Elon’s double nothingburger: robotaxis any year now, bro. And robots, bro. Trust us, bro.
https://pivot-to-ai.com/2024/10/11/elons-double-nothingburger-robotaxis-any-year-now-bro-and-robots-bro-trust-us-bro/
207 points · 42 comments · view on lemmy.world
42 Comments
mpk@awful.systems · 68 pts · 1y
Anthony Levandowski (the Waymo guy) on the robot cabs: "You’re putting the power back into the people’s hands, where a small business owner could have, you know, a fleet of 10 cars or 20 cars that they run themselves as their business. It’s a great model for the future where it’s lots of mom and pops, rather than one mega corp that does that.”
Because that is EXACTLY what will happen and it will absolutely NOT be the case that megacorps will simply do exactly what megacorps do and flood cities with robotaxis running at a loss in order to control the market and then jack up prices. No siree, it'll be all Mom and Pop's Friendly Robotaxi Company.
bitofhope@awful.systems · 31 pts · 1y
finger curls on the monkey paw
Inspiring! Mom and Pop have started a small business and are now franchisees of Megacorp Robotaxi. After financing and purchasing a fleet of cars, they can enjoy a steady and reliable income while only having to take care of vehicle maintenance, autopilot software license fees, accounting, possible municipal taxi licensing and other legal and clerical duties and liabilities of running a business.
Thanks to Megacorp Robotaxi's excellent reputation and customer loyalty and not at all because Megacorp Robotaxi has a de facto monopoly on taxi business, Mom and Pop are not worried about the competition, save for maybe some friendly and good-natured rivalry with other proud franchisees of the Megacorp Robotaxi family.
mpk@awful.systems · 20 pts · 1y
You forgot to mention that Mom and Pop also benefit from their fleet being linked exclusively to the Robocharge(tm) charging network, which provides reliable charging 24/7 for a simple convenience fee of 25% on top of the local power company's grid rate.
Amoeba_Girl@awful.systems · 13 pts · 1y
And even if that were true ... There's nothing virtuous about small businesses and I'm just aghast at this inane petit bourgeois vision for the future instead of, you know, actual public infrastructure.
o7___o7@awful.systems · 5 pts · 1y
It's car dealerships, but for rentals.
swlabr@awful.systems · 12 pts · 1y
Rejoice, peon! For you have been BLESSED. Our RNG has deemed you are WORTHY to LEASE the chariot of your LORD, the WYMH McUltra Car.
Not_mikey@slrpnk.net · 27 pts · 1y
I liked in his presentation how he mentioned how bad LA traffic was and how it takes hours to cross the city, then didn't mention how all these robo taxis, if they ever become a thing, would just exacerbate the problem.
"Oh but while you wait in the deadlock traffic you can be on your phone instead of paying attention and stressing out" yeah, but I can also already do that on a bus / train and those actually help to alleviate traffic.
bitofhope@awful.systems · 21 pts · 1y
Sure, but you might have to sit next to a poor.
Soyweiser@awful.systems · 24 pts · 1y
I know im a big nerd but "Musk also presented the Optimus robot, your plastic pal who’s fun to be with — “your own personal R2-D2, C-3PO!”.
Why would I need an astromech droid Musk? At least a GNK droid provides power. Stupid sexy gonk droid.
mpk@awful.systems · 25 pts · 1y
Don't have much use for a protocol droid either.
Silic0n_Alph4@lemmy.world · 21 pts · 1y
What I really need is a droid who speaks the binary language of moisture vaporators.
dgerard@awful.systems · 10 pts · 1y
i believe @self is writing one in Nix
self@awful.systems · 5 pts · 1y
you know, humidity control is one of the few parts of my house that isn’t controlled by a handbuilt Linux system I’ve fastened to the wall
…so what I’m saying is now I’m writing one in nix, yes
DarkThoughts@fedia.io · 7 pts · 1y
I need one with a sleeve mount that can dirty talk.
DScratch@sh.itjust.works · 13 pts · 1y
H e y
T h e r e ,
A d e q u a t l y
S i z e d
B o y .
A r e
Y o u
S e e k i n g
P l e a s u r e ?
bitofhope@awful.systems · 12 pts · 1y
We have a protocol droid at home, it's called curl.
Soyweiser@awful.systems · 6 pts · 1y
Considering the important parts of that, aka the languages can be done by your phone sure. But it would at least have a minimal use. R2 d2 needs special attachments to serve drinks.
The cybertray, competitively priced at 4000$ and the reported risk of it breaking when wet is fairly minimal.
thisNotMyName@lemmy.world · 21 pts · 1y
Woah Elon invented busses, but worse! What a genious! Hopefully my city now stops investing in public transport immediately so we can wait for this cool thing to become market ready! /s
dgerard@awful.systems · 12 pts · 1y
Robobuses running down the Vegas Hyperloop, forever
self@awful.systems · 4 pts · 1y
can it even fit a robovan? the thing barely fits the cars it was designed for, and I wouldn’t put it past musk to forget his past failed shit or assume it can easily be expanded when it can’t
rook@awful.systems · 13 pts · 1y
To the surprise of no-one: the robots were just mechanical turks.
https://jalopnik.com/teslas-beer-serving-optimus-robot-was-controlled-by-a-h-1851670923
fasterandworse@awful.systems · 12 pts · 1y
It's like the behind-the-scenes of the making of a product has become the product and there isn't anything else after it
sailor_sega_saturn@awful.systems · 11 pts · 1y
Coming soon*: the thing we already said was coming soon, only worse in every way! No steering wheel! No charging port! One seat for you and one seat for your faceless robot "friend"!
