5 ms·

One of my favorite tech articles of all time involved this guy. He was showing off the self driving capabilities of his framework and took a reporter out on a d

by p0wn 4y ago

One of my favorite tech articles of all time involved this guy. He was showing off the self driving capabilities of his framework and took a reporter out on a drive. Everything went well and while they were wrapping up the interview the reporter said "Well I bet you're just driving around all the time hands free, it must be amazing" and Hotz says "Oh well I just got it working this morning". Classic. I love it. My kind of engineer.

daniel-cussen 4y ago
RcouF1uZ4gsC 4y ago
That kind of attitude is great for editor or compiler or game development. It is absolutely the wrong attitude for self-driving cars or anything that is safety critical.
- 1980phipsi 4y ago
  To be fair, he was recently in the news saying self-driving cars are a scam. https://cleantechnica.com/2022/10/09/george-hotz-autonomous-cars-are-a-scam-connected-cars-may-be-the-new-thing/ https://cleantechnica.com/2022/10/09/george-hotz-autonomous-...
  - panick21_ 4y ago
    Self driving car companies, not cars are the scam. And he has been saying the same thing for years.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - jeffbee 4y ago
    "I am a charlatan and therefore this whole industry is a scam" does not have great logic to it.
  - collegeburner 4y ago
    "I couldn't get this working so nobody else can either". Classic gifted kid response to failure tbh.
  - thepasswordis 4y ago
    >autonomous cars are no closer to reality today than they were 5 years ago Why do people keep printing things like this, which are objectively wrong? I have had a completely autonomous waymo come to my location, pick me up, and take me to another location. That didn't exist five years ago, it does exist now. How is this not "closer" than it was 5 years ago when it literally exists now, and didn't exist then?
    - cjbgkagh 4y ago
      I think it’s the hard parts are still just as hard.
    - jerojero 4y ago
      I don't really know the state of the art in self-driving. But it might very well be that it wasn't the technology that changed in these past 5 years but the regulation around it as incremental changes were made to regular cars which have led to regulators consider that the technology was, after all, safe enough for these use cases. Not that the technology hasn't improved, but with these things there might be many factors involved that might answer the question "why we have this today and not 5 years ago".
    - Barrin92 4y ago
      because that's like arguing that because you can now climb your way up a tree which you couldn't do five years ago you're closer to climbing to the moon. Self-driving is still incredibly limited and progress is often overstated because people make headway on some tiny issue. A thing I always liked for people who think progress is rapid, this is Germany in the 1980s where Ernst Dickmann had autonmous cars drive thousands of miles: https://youtu.be/_HbVWm7wdmE https://youtu.be/_HbVWm7wdmE
      - thepasswordis 4y ago
        What? No, it would be like if somebody said "some day we will travel to the moon", and then after the Apollo missions there were articles being published that said "we are no closer to traveling to the moon than we were 5 years ago". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHdKm0kW4l0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHdKm0kW4l0 This is a video of a person riding in a fully self driving car.
  - jocker12 4y ago
