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Comment by noahl | Hacker News Reader

I think the biggest news was this sentence:

    If all goes well, we’d like to run a small pilot program here in California in the next couple of years.

This is the next step in their very slow but, apparently, very steady march towards real self-driving cars that anyone can buy.

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Why buy a self driving car when you could rent one as needed?

I used public transit, taxis and car sharing services exclusively until I started a family. At which point setting up the carseat every time became prohibitively cumbersome and I bought my own car. Children's car seats are very personal in terms of size and configuration and are required by law.

I think things like that will make people want their own self driving car. You want the one that fits your wife and two kids and your dog. Or you're rich and you want to be driven around in a really nice one that hasn't been used by other people.

The more I think about it, the more I imagine rich people increasing their car ownership due to self driving cars. Take your fleet with you to the cottage or across the country, why not?

I fully agree with all of the above. I also feel that people who have the means to purchase a self-driving car will do so. The compromises necessary to make a vehicle appropriate for use by multiple users conflict with the comfort and luxury many people expect in a vehicle they spend hours each day in. Would you like to spend your hour commute each day in a bus or taxi seat when you can afford the comfort of a Mercedes, BMW or even Toyota seat?

(I have a toddler, so I drive a car with a child seat.)

I think we'll get over that attachment to specific car seats and instead more versatile seats will come into play.

In the future, I imagine your car booking app will recognise your usual bookings (e.g., solo/couple, family with one toddler, moving cargo) and you will tap a preset to book whichever car you need.

If your partner and kid are heading to a family engagement, up rolls a car with a baby seat pre-fitted and cleaned. If you're needing to move something large, a van shows up.

Those that want a premium service, will book the platinum tier, either all the time or maybe just for date night.

In NYC, at least, taxis and for-hire vehicles are exempt from car seat laws: http://www.nyc.gov/html/tlc/html/faq/faq_pass.shtml#9

I wish I could use car sharing and the baby seat issue is a problem with that. It seems easy to solve, though - I don't see why those couldn't be integrated into the cars by default. A lot of taxis already have that, they are just sometimes too lazy to take them out.

I don't know what you mean by personalized car seats - I think there are merely some variations dependent on size of the child? But car seats can grow along with the child, usually you can leave more and more stuff out the older the child gets?

Not sure why car sharing services overlook that atm - maybe because most families tend to own a car, so it is not a big market for them?

For most people who own cars, they are an extension of all their other personal space.

I want to be able to leave things in my car and not have to take them out or replace them each time I drive. My sunglasses, the car seat, old-fashioned maps. Maybe I'd like to be able to leave my potato chip wrappers in there without worrying about it, or maybe I'd like to own something where I'm guaranteed others haven't left their potato chip wrappers behind.

Cleanliness. Who else has been in this thing? Did they leave lice behind? Did they jam the window so that when I use the car, there's an annoying breeze?

Style. My car says something about me. Maybe I want rims, or to paint it with flames, or maybe just pink. What about that stereo system?

Status. My car is mine and I can afford it. Like watches, nice clothes, or big houses, it's something people desire.

Practicality. If I don't live in a city, how long is it going to take a rental car to get to me? Why not own one that sits in my driveway, so I don't have to wait for it?

There are plenty of great reasons to want to own a self driving vehicle, instead of renting them.

I think the price of a self driving car will be very high, and the price of a taxi/rental service (which will no longer have a driver) will go down, making a taxi/rental much more attractive monetarily than it is at present. To your arguments:

- storing necessities - this is probably the strongest argument that will have to be worked around

- cleanliness - is this currently a problem with taxis and rental cars? I haven't had this issue.

- style - I think this is true in certain places (I'm thinking of places like LA where there is a strong car culture) and I think is something that will change as owning a car becomes an unneeded expense. Think of it like owning a plane. Sure, it could say something about who you are, but there are cheaper ways to do that.

- status - same argument as style

- practicality - especially at a larger scale, wait times could be greatly reduced by having more taxis/rentals on the road at any given time, including in the suburbs. There still would be a lack of convenience, but I think the idea of having an expensive piece of equipment sit idle all day in your driveway for the off chance you need to use it suddenly will seem wasteful. In fact it's wasteful now, it's just there isn't a good, cheap, and convenient enough alternative to use instead. A driverless taxi/rental could be that alternative.

I predict a maximum price of $9k, but suspect the target price is $5k. For reference a SmartCar in this market (California) is $15k. Low power and a minimal interior means the main costs are the roll cage/safety features and the drivetrain. The marginal cost of the self-driving functionality is low, and Google can amortize the fixed costs very easily.

About cleanliness, taxis and rental cars are clean because there is someone there to clean it between each customer. That doesn't work for carsharing, where cars go directly from a customer to the next.

My experience with these systems is that you don't find anything really dirty in the cars, but you tend to find empty bottles and things like that in them. Not a deal breaker if you just want to get somewhere, but not very family-friendly either.

Car sharing services in Japan ask you immediately (via the navi) what the state of the car is. I imagine it negatively impacts the previous rider in some way. A simple social pressure like that can work wonders.

> A simple social pressure like that can work wonders.

So would variable pricing based on how often you leave the car a mess (with appropriate filters to mitigate against the trolls).

I live in a mega city where taxis are cheap so I take the daily and avoid owning my own car. The big deal will be in cities like mine where parking is rare and expensive if found at all, while roads are extremely congested. Self driving cars solve the parking problem (which admittedly, taxis do today) + can use road bandwidth much more efficiently (which taxis cannot). In the end, I see all of these factors destroying personal car ownership in big cities. Now:

Cleanliness: this is an issue in taxis already. Sometimes I get into a taxi without window handles, but that is the government's doing.

Style: expressing yourself through your car sounds like a very American thing. Much of the world is not America, to say the least.

Status: this is the biggie where I live: those with money have to show off their Audi TT's and BMWs. Perhaps they will still own their cars, just like they do today (whereas many people just rely on taxis).

Practicality: my city already does not allow outsiders to enter within the 5th ring road during working hours (7AM to 7PM), while their is a lottery for "owning" a car with 20-1 odds per cycle. I can imagine that there will just be different vehicles for the country-side vs. the cities: the latter will be automated while the former won't be. You can own your country-side car if you want, but you can't drive it inside the 5th ring road given traffic unless it has a self-driving mode (to optimize traffic).

I never want to own another car. That is a huge amount of capital I could put towards Uber, or this.

Personally, I don't drive; it freaks me the hell out. However, I've got a housemate who does drive, and he has several thousand dollars worth of ham radio equipment installed in his car. I also have friends who do volunteer fire work and other first response type duties. Doing things like that in a rental would be near impossible.

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