don’t come with a requirement that drivers watch the road
Seems it’s like every other Mercedes then
Hey I’m watching it on my mirrors.
if it can drive a car why wouldn’t it be able to drive a truck?
I’m surprised companies don’t just build their own special highway for automated trucking and use people for last mile stuff.
It’s called a train, no?
yeah that would be great. Say, you can save on that a little if you put wheel guides on the road since theyre all headed in the same direction, and maybe you can replace the tires with something that fits into that guide pretty well so that you don’t have to replace them as much. Matter of fact, all of these trucks can become electric if they run electricity through the track or above it. This is a revolutionary idea!!
We could make it work on a guide line and attach a bunch of trailers to one truck. You’re a genius.
A monorail of course.
That’s more of a Shelbyville idea
This idea seems to be getting some steam. I’m all aboard it!
Some might even call that invention a train.
They are testing them already. I only have a German article that came out this week https://www.tagesschau.de/wirtschaft/technologie/fahrerlose-lkw-man-test-autobahn-100.html
The truck division of Mercedes (Daimler) is already testing the trucks in the US. They plan commercial usage in 2027. MAN is testing in Europe in wants to start commercial usage in 2030.
On private roads in Canada, the mining giant Teck is starting to use autonomous transport trucks.
To me this is less frightening for public safety and more for reasons related to climate change, since this kind of industrial expansion will be less contingent on worker availability.
Mind you, the whole push toward driverless vehicles seems insanely redundant as a concept, since driverless tech in the form of high-speed rail has been around for decades in an infinitely more efficient way than could ever be offered by personal vehicles.
This is really cool and you’re all sad wankers.
Oh it doesn’t work in all these conditions.
Well it went from not working at all to a completely self driving car in certain situations. That’s great. It’s the future. We are living in the future
The better future isn’t better cars it’s removing cars
how dare someone enjoy driving
We had that. It wasn’t a future.
Getting on a train definitely feels like the future compared to a car.
Don’t have to drive, faster, cleaner, more space, more comfort, can buy food, can go to toilet, better view.
When the train can park next to my house so that my grandma on a wheelchair can get in, or get me to a KFC in the middle of the night, or move a random piece of furniture, I’m in.
A nice bike lane infrastructure would be a blast too, for when you don’t need to move a cargo.
Both are must for large cities, but unrealistic pretty much everywhere else.
Good job that most trips don’t involve moving a grandma or furniture. Most people rent something if they want to move furniture anyway so that seems like a non issue.
As for KFC deliveries. That doesn’t involve your own personal car so that doesn’t make any sense. No one is complaining about delivery vehicles.
Cycle lanes are good. Last mile is the real problem. Cargo bike are a thing.
So we need cycle lanes, we need trains, both of those are policy issues. Once they have self driving cars, or they invent taxis, that you can use to pick your grandma up for 1% of human trips. What’s the excuse then?
Yeah I doubt this can drive American roads in any weather condition and not have issues.
Correct, it only works when certain conditions are met.
Drivers can activate Mercedes’s technology, called Drive Pilot, when certain conditions are met, including in heavy traffic jams, during the daytime, on spec ific California and Nevada freeways, and when the car is traveling less than 40 mph. Drivers can focus on other activities until the vehicle alerts them to resume control. The technology does not work on roads that haven’t been pre-approved by Mercedes, including on freeways in other states.
Read article
in any weather condition
LOL. Weather is probably the smallest of the problems they have solved.
German car makers have a habit of actually testing all their models in all weather conditions, routinely, around the globe.
…
As of April 11, there were 65 Mercedes autonomous vehicles available for sale in California, Fortune has learned through an open records request submitted to the state’s DMV. One of those has since been sold, which marks the first sale of an autonomous Mercedes in California, according to the DMV. Mercedes would not confirm sales numbers. Select Mercedes dealerships in Nevada are also offering the cars with the new technology, known as “level 3” autonomous driving.
…
Drivers can activate Mercedes’s technology, called Drive Pilot, when certain conditions are met, including in heavy traffic jams, during the daytime, on spec ific California and Nevada freeways, and when the car is traveling less than 40 mph. Drivers can focus on other activities until the vehicle alerts them to resume control. The technology does not work on roads that haven’t been pre-approved by Mercedes, including on freeways in other states.
