Driverless cars run by a company protecting itself from reputational and legal risk seems less dystopian than the status quo.
>> that's cool. until it's not...same with code updates that will make cyclist life worse...you're not really their main concern
I agree and expect that the wide safety tolerances driverless cars currently have will become tighter as they gain more experience, and that this will make them more efficient but potentially less pleasant to be around than they used to be.
But even if pedestrian and cyclists lives are not a main concern for self-driving car companies, some concern is better than none. For some human drivers their concerns seem to be things like not getting arrested, getting to their destination as quickly as possible, checking social media to satisfy their boredom, and not scratching the paint on their vehicle. Some drivers consider vulnerable road users like cyclists to be sub-human [1].
My point is that the bar in the US has been set so incredibly low that even if the code updates make their products worse for cyclists than they used to be or even killing some vulnerable road users that may still be safer and preferable to the incompetence and complete indifference on the part of human drivers.
Having said that, the same calculus may not apply in countries that don't issue drivers a license to kill people, so the bar for driverless cars is likely to be much higher in such places.
[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S136984782...
If Waymo hits a cyclist which leads to death, and Waymo is found to be at fault, that's definitely going to make headlines and potentially lead to a pause of the entire operation.
These regulators should be supported and kept clear of regulatory capture. Other countries can do this, so should the US.
And not sure why you think running stop signs or any anti safety measures would increase profits.
Like banning them altogether following a public outcry? That is the mechanism to hold them accountable.
Also in individual cases it will be very easy to sue them for accidents they caused or contributed to. Already is.
Where does this “no mechanism to hold them accountable” comes from?
Because this big companies like Google are actually evil. As an example the mobile YouTube app does not let you use it if you turn off the screen. So Google decided that wasting energy and killing batteries is an acceptable thing to do, this is pure evil - I would accept they adding more advertising or whatever but killing the life span of a device and wasting energy is truly evil shit.