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Comment by laweijfmvo | Hacker News Reader

What seems odd to me is that hardly anyone in SF seems to want them there (citizens, officials) yet it keeps getting pushed through?

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I’m in SF and want them, my friends want them - we aren’t represented by the local media or reactionary politics.

Same with doordash as an earlier example, endless articles about how terrible doordash and Uber are while a large percentage of people in SF use it.

Everyone I know in SF is excited it's really only the officials and some news stories. The wait list to join the App is crazy long demand outpaces the number of cars they have on the road. You're just seeing a very skewed narrative.

I guess we hang in different circles because I don't know anyone who supports them.

You hang in NIMBY circles for sure then.

I'm not in SF, or even inte US - but the view I get from the internet reading stories, posts and comments is that only people in the NIMBY community really gets to voice their opinions in SF.

I'm not sure how one would go about substantiating that "nobody wants them there". It's hard to get the pulse of it outside of the media bubble which tends to be tech-negative.

I'm so excited for them to come to Seattle!

There are many people that want them! There are even more than want 90% cheaper Ubers.

Wouldn’t get your hopes up on it being 90% cheaper—typically Waymo cost the same or slightly more than Uber for me. Obviously the economics change as time goes on but I doubt they will make it that much cheaper.

> but I doubt they will make it that much cheaper.

All other tech has gotten 10x cheaper across 10 years. No reason to doubt robotaxi fleets won’t as well.

Without the need of a driver, cars will increasingly be offered as a rental service rather than an ownership object. In a good month, the only expenses I pay for my car is gas, which is 150-200 USD. Do you think driverless car services will somehow be immune to the pressures every other rentier model (actual rent, SaaS, Netflix, etc etc etc) succumbs to?

> All other tech has gotten 10x cheaper across 10 years

Well that’s flat out not true, EVs aren’t 90% cheaper than they were 10 years ago.

I'm in SF and I welcome them. Human drivers are much worse.

You're just seeing the loudest folks who are the most extreme, not the actual mean opinion.

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