 2,000 cases (or 51,744 cans) of Bud from Fort Collins, Colorado to Colorado Springs along Interstate 25.
 
Can't wait til I read about the first hijacking of a beer truck using a computer, from the comfort of your Lazy Boy recliner, while watching your favorite NHL team.
 
A self driving 80,000 pound big rig. I don't fucking think so.... I'm all for technology, but one day one of these things will go all Skynet and shit and wipe out 100 people in the biggest accident Leroy ain't never seen before.

Lock that thing down on rails (as in make it a train) or something.

Given the potential for mass carnage, sounds like a good project for Hadley-Watson.
 
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I give up. You people are hopeless. No matter how hard I try to keep your head over the dinner table you're still desperately trying to duck under it.
 
This can't come soon enough. I've mentioned before that my dad owns a trucking company and the one major problem he has is the drivers. The many are crooks.

Heck, a prior (fired for hauling illegal loads on the side) driver may be going away because he snuck into the yard and glued all of the locks, and turned the refrigerating unit to heat in an attempt to spoil the load. Not too bad you say, he also went the extra mile of slicing the brake lines in a way that would cause them leak while in transit. Attempt murder much? Dumbass did all of this after passing through a few cameras and with a GPS unit on his own rig (for his new employer). This comes after making death threats as well in prior conversations.
 
thats one weirdo... there are million + good truck drivers that make an honest living. i'd like to see one of these handle jackknifing during a storm accross an expressway.
 
oROEchimaru said:
thats one weirdo... there are million + good truck drivers that make an honest living. i'd like to see one of these handle jackknifing during a storm accross an expressway.
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It won't, the company behind the "self-driving technology" had to spend several weeks mapping the route, determining the ideal time when there won't be much traffic and give it a police escort just to get it to drive on the highway. It also still needed a human to merge and exit and drive the non-highway portion.
 
Options:

635789907572142925-38831165_studying.jpg


or

ostrich-head.jpg
 
What happens if Otto deflates? Does someone have to blow him back up through his "inflation tube"?
 
The logistics companies will probably come up with a hub to hub system where self-driving trucks will only go from A to B and use contract drivers to take it from there after arrival to deliver the cargo at the destination.
 
SLee said:
It won't, the company behind the "self-driving technology" had to spend several weeks mapping the route, determining the ideal time when there won't be much traffic and give it a police escort just to get it to drive on the highway. It also still needed a human to merge and exit and drive the non-highway portion.
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Thats practical for testing and impractical for the future except that most cross country semi work is done off hours and most local stuff during office hours.
 
Wierdo said:
Options:

635789907572142925-38831165_studying.jpg


or

ostrich-head.jpg
Click to expand...




Problem is that even if everyone does the first image, not everyone will achieve the same results. Some people are dumb as rocks, full on mental retardation, others are above them but far below average, and we have everything in between. A world where the prospects of people that are not mentally more gifted is diminished because no one values their labor in our capitalistic world is not a good one. And the answer to "try harder" or "be smarter" is not a solution because there are attributes in this world beyond financial resources and connections that contribute to the fates of men.



And this is why... we need some form of universal basic income to tide us over until we can CRISPR our way out of relegating hundreds of millions of the less gifted behind in modern society.
 
tybert7 said:
And this is why... we need some form of universal basic income to tide us over until we can CRISPR our way out of relegating hundreds of millions of the less gifted behind in modern society.
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I only agree to the concept of a basic income if the work is being done by automation. It's a deliver system on which people share in the profits of automation. However, without automation, I cannot agree to it. I do feel the inevitable conversation is going to be brought up sooner than later. So, this is definitely something that will need to be discussed.

We exist as a society that's on the cusp of a new market. We are no longer going to develop labor as work, as that is going to be mostly automated. Sure, there's going to be some types of labor that cannot be automated and those jobs will be in high demand. It's still not going to be enough to sustain a whole class of people.

I don't fear the Automation Age, I fear the people fighting it. They are going to fuck over a whole class of people in trying to adhere to an old way of life.
 
I think people need to worry about the impact of TPP on jobs far more than automated trucking or taxis or buses or trains or planes, combined.
 
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twonunpackmule said:
I only agree to the concept of a basic income if the work is being done by automation. It's a deliver system on which people share in the profits of automation. However, without automation, I cannot agree to it. I do feel the inevitable conversation is going to be brought up sooner than later. So, this is definitely something that will need to be discussed.

We exist as a society that's on the cusp of a new market. We are no longer going to develop labor as work, as that is going to be mostly automated. Sure, there's going to be some types of labor that cannot be automated and those jobs will be in high demand. It's still not going to be enough to sustain a whole class of people.

I don't fear the Automation Age, I fear the people fighting it. They are going to fuck over a whole class of people in trying to adhere to an old way of life.
Click to expand...


I don't think we can or should fight the coming age of increasing automation, but the libertarian notions that we can just rely blindly on the free market fairy and shift all the people displaced by the coming changes, or that everyones skills and talents are ever going to be valued as much as others is a fantasy that will lead to a more dystopian future. There is a much lower premium on lower skilled manual labor than there used to be aside from a smattering of "dirty" jobs that few people want to touch. The notion that people will find other things to do for gainful employment has worked and will continue to work... until it doesn't. The biggest flaw of libertarian thought is the presumption that because something has worked across certain time scales that the same model can be applied in all scenarios with the same result. I'd love for that to be the case, but if it's not it would be useful to come up with some contingencies so we can achieve some better social cohesion.

This comical depiction of a pc master race looking out at the desperation of the console peasantry has parallels in the automation world if things become as bleak as some of us fear.


maxresdefault.jpg



Will things get that bad? Probably not, but it's still worth looking for ways of boosting those that are not so gifted up a little higher if we can.
 
Find it hard to believe USDOT knew about this.


Regs for trucking are considerably tighter than cars.
 
Verge said:
Find it hard to believe USDOT knew about this.


Regs for trucking are considerably tighter than cars.
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psst, I know a guy who knows a guy who is above the law. You need to find this place where a little money goes a long way. It's called Washington, DC.
 
jpm100 said:
psst, I know a guy who knows a guy who is above the law. You need to find this place where a little money goes a long way. It's called Washington, DC.
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There are trillions of dollars that don't want self driving trucks, completely aside from the safety fears.


Truck drivers make up 2.5% of our entire workforce. Yikes
 
jpm100 said:
I think people need to worry about the impact of TPP on jobs far more than automated trucking or taxis or buses or trains or planes, combined.
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Agree, some tidbits coming out every once in awhile about open borders when the Dems get elected again. Canada has already dropped the Visa requirement for Mexicans wanting to work the farms. So I guess the next thing you will hear before the election by the Democrats is that the Mexicans are crossing into the US illegally to get to Canada.
 
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