…
U.S. customers can buy a yearly subscription of Drive Pilot in 2024 EQS sedans and S-Class car models for $2,500.
…
Mercedes is also working on developing level 4 capabilities. The automaker’s chief technology officer Markus Schäfer expects that level 4 autonomous technology will be available to consumers by 2030, Automotive News reported.
…
I’ve seen this headline a few times and the details are laughably bad. The only reason this can be getting any press is because the headline is good clickbait. But 40 mph top speed on approved roads in 2 states only if a car is in front of you in the daytime is entirely useless. I guess it’s a good first step maybe? But trying to write headlines like this is big news is sad.
It’s starting in California where there are a meaningful number of high earners who are spending hours per day in 4 lane bumper to bumper traffic.
Having actual autonomy during those hours is still shit. But it’s a hell of a lot less shit that the tedium of the high attention requirements of sitting in traffic at a crawl.
40 mph top speed on approved roads in 2 states only if a car is in front of you in the daytime is entirely useless.
It’s specifically designed to navigate traffic congestion, which happens under 30 mph. It can keep up with the lane, deal with lane changes, honk if someone backs into you, let ambulances through, things like that. Not sure why the article presents it as generic driving.
The reason this gets attention is because it’s the first level 3 sold to consumers.
The tech is hard, of course it’s gonna start out with laughingly limited capabilities. But it’s the first step towards more automation.
Fucking subscription. No.
Hmm, so only on a very small number of predetermined routes, and at very slow speeds for those roads.
Still impressive, but not as impressive as the headline makes out.
Yes, but it’s actually level 3.
Not the Tesla “full self driving - no wait we actually lied to you, you need to be alert at all times” bullshit.
We’ll wait and see i guess
And definitely not worth the $2500 a year they’re asking for the feature.
Come on, you have been able to pay the price of that Mercedes in the first place.
These 2500 are not going to hurt.
Many people use credit to buy a car out of their league.
Then those people might as well take an extra loan for 2500 a year. I’m not sure what the point is you’re trying to make here.
They may do so. I have no mercy for them.
If they assume full liability for any collisions while the feature is active (and it looks like they do), then I can see that being fair.
Chances are, If you can afford the car, then that amount is nothing to you.
Having known one, some of their customers love their feature loaded cars to brag about and feel extra special. Some will definitely pay the 2.5k gladly.
Conspicuous Consumption.
They got an army of thousands of Indians to watch the road for you?
No they just got a few dozens good lawyers instead if the lawsuits costts less than the profits and you get publicity out of it then that’s business for ya
The best lawyers are going to use AI to create their legal arguments. And you know what AI stands for. Always Indians.
No matter how you slice it, it’s Indians all the way down.
This is the best comment I’ve read on Lemmy in the 6 months I’ve been here.
No, you’re thinking of Amazon.
They got an army of thousands of Amazonians to watch the road for you?
Time for snoo-snoo?
Ah, the ol’ reddit swi- oh wait…
deleted by creator
I would let Xena Warrior Princess drive with a 300ms latency, no doubt.
It will be litigated almost immediately. There is no current combination of model and hardware platform that a car could reasonably run that could be called “fully self driving” at any useful speed. This thing sounds like parking assist on steroids maybe, or “stalled traffic assist”. They will be sued.
There’s tons of conditions
when certain conditions are met, including in heavy traffic jams, during the daytime, on spec ific California and Nevada freeways, and when the car is traveling less than 40 mph. Drivers can focus on other activities until the vehicle alerts them to resume control.
I doubt this is a mistake, they must have really high confidence in the tech as well as with the restrictions, not even Tesla had the balls to announce that you could drive distracted.
not even Tesla had the balls to announce that you could drive distracted.
That’s the difference between Level 2 and Level 3 full self driving. Teslas are Level 2.
That’s what I’m saying, they could have called this a “Ultra advanced level 2” and avoided opening themselves up to a TON of liabilities. Once you start saying this is a level 3 system and you don’t need to pay attention to the road with it, well, that shuts the door to many defenses they could use of it was “just” level 2 if something happens. So that means they must be really confident in their system
Did you read the article? There are already plenty of conditions for activating the self driving mode.
There is no current combination of model and hardware platform that a car could reasonably run that could be called “fully self driving” at any useful speed.
