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Comment by JabavuAdams | Hacker News Reader

Who did the industrial design on these cars? What's the target market?

I love the tech, and I love the goal, but I might refuse to ride in one of these just because they look too retarded.

EDIT> This may seem frivolous, but I see it as a huge barrier to adoption. At least make them look cool, not like preschool toys.

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>Who did the industrial design on these cars? What's the target market?

No one did the industrial design. It isn't a product, it is a prototype to test a technology.

Right, but someone had to create that image, even if it's CG. The image itself is a liability to the eventual product's marketing.

> retarded

Not to derail, but I'd avoid using language like this if you want to be taken seriously.

That's one way of looking at it.

OTOH, some of the smartest and most successful people (at creating products) that I know express themselves like this. So ... tolerance works both ways. Don't flip the bozo bit based on a word -- there are many cultures on the internet.

EDIT> Your suggestion is prudent, but I don't want prudence and inoffensiveness to suck the life out of my communications, leaving only a dry passive-voiced husk.

Nobody likes a self-righteous censor, I get that, but I'm just being honest with you: it comes off as lazy and juvenile without really helping your case.

I'll try to be more tolerant...

The design is very much intentional. A huge barrier to adoption for self driving cars is perception of safety; Google wanted a car that looks safe not dangerous.

It looks like a kindergarten toy. Perhaps they should have made it look like an Escalade if they were going for the perception of safety?

Perception of safety... to other drivers on the road. This is a research prototype, there is no target consumer yet. The main goal is having a car that people will feel comfortable seeing driving itself on the street, not buying, yet. So, "toy car" is what they should be going for, at this point ;)

I guess I'll go with the default assumption that people at Google are smart. What worries me is that a company as smart and as experienced as DEKA could produce something as geeky as the Segway. Don't want to see Google afflicted by the same nerd-blindness.

an escalade is pretty shit as far as safety goes. it's an active danger to other road users and a magnet for rollovers.

The car pictured is one that drives Google employees from the parking garage to the front door, if memory serves. It's not for sale to consumers.

Ok, that makes more sense. If I were at Google, I'd still be very upset about those images being disseminated, as that design will likely provoke ridicule among the mass market.

Kind of the same way that a Segway is neat tech, but riding one is a defacto declaration that you don't care how goofy you look. Not good marketing.

As a prototype, Google want their cars to be instantly recognizable, not just 'another car'.

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