Apple 'Accelerating' Efforts to Catch Up With Self-Driving Competition, Expands California Fleet to 27 Vehicles

[Will.O.Bie]

Driving is instinctual. No AI or software will ever replace driver instincts to avoid potential collisions. As a former transport driver, autonomous vehicles should be in everyone's garage in order for me to anoint it safe to drive. Someone said that the vehicle reminds you to pay attention to the road; if your car is driving you and you "feel" like it's safe to do so, you are gonna take a nap after a 12-15 hour shift at the office. People don't pay attention on the road now, with their phones in their faces while going 50mph on the highway, putting on makeup, reading something on their iPad. This will enable even worse driving habits than what people have now. I've witnessed several disastrous accidents because they can't put their devices down for one second.

Not to sound ancient and all...lol

Oh boy... I can't wait!

Me: Hey Siri, take me home!
Siri: OK... now playing "Take me home, country roads" by John Denver
Me: Hey Siri... cancel and take me HOME!
Siri: OK... plotting route to Gnome, Alaska.
Me: Hey Siri... cancel and take me to a Ford Dealer!

This is freaking hilarious! That's why I disabled Sori -yes Sori, not a typo- a long time ago. If I can fire Sori as an assistant, I would have done this a million times over.

 

[whooleytoo]

Slightly thinner cars each year?

Don't insert any key, but try the handle 2 or 3 times and it'll open...
[doublepost=1516900066][/doublepost]

Driving is instinctual. No AI or software will ever replace driver instincts to avoid potential collisions.

I think the biggest issue might be mixing autonomous and non-autonomous cars. Probably the biggest challenge for AI driving is how to predict what people are going to do. If every car were running based on the same driving/logic rules, it'd likely be far, far safer.

You'd still have crashes due to mechanical failures, pedestrians or animals running onto the road, extreme weather or faults in the road/infrastructure, of course. Oh, and crackers could probably wipe out thousands if they could insert subtle bugs in the software...

 

[User 6502]

I would never trust software to drive me and my family in my car.

I struggle to trust humans for this task. Self driving software has some way to go but eventually it will be far safer than any human driver. At that point driving a car should be forbidden, as it would be too risky compared with driverless cars.

 

[cuencap]

27...Lexuses...?

 

[zombierunner]

When the cars come out, should I get AppleCare+, or just an Otterbox?

Dbrand Skin should be enough.

 

[ackmondual]

If I am honest, right now I don't want to be driven by a car controlled by Apple's software.

Huh... while I agree with your sentiment, for me, it goes beyond that.... I don't want to pay for Apple's car driving software.

 

[sidewinder3000]

If I am honest, right now I don't want to be driven by a car controlled by Apple's software.

Until Apple evolves beyond their focus on “in-device” computing for AI, and embraces the power of cloud computing for AI applications, I have doubts about their entree into autonomous driving.

 

[BruceEBonus]

Self driving cars are a white elephant. Like 3D movies. AR and Amazon Drone Deliveries. It's all sci(ence) in the sky. It's not going to happen. Really. Great idea in theory. Reality (ironically) gets in the way eventually.

Couple this to Apple now being two years behind the competition in other fields then that puts the kybosh on it from the start off.

Please. No more vanity projects. Let's get the ground work done first on the bread and butter product.

Thanks.

 

[mikethemartian]

User error or not, this particular Tesla didn't recognize a big red stationary object.

Apparently the human driver didn't either.

 

[Apple Knowledge Navigator]

Surprised no-ones mentioned the pun in the title... Accelerating?

I'll grab my coat.

 

[44267547]

Imo Apple shouldn’t make the actual car. They should focus on making what’s already available better.

But in fairness, we don't know that Apple is actually making a car. It's only been rumored that they are or Do they have ulterior motives otherwise with the software? Part of me believes the actual car making rumors is a smoke screen.

 

[MickeyAlexander]

"Apple ‘Accelerating’ Efforts...”

I see what you did there, MR.

 

[IJ Reilly]

Driving is instinctual. No AI or software will ever replace driver instincts to avoid potential collisions. As a former transport driver, autonomous vehicles should be in everyone's garage in order for me to anoint it safe to drive. Someone said that the vehicle reminds you to pay attention to the road; if your car is driving you and you "feel" like it's safe to do so, you are gonna take a nap after a 12-15 hour shift at the office. People don't pay attention on the road now, with their phones in their faces while going 50mph on the highway, putting on makeup, reading something on their iPad. This will enable even worse driving habits than what people have now. I've witnessed several disastrous accidents because they can't put their devices down for one second.

Not to sound ancient and all...lol

Your argument utterly defeats itself. Do I need to point out how?
[doublepost=1516901979][/doublepost]

But in fairness, we don't know that Apple is actually making a car. It's only been rumored that they are or Do they have ulterior motives otherwise with the software? Part of me believes the actual car making rumors is a smoke screen.

Actually, it's pretty clear that they are not, and all the evidence that they ever were designing an Apple branded car was exaggerated.

 

[adamski23]

Imagine if Apple built the cars and they started “couraging” out old tech.

Wheels? Who needs those?

On a more serious note I’m highly skeptical of autonomous driving systems, regardless of the company. It scares me to put that much trust in a computer.

 

[44267547]

Actually, it's pretty clear that they are not, and all the evidence that they ever were designing an Apple branded car was exaggerated.

Actually, I remember the early on rumors that they were secretly building a car in the middle the night near the Apple campus, And I just never bought into the reasoning that they were ever building a car. I think the software development seems more in tune of Apple doing something bigger in that area.

