Mastodawn

I've been saying it for a minute, yelled at some on #mastodon. Same for #waymo, it is safer, the cars just drive better. It is not all the #AI, some of it is lidar and networks that allow the AI to see many blocks/many miles ahead.

This is the first industrial #killerapp of the #AI era, but more are coming for manufacturing jobs. And yes, if you are any kind of spreadsheet jockey like a medical coder, or a monkey developer (you convert a spec to a language) do worry!

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/17/business/self-driving-semi-trucks-texas-us.html

Driverless Big Rigs Are Coming to American Highways, and Soon

There are active test runs in Texas, and a handful of companies are banking on making a big entry into the market as early as next year.

The New York Times

Show thread

Vesipeto Vetehinen Mar 18

@stalbaum I think they will be safer but you should really hold these businesses up to a standard that ensures it. Waymo seems to be the one that is the furthest along and takes safety seriously and even for their vehicles you continue to see videos where they have issues with properly following the rules of the road and because of that they can end up in potentially dangerous situations.

They still do a good job usually and almost certainly can react better when someone else does something unexpected. Most of the time the issues are more an annoyance or something that slows down traffic instead of anything potentially dangerous and that's reflected by Waymo's safety record which seems to be good. I'm more worried about others like Tesla who have intentionally tied their hands by not using LIDAR and are under pressure to roll out robotaxi.

Show thread

1337 $#!+ I did that Mar 18

@vetehinen agree 100% They should be safer if they are going to be allowed to replace people. And people have to get something, a ubi would only be a start.