    This is not news. He is saying that for at least two years now - https://reason.com/video/2020/02/24/george-hotz-fully-self-driving-cars-are-a-scam-and-silicon-valley-needs-to-die/ https://reason.com/video/2020/02/24/george-hotz-fully-self-d...
- terafo 4y ago
  That's what he is talking about. There are different standards for safety for experimental planes and commercial jets. And he is much better in building former than latter.
- breck 4y ago
  Please read the details of Howard Hughes's test flights (also Winston Churchill) and realize that perhaps it's people like that who are required to make anything work. If planes were designed by safety committees we would have never figured out how to make them light enough to fly.
  - paulryanrogers 4y ago
    No one is saying people cannot experiment. We'd just not rather be the unsuspecting rats in Tesla's try-not-to-kill-too-many-pedestrians beta.
    - tim333 4y ago
      Well personally I'd rather not be any of the 1.35 million annual road deaths. It wouldn't make a huge difference to me if I was one of the 0.000001% got by a Tesla or one of the other ones. If you want to help US pedestrians you'd be much better going after SUVs and pickups https://www.webmd.com/first-aid/news/20220318/turning-pickups-suvs-pedestrians-study https://www.webmd.com/first-aid/news/20220318/turning-pickup...
      - paulryanrogers 4y ago
        We can do both. And based on interventions per mile driven I'd say Tesla's are a whole new level of danger.
- generalizations 4y ago
  > It is absolutely the wrong attitude for self-driving cars or anything that is safety critical. With your attitude, we would never have allowed cars in the first place.
- turminal 4y ago
  Compiler development is (often indirectly) safety critical too.
- wiseowise 4y ago
  You do understand that this is joke, right?
mayankkaizen 4y ago
It is funny to read top comment and then your comment. The thing you are admiring about him is the same thing top commentor is criticizing.
- PragmaticPulp 4y ago
  Comma was always riding the tailwinds of the underdog effect. When Tesla ships an autopilot on mass market cars that fails in edge cases, commenters are up in arms that it wasn’t tested to perfection in every scenario. Big companies are punished if they don’t deliver perfection. When an underdog company hacks together an autopilot proof of concept and takes a reporter for a ride with it, they’re heroes for pulling off a technical feat like that. Underdog stories will always draw applause. The challenge with a company like Comma is that they can’t maintain underdog status forever. The product is very impressive in the context of an underdog hacker success story, but outside of a few early magazine shootout wins it just can’t hang with the efforts of the big companies throwing huge budgets at their own solutions. This puts them in a difficult spot because the underdog-hacker story can’t scale forever.
  - covertBehavior 4y ago
    Is this why Argo AI (legacy funded startup from the ranks of CMU, system set them up for success) just shut down their entire company and Comma is still selling devices? No? Ok.
    - qeternity 4y ago
      I'm not sure what you think this proves, but Argo's shutdown is indicative of just how difficult driverless is. GP's comment is entirely about how Comma needs to mature beyond the hacker underdog shipping some devices to DIY tinkerers, and that's an incredibly challenging task. If anything, your comment is proof.
      - covertBehavior 4y ago
        It proves that comma is making money today by being an “underdog” while Argo never made a dime and is now out of business by being the opposite of an underdog. Would you rather be an underdog or be unemployed?