It’s still not flawless and reguires an attentive driver but Tesla FSD Beta V12 is pretty damn impressive. They made a huge leap forward by going from human code to 100% neural nets. I don’t think we’re too far a way from a true robo-taxi and there’s going to be some humble pie served for the LiDAR/radar advocates. I highly recommend everyone to watch some reviews on YouTube if you aren’t up to speed with the recent changes they’ve made.
Sued for what?
I mean I disagree with most of what the person you’re responding to is saying, but they are entering into a new stage of vehicular liability. By telling the driver they don’t have to pay attention there is an implied transfer of liability.
It probably says somewhere in the terms of use that Mercedes isn’t at fault or that you have to carry some special kind of insurance, and frankly computers have a pretty good shot at being better than your average human driver so they’ll hopefully be easier to insure, but nevertheless, people on both sides of every accident for the first few years with this tech will sue. Any chance to squeeze a few milly out of a 100 billion dollar car company.
Sure, anyone can sue for any reason. That doesn’t mean that a case will be successful. I do agree with you that there if a transfer of liability, until the car tells the driver that manual intervention is needed. But also, this can be used on only specific roads, under specific weather and traffic conditions, I really don’t think it’s much to ask of a robot to do. It actually seems like a pretty boring level of autonomy.
https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a39481699/what-happens-if-mercedes-drivepilot-causes-a-crash/
“Mercedes will accept full legal responsibility for the vehicle whenever Drive Pilot is active.”
It will only activate if all the conditions are met, but not clear on how long the driver has to take over on deactivation before they stop accepting liability…
Musk: Fuuuuuuu
Had this been BMW I would have assumed it was an onion article.
Why?
Exclusive: Mercedes becomes the first automaker to sell autonomous cars in the U.S. that don’t come with a equirement that drivers watch the road
Rachyl Jones April 19, 2024, 12:05 AM UTC
4–5 minutes
The next time you’re traveling on the interstate and see a fellow driver whose hands are full with everything but the wheel—scrolling TikTok, applying mascara, eating breakfast—don’t panic. It’s all legal in certain states, as long as they’re in a new Mercedes with autonomous driving technology.
The luxury automaker has become the first in the nation to start selling self-driving cars—at least those that afford riders a hands-free experience—to regular consumers. So far, the company has sold at least 65 autonomous vehicles in California, Fortune has learned through an open records request submitted to the state’s DMV. Select Mercedes dealerships in Nevada are also offering the cars with the new technology, known as “level 3” autonomous driving.
Level 3-enabled cars went on sale in December, Mercedes told Fortune. California and Nevada are the only two states where the company can legally sell the technology to consumers. The two state DMVs gave Mercedes approval to begin selling the cars last year—Nevada in January, and California in June. Mercedes announced in September its planned to begin sales, but this is the first news of the cars actually reaching consumers.
Drivers can activate Mercedes’s technology, called Drive Pilot, when certain conditions are met, including in heavy traffic jams, during the daytime, on specific California and Nevada freeways, and when the car is traveling less than 40 mph. Drivers can focus on other activities until the vehicle alerts them to resume control. The technology does not work on roads that haven’t been pre-approved by Mercedes, including on freeways in other states.
The sales mark a new echelon of autonomous driving available to the average American. Mercedes is the first automaker selling to customers to achieve level 3 capabilities in the U.S., with Tesla and others still offering technology at level 2—in which cars can perform specific tasks but require constant supervision from a driver. Some drivers, however, ignore those rules and operate the cars as if they are more capable than they are. Some drivers, however, ignore those rules and operate the cars as if they are more capable than they are. One family of a deceased driver has accused Tesla of hyping its assisted driving technology as fully autonomous, allegedly leading to tragic results, while California’s DMV last year accused the company of false advertising over the matter.
Meanwhile, robotaxis from Alphabet’s Waymo and GM’s Cruise operate at level 4, meaning cars drive autonomously in most conditions without human interference. But these companies currently don’t sell vehicles to consumers, and Cruise recently halted its service after California’s DMV suspended its license due to an incident in which a car dragged a pedestrian under its carriage for 20 feet.
U.S. customers can buy a yearly subscription of Drive Pilot in 2024 EQS sedans and S-Class car models for $2,500. Mercedes began selling level 3-enabled cars in its home country of Germany in May 2022. The European packages cost 5,000 to 7,000 euros ($5,300 and $7,500) for a three-year membership.
