Auto 2.0 Self Driving Vehicles

[FoMoJo]

I'm not sure if the world is ready for self driving vehicles.  However, it seems that they're just around the corner.

Interesting article.

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/business/autos/ford/2018/11/15/ford-rolls-out-self-driving-vehicles-business-strategy/1991678002/

Ford: We're doing more in Auto 2.0 than you think

Ford Motor Co. delivered a message to skeptical investors wanting answers about its Auto 2.0 strategy: We're doing more than you think.

They outlined how Ford thinks it can make money on those cars once they launch, how the research they've done in Miami has changed how the vehicles operate, and how that research will be applied come 2021 when Ford plans to launch self-driving service in multiple cities.

"The world doesn't understand how much progress we've made," Ford CEO Jim Hackett said in an interview Wednesday in Miami. "The world doesn't see smart. I've got to kind of get you to live in it. It's come a long way."

Ford plans to spend $4 billion over the next few years building those vehicles and the business model it will run them through to make money. Ford has been secretive about its self-driving vehicles and future plans, much to the displeasure of the investment and analyst community...more

[Payman]

Yeah, well "smart" still doesn't know how to handle snow.

[FoMoJo]

Yeah, well "smart" still doesn't know how to handle snow.

I guess that's why they're doing their testing in Miami.

[12,000 RPM]

After hearing Hackett's Planet Money interview, I'm worried for Ford.

[giant_mtb]

Yeah, well "smart" still doesn't know how to handle snow.

That's fine with me.  Means we get to keep driving our own vehicles longer.

[FoMoJo]

Something else to consider...Are self-driving cars the brothels of the future?

A new study from the universities of Surrey and Oxford liken autonomous vehicles to Amsterdam's Red Light District

Self-driving cars will become the brothels of the future. So say two academics from the universities of Surrey and Oxford, professors Scott Cohen and Debbie Hopkins, predicting that autonomous automobiles will replace "hotels-by-the-hour" rooms as the no-tell-motels of the Digital Age.

The study also envisions other paradigm shifts, such as budget travellers sleeping in their cars while travelling overnight between cities rather than using airline travel and/or staying in hotels. The authors — Cohen teaches tourism and transport at Surrey, while Hopkins is a research fellow in Oxford's Transport Studies Unit — also wonder if guided tours ("coach trips," as they're called in Old Blighty) might become a thing of the past as the aftermarket supplies third-party "tour" software to augment the experience of a car that already drives itself.