by p0wn 4y ago

daniel-cussen 4y ago

RcouF1uZ4gsC 4y ago

That kind of attitude is great for editor or compiler or game development. It is absolutely the wrong attitude for self-driving cars or anything that is safety critical.

1980phipsi 4y ago
To be fair, he was recently in the news saying self-driving cars are a scam. https://cleantechnica.com/2022/10/09/george-hotz-autonomous-cars-are-a-scam-connected-cars-may-be-the-new-thing/ https://cleantechnica.com/2022/10/09/george-hotz-autonomous-...
- panick21_ 4y ago
  Self driving car companies, not cars are the scam. And he has been saying the same thing for years.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- jeffbee 4y ago
  "I am a charlatan and therefore this whole industry is a scam" does not have great logic to it.
- collegeburner 4y ago
  "I couldn't get this working so nobody else can either". Classic gifted kid response to failure tbh.
- thepasswordis 4y ago
  >autonomous cars are no closer to reality today than they were 5 years ago Why do people keep printing things like this, which are objectively wrong? I have had a completely autonomous waymo come to my location, pick me up, and take me to another location. That didn't exist five years ago, it does exist now. How is this not "closer" than it was 5 years ago when it literally exists now, and didn't exist then?
  - cjbgkagh 4y ago
    I think it’s the hard parts are still just as hard.
  - jerojero 4y ago
    I don't really know the state of the art in self-driving. But it might very well be that it wasn't the technology that changed in these past 5 years but the regulation around it as incremental changes were made to regular cars which have led to regulators consider that the technology was, after all, safe enough for these use cases. Not that the technology hasn't improved, but with these things there might be many factors involved that might answer the question "why we have this today and not 5 years ago".
  - Barrin92 4y ago
    because that's like arguing that because you can now climb your way up a tree which you couldn't do five years ago you're closer to climbing to the moon. Self-driving is still incredibly limited and progress is often overstated because people make headway on some tiny issue. A thing I always liked for people who think progress is rapid, this is Germany in the 1980s where Ernst Dickmann had autonmous cars drive thousands of miles: https://youtu.be/_HbVWm7wdmE https://youtu.be/_HbVWm7wdmE
    - thepasswordis 4y ago
      What? No, it would be like if somebody said "some day we will travel to the moon", and then after the Apollo missions there were articles being published that said "we are no closer to traveling to the moon than we were 5 years ago". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHdKm0kW4l0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHdKm0kW4l0 This is a video of a person riding in a fully self driving car.
- jocker12 4y ago
  This is not news. He is saying that for at least two years now - https://reason.com/video/2020/02/24/george-hotz-fully-self-driving-cars-are-a-scam-and-silicon-valley-needs-to-die/ https://reason.com/video/2020/02/24/george-hotz-fully-self-d...
terafo 4y ago
That's what he is talking about. There are different standards for safety for experimental planes and commercial jets. And he is much better in building former than latter.
breck 4y ago
Please read the details of Howard Hughes's test flights (also Winston Churchill) and realize that perhaps it's people like that who are required to make anything work. If planes were designed by safety committees we would have never figured out how to make them light enough to fly.
- paulryanrogers 4y ago
  No one is saying people cannot experiment. We'd just not rather be the unsuspecting rats in Tesla's try-not-to-kill-too-many-pedestrians beta.
  - tim333 4y ago
    Well personally I'd rather not be any of the 1.35 million annual road deaths. It wouldn't make a huge difference to me if I was one of the 0.000001% got by a Tesla or one of the other ones. If you want to help US pedestrians you'd be much better going after SUVs and pickups https://www.webmd.com/first-aid/news/20220318/turning-pickups-suvs-pedestrians-study https://www.webmd.com/first-aid/news/20220318/turning-pickup...
    - paulryanrogers 4y ago
      We can do both. And based on interventions per mile driven I'd say Tesla's are a whole new level of danger.
generalizations 4y ago
> It is absolutely the wrong attitude for self-driving cars or anything that is safety critical. With your attitude, we would never have allowed cars in the first place.
turminal 4y ago
Compiler development is (often indirectly) safety critical too.
wiseowise 4y ago
You do understand that this is joke, right?

mayankkaizen 4y ago

It is funny to read top comment and then your comment. The thing you are admiring about him is the same thing top commentor is criticizing.

PragmaticPulp 4y ago
Comma was always riding the tailwinds of the underdog effect. When Tesla ships an autopilot on mass market cars that fails in edge cases, commenters are up in arms that it wasn’t tested to perfection in every scenario. Big companies are punished if they don’t deliver perfection. When an underdog company hacks together an autopilot proof of concept and takes a reporter for a ride with it, they’re heroes for pulling off a technical feat like that. Underdog stories will always draw applause. The challenge with a company like Comma is that they can’t maintain underdog status forever. The product is very impressive in the context of an underdog hacker success story, but outside of a few early magazine shootout wins it just can’t hang with the efforts of the big companies throwing huge budgets at their own solutions. This puts them in a difficult spot because the underdog-hacker story can’t scale forever.
- covertBehavior 4y ago
  Is this why Argo AI (legacy funded startup from the ranks of CMU, system set them up for success) just shut down their entire company and Comma is still selling devices? No? Ok.
  - qeternity 4y ago
    I'm not sure what you think this proves, but Argo's shutdown is indicative of just how difficult driverless is. GP's comment is entirely about how Comma needs to mature beyond the hacker underdog shipping some devices to DIY tinkerers, and that's an incredibly challenging task. If anything, your comment is proof.
    - covertBehavior 4y ago
      It proves that comma is making money today by being an “underdog” while Argo never made a dime and is now out of business by being the opposite of an underdog. Would you rather be an underdog or be unemployed?