The cars sport turquoise lights on its rear-view mirrors, headlights, and taillights to let law enforcement and other drivers know when the car is operating autonomously. Drive Pilot is only available on select models that have the built-in hardware, including a sensor at the front of the car and a camera in the rear windshield.
Mercedes is also working on developing level 4 capabilities. The automaker’s chief technology officer Markus Schäfer expects that level 4 autonomous technology will be available to consumers by 2030, Automotive News reported. But the jump to level 4 is considerably more difficult than achieving level 3. While humans are still expected to take control of the car based on the circumstances in level 3, level 4 technology is supposed to offer near-total autonomy. At this level, a driver only needs to take over if the system fails. That means the technology must be able to safely respond to nearly all unexpected situations on the road.
The cars sport turquoise lights on its rear-view mirrors, headlights, and taillights to let law enforcement and other drivers know when the car is operating autonomously.
That’s actually a pretty neat solution lol
When Verge tested the EQS in September these turquoise lights weren’t road-legal yet. It’s been proposed as a standard by the SAE but each jurisdiction will have to approve it individually.
How is that legal?
Because it’s an extremely narrowly defined set of requirements in order to use it. It’s “approved freeways with clear markings and moderate to heavy traffic under 40MPH during daytime hours and clear conditions” meaning it will inch forward for you in bumper to bumper traffic provided you’re in an approved area and that’s it.
Right, this is an insurance product more than a tech product.
Still seems not legal to not pay attention to the road. Wouldn’t fly over here at least.
Correct, it only flies in California and Nevada, where the DMV approved it
How is that different than LKAS + ACC?
Those still require your full attention and hands on the wheel.
In theory. In practice, it just beeps at you if your sandwich hand is steering.
that paid for it to be, like everything else that’s legal?
They got certification from the authorities, and in the event of an accident, the manufacturer takes on responsibility.
lol, ‘manufacturer takes on responsibility’ so… I’m just fucked if one of these hits me?
see a mercedes, shoot a mercedes. destroy it in whatever way you can.
No you’re guaranteed that the Mercedes that hit you is better insured for paying out your damages than pretty much anyone else on the road that could hit you.
lol corporations don’t have responsibility though. that’s the whole point of them. they’re machines for avoiding responsibility.
In this case the responsibility to pay will ultimately fall on everyone, not just on the pedestrian getting hit. Still not good, but you won’t be SOL.
been hit before, not buying it. gonna be proactive about self defense.
I’ve been hit 4 times
If these have lidar (unlike teslas) then they might be better at detecting obstructions but I feel like real world road conditions are not kind to cameras and sensors.
Fixed lidar sensors are not as reliable as it’s made out to be, unfortunately. Dome lidar systems like those found on Waymo vehicles are pretty good, but way more advanced (and expensive) than anything you’d find in consumer vehicles at the moment. The shadows of trees are enough to render basic lidar sensors useless, as they effectively produce an aperiodic square wave of infrared light (from the sun) that is frequently inseparable from the ToF emission signal. Sunsets are also sometimes enough to completely blind lidar sensors.
None of this is to say that Tesla’s previous camera-only approach was a good idea, like at all. More data is always a good thing, so long as the system doesn’t rely on the data more than the data’s reliability permits. After all, cameras can be blinded by sunlight too. IMO radar is the best economical complementary sensor to cameras at the moment. Despite the comparatively low accuracy, they are very reliable in adverse conditions.
Please touch grass soon.
more likely glass first, if I try. not in a pedestrian friendly area.
The sad part of this is somehow thinking that payment solves any problem. Like, idk what they would pay me, just bring back my dead wife/child/father whatever. You can’t fix everything with money.
Human drivers are far more dangerous on the road, and you should be applauding assisted driving development.
It only works on a small handful of freeways (read: no pedestrians) in California/Nevada, and only under 40 MPH. The odds of a crash within those parameters resulting in a fatality are quite low.
Love how companies can decide who has to supervise their car’s automated driving and not an actual safety authority. Absolutely nuts.
Who said there was no safety authority involved? I thought it was part of the 4 level system the government decided on for assisted driving.
Assuming a functional legal system, they’d be liable for damages if they lie about product safety.
That’s gonna do the people murdered by an algorithm a lot of good… /s
You can’t have a babysitter following every human to make sure they don’t do something dangerous. Except for high risk areas, liability is the most practical option.