 

[iapplelove]

But in fairness, we don't know that Apple is actually making a car. It's only been rumored that they are or Do they have ulterior motives otherwise with the software? Part of me believes the actual car making rumors is a smoke screen.

I agree, although I’m not sure I would wager they are not building a car from scratch. Instead focusing what’s inside the car.

 

[sidewinder3000]

Until Apple evolves beyond their focus on “in-device” computing for AI, and embraces the power of cloud computing for AI applications, I have doubts about their entree into autonomous driving.

I use Siri all the time, but it has a lot of room for improvement, and is seriously behind Alexa and Google Asst. in some significant ways.

I also use Apple Maps, which keeps getting better but, again, is way behind Google Maps is some important ways. GM keeps innovating and AM keeps slowly playing catch up. The gap appears to be widening.

Unless Apple has state of the art voice recognition/personal assistant AI (Siri), and bleeding edge/world-class navigation (Apple Maps), there is no way they will be able to create a viable, trustable autonomous driving system that’s anything other than also rans.

They need a cultural change, where they no longer want to “compete” in services, but decide that they will innovate and lead in services, and not be bested by free, as supported services. Apple customers pay a premium and deserve the best services on the market. And there would be no better incentive to buy an Apple device than if that was the only way to get the best services available.

 

[mi7chy]

Not sure I want to be driven by any software, right now:
Autonomous Tesla Crashes Into Parked Fire Truck on California Freeway

The driver of the Tesla is my dad's friend. He said that he was behind a pickup truck with AP engaged. The pickup truck suddenly swerved into the right lane because of the firetruck parked ahead. Because the pickup truck was too high to see over, he didn't have enough time to react. He hit the firetruck at 65mph and the steering column was pushed 2 feet inwards toward him. Luckily, he wasn't hurt. He fully acknowledges that he should've been paying more attention and isn't blaming Tesla. The whole thing was pretty unfortunate considering he bought the car fairly recently (blacked it out too).
Edit #1: He had some minor cuts and bruises, but nothing serious. As for the 65mph detail, the braking system could've intervened before the collision, but there's no way he could tell.

 

[can$rules]

Imagine if Apple built the cars and they started “couraging” out old tech.

Wheels? Who needs those?

Are you saying they'll come up with a levitating car? After those come out any wheeled car will seem to be from the stone age.

I find it funny how people are scared of software driving their car but are ok with an Uber driver who may be more interested in chatting with you than paying attention to the road.

How many people were killed on the road the same day of that non-fatal Tesla accident?

 

[btownguy]

This was user error. Tesla’s autopilot is fully autonomous yet and instructs the user to pay attention attention.

Ugh, not to be a grammar Nazi or anything, but please proofread before hitting reply. Your typo here completely changes your intended meaning to the exact opposite. I see this all the time and it's so frustrating.

 

[IJ Reilly]

Actually, I remember the early on rumors that they were secretly building a car in the middle the night near the Apple campus, And I just never bought into the reasoning that they were ever building a car. I think the software development seems more in tune of Apple doing something bigger in that area.

We heard those rumors time and again, but they didn't improve with repetition because the evidence to support them was nil (even as rumors go), and the logic behind them even more difficult to imagine. At least MR is now putting "Apple Car" in quotes, which is something they should have done a year or more ago when they started reporting these rumors.

I never saw an Apple branded car as being anywhere near Apple's area of expertise. Autonomous driving tech for the use of other carmakers isn't much closer to where they normally live, so I suspect this is a deeper and more complicated story than what is being currently reported.

 

[sidewinder3000]

Self driving cars are a white elephant. Like 3D movies. AR and Amazon Drone Deliveries. It's all sci(ence) in the sky. It's not going to happen. Really. Great idea in theory. Reality (ironically) gets in the way eventually.

Couple this to Apple now being two years behind the competition in other fields then that puts the kybosh on it from the start off.

Please. No more vanity projects. Let's get the ground work done first on the bread and butter product.

Thanks.

“Amazing. Every word of what you just said was wrong.“

Self driving cars are not a white elephant. 3D movies will keep getting better and more immersive. And AR and drone deliveries will be a part of daily life within a generation.

 

[timber]

At this point every car group in world is invested in this and at the same time extremely weary of Apple (or any tech company for that matter) as a cooperative supplier.

I have some trouble imagining what they intend to do with this. At the same time a company as large as the current Apple does need some general R&D in industry trends, they are too large to just keep to the basics.

 

[UL2RA]

After experiencing iOS 11, I can't imagine being in a car powered by Apple software.

 

[44267547]

We heard those rumors time and again, but they didn't improve with repetition because the evidence to support them was nil (even as rumors go), and the logic behind them even more difficult to imagine. At least MR is now putting "Apple Car" in quotes, which is something they should have done a year or more ago when they started reporting these rumors.

I never saw an Apple branded car as being anywhere near Apple's area of expertise. Autonomous driving tech for the use of other carmakers isn't much closer to where they normally live, so I suspect this is a deeper and more complicated story than what is being currently reported.

I just don't see why Apple would want to build their own car. We know the software development is going to play a much larger role in the something we don't have a full understanding of, but it just seems complacent that they would ever be building a car to begin with. But a lot of those early on "Building a car" rumors that were reported or year or so ago have fallen off, and it's usually just updated articles about the Lexus vehicles spotted roaming around with the geographic hardware attached.