GeorgeBMac

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GeorgeBMac
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  • Microsoft says that if Apple isn't stopped now, its antitrust behavior will just get worse...

    GeorgeBMacGeorgeBMac
    Strong people, strong companies and strong countries try to make themselves better.
    Weak people, weak companies and weak countries try to tear down the competition.
    Beats

  • Motor Trend reimagines the 'Apple Car,' sees autonomous rideshare in Apple's future

    GeorgeBMacGeorgeBMac
    MplsP said:
    The Ride sharing and car sharing concepts have been around for years and have  never taken off. What makes an electric car with auto pilot suddenly different? 

    Elon Musk has made similar fanciful statements and those are just as wrong. Just because it’s by Tesla or Apple won’t change human nature or people’s opinions. 
    While I am not holding my breath for car sharing, I think it does change the equation.

    Sharing never took off because the owner of the car retains responsibility for that car -- so insurance companies pretty much dictate what happens (or not).   The closest we come to that is the rental car agencies -- which are both expensive and cumbersome.

    Autonomous vehicles could cut through all of that:  If you need a car simply text Avis and one will show up at your door with no human intervention -- like an elevator.  Or, if you're in the city and need a ride home just jump into one parked at the curb -- much like the bike rentals becoming popular these days.
    While it becomes feasible, I think it will remain of limited value.  I think predictions of it replacing car ownership are overly optimistic.
    JWSC

  • Motor Trend reimagines the 'Apple Car,' sees autonomous rideshare in Apple's future

    GeorgeBMacGeorgeBMac
    foregoneconclusion said:
    GeorgeBMac said: But, I think that will take government intervention for things such as roadways designed for autonomous vehicles and perhaps including communications between the vehicle and roadway as well as vehicle to vehicle.
    This is getting closer to the truth: autonomous vehicles won't be viable without special exemptions and special treatment from the government. 

    Possibly, but that's not what meant.
    I meant that roadways may need to be enhanced in order to get the full benefit from autonomous vehicles -- particularly in relation to communications technologies.

    Or is that what you mean by "special treatment"?
    It isn't -- no more than paving roads for internal combustion engines.  It is the government's job to provide infrastructure to support the American people and American business -- and keep it up with the times.
    roundaboutnow

  • Motor Trend reimagines the 'Apple Car,' sees autonomous rideshare in Apple's future

    GeorgeBMacGeorgeBMac
    These predictions need to be refined:   Having an autonomous car does not mean people will no longer need (or want) their own car.  It enables that to happen but it doesn't make it happen.

    As the article mentions:  in a major metropolitan city, simply ordering an autonomous taxi would work.   But in the suburbs and rural areas, that is not practical because you need a vehicle to go anywhere -- so that means owning one.

    For the foreseeable future autonomous vehicles will likely, be restricted to taxis and to the well-off buying high end vehicles.   The