Or maybe, like, regulation?
So you want to read 50 page regulation about how to boil water in your home because boiling water can hurt people?
And how do you regulate AI when you have no idea how it works or what could go wrong. Not as if politicians are AI experts. Driving itself is already heavily regulated, the AI has to follow traffic rules just like anyone else, if that is what you are thinking.
Why do you believe that judges (or even juries made of lay people) can make sense of the very things that you’re so confident legislators or regulators cannot?
I’m not saying regulation is perfect, and as a result, certainly there is a role for judicial review. But come on, man…lots of non sequiturs and straw dogs in your argument.
Quite often, juries don’t have to rule on technical matters. Juries will have available internal communications of the company, testimonies of the engineers working on the project etc. If safety concerns were being ignored, you can usually find enough witnesses and documents proving so.
On the other hand, how do you even begin to regulate something that is only in the process of being invented? What would the regulation look like?
They actually did get certified by an authority
An “authority” of people who fell for some marketing bullshit.
Read the dammed article, it literally said the DMV for California and Nevada. It’s the fucking government.
Spoken like someone who clearly knows nothing about the technology.
According to who? Did the NTSB clear this? Are they even allowed to clear this? If this thing fucks up and kills somebody, will the judge let the driver off the hook 'cuz the manufacturer told them everything’s cool?
According to who? Did the NTSB clear this?
Yes.
If this thing fucks up and kills somebody, will the judge let the driver off the hook 'cuz the manufacturer told them everything’s cool?
Yes, the judge will let the driver off the hook, because Mercedes told them it will assume the liability instead.
You do realize humans kill hundreds of other humans a day in cars, right? Is it possible that autonomous vehicles may actually be safer than a human driver?
Only on closed courses. The best AI lacks the basic heuristics of a child and you simply can’t account for all possible outcomes.
Sure. But no system is 100% effective and all of their questions are legit and important to answer. If I got hit by one of these tomorrow I want to know the process for fault, compensation and pathway to improvement are all already done not something my accident is going to landmark.
But that being said, I was a licensing examiner for 2 years and quit because they kept making it easier to pass and I was forced to pass so many people who should not be on the road.
I think this idea is sound, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t things to address around it.
Honestly I’m sure there will be a lot of unfortunate mistakes until computers and self driving systems can be relied upon. However there needs to be an entry point for manufacturers and this is it. Technology will get better over time, it always has. Eventually self driving autos will be the norm.
Can’t the entry point just be that you have to pay attention while it’s driving for you until they figure it out?
That still doesn’t address all the issues surrounding it. I am unsure if you are just young and not aware how these things work or terribly naive. But companies will always cut corners to keep profits. Regulation forces a certain level of quality control (ideally). Just letting them do their thing because “it’ll eventually get better” is a gateway to absurd amounts of damage. Also, not all technology always gets better. Plenty just get abandoned.
But to circle back, if I get hit by a car tomorrow and all these thinga you think are unimportant are unanswered does that mean I might mot get legal justice or compensation? If there isn’t clearly codified law I might not, and you might be callous enough to say you don’t care about me. But what about you? What if you got hit by a unmonitored self driving car tomorrow and then told you’d have to go through a long, expensive court battle to determine fault because no one had done it it. So you’re in and out of a hospital recovering and draining all of your money on bills both legal and medical to eventually hopefully get compensated for something that wasn’t your fault.
That is why people here are asking these questions. Few people actually oppose progress. They just need to know that reasonable precautions are taken for predictable failures.
But then it’s good that the manufacturer states the driver isn’t obliged to watch the road. Because it shifts responsibility towards the manufacturer and thus - it’s a great incentive to make technology as safer as possible.
To be clear I never said that I didn’t care about an individual’s safety, you inferred that somehow from my post and quite frankly are quite disrespectful. I simply stated that autonomous vehicles are here to stay and that the technology will improve more with time.
The legal implications of self driving cars are still being determined and as this is literally one of the first approved technologies available. Tesla doesn’t count as it’s not a SAE level 3 autonomous driving vehicle. There are some references in the liability section of the wiki.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_of_self-driving_cars
You’re deciding to prioritize economic development over human safety.
*at 40mph on a clear straight road on a sunny day in a constant stream of traffic with no unexpected happenings, Ts&Cs apply.
According to that teal light.
Guessing their insurance is privately funded