Wait wait where are you going investors?! We have also designed a worse bus!
::: spoiler *
dgerard@awful.systems · 10 pts · 1y
That disclaimer looks hilariously terrible, but it's pretty standard. For all his bluster about the SEC, Musk speaks securities law compliant hype fluently. Listen closely and you'll notice all his future hype statements are carefully hedged and thoroughly fall within the bounds of "forward looking statement".
mpk@awful.systems · 10 pts · 1y
also why does he think people will take on his "wacky" pronunciation of "Robovan" to rhyme with "gas oven"? I generally leave actually listening to Musk's live ramblings to the professionals but damn, this guy is a terrible public speaker. Has his schtick always consisted mostly of awkward pauses and ers and ums or is this a new thing?
Soyweiser@awful.systems · 6 pts · 1y
Yes that always was his thing. Some people rationalize it to themselves by going 'he is such a genius his head has so many ideas he struggles to express them'. I think he might have adhd.
hrrrngh@awful.systems · 8 pts · 1y
Oh no, I don't think we're ready for him to start mythologizing autism + ADHD.
Watching my therapist pull up Musk facts on his phone for 40 minutes going "bro check this out you're just like him frfr" the moment he learned I was autistic was enough for me. Please god don't let musk start talking about hyperfocusing.
froztbyte@awful.systems · 6 pts · 1y
I think he's outright claimed it, but tbh fuck that noise. whether he does or doesn't is of no importance as pertains his continued choice to be a lying abusive extractivist fash-enabling piece of shit
self@awful.systems · 7 pts · 1y
I’m friends with people who used to be gigantic musk fans (and they’ve fortunately gone in the opposite direction since then), and the vocal tics are absolutely something they mythologized — I vividly remember one of them cooing over how adorable his stutter is during the original cybertruck/neuralink announcement way back, which they of course insisted we watch live
and as someone who’s struggled with mild to severe vocal tics and other difficulties verbally communicating off and on for decades: I’m not an expert, but it’s real fucking weird he can turn the tics off when he needs to for an interaction. for example, during the Twitter space when an ex-Twitter engineer surprised him and called him out for making shit up about Twitter’s infrastructure, he instantly went from “shy mess” to “the worst executive you’ve ever met is trying to get you fired” — all steel, no stutter, an entirely different persona designed to make musk feel like he won that interaction. and if I were in that spot (and thank fuck I never will be that big an asshole), I’d be a fucking mess — that kind of stress makes me stutter, fuck up my phrasing, and talk in weird loops right away. I get a lot less confident as my brain overanalyzes what I’m saying.
and again everyone’s different and I’m not an expert, but it’s real weird the guy’s pattern is the exact opposite of myself and essentially everyone else I know who struggle with speaking under pressure. to be honest, I’m fairly certain the richest boy in the world can afford a vocal coach — and I’m also convinced he paid that vocal coach to sound like more of an adorable, vulnerable, relatable nerd
Soyweiser@awful.systems · 5 pts · 1y
Re coaching. It is amazing how he went from young rich need to whatever he is now (not sure if the stories I heard about him wearing bronzer at the trump rally are true) vs bezos who went from rich young nerd to lex luthor lookalike. Or even Zuckerberg who after all the alien jokes prob got help and now looks like a normal person.
Soyweiser@awful.systems · 4 pts · 1y
He claims he has autism, but because his first wife left him after she got her adhd meds he hates adhd meds. So dont worry about him turning into an adhd high functioning example.
Melatonin@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 9 pts · 1y
I know we're on the cusp of a cool Jetsons future. Why are there so many idiots in the way of progress? Fake research papers flooding the educational system, megalomaniacal infantile "accidental" billionaires running the show.
I'm convinced we as humans are doomed to forever "Forrest Gump" our way forward.
Sam_Bass@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 1y
just a south african ass clown
fasterandworse@awful.systems · 6 pts · 1y
I'm convinced he pronounced robovan the way he did because he was advised on the social media engagement technique of dropping deliberate mistakes in your videos
self@awful.systems · 7 pts · 1y
it feels so much like he’s reaching for… something? from nerd culture and missing the mark so much it’s unrecognizable. my brain went to the old RedLetterMedia review where they kept pronouncing “geteven” as one word, but like… musk, buddy, you’re the one who insisted on naming it a robovan, this doesn’t work
and speaking of reaching for nerd culture and missing, “your own personal R2D2 C-3PO” is exactly how my mom would describe a robot after a bit too much wine, and it’s really embarrassing it’s this easy to pander to nerds
fasterandworse@awful.systems · 6 pts · 1y
so much this when he said the "future should look like the future" and this art deco style roach rolls out
self@awful.systems · 7 pts · 1y
my first thought on seeing the robovan was that I better make sure I got all the plasmids I needed cause when I enter that Bioshock's definitely doing a level transition I can't come back from
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 1y
And his personal hygiene is . . . beyond reproach.
VantaBrandon@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 1y
Don't worry, by the time they're on the road Trump Social will own GoogleMetaXFlix and you can read all the news about how they don't explode and catch on fire all the time and are super reliable cars! Welcome to Costco, I love you.
VantaBrandon@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 1y
50,000 gallons of water to put out 1 Tesla Semi that caught on fire bro, thats lit!
sailor_sega_saturn@awful.systems · 6 pts · 1y
I mean as long as all the passengers can escape from the flames in time and the manufacturer didn't do something silly like use "bulletproof" glass for the windshields or make the regular door handles inoperable without power. Haha but surely no one would design a car that way!
Nuke_the_whales@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1y
Robot Butlers, I'm pretty sure the Orville showed us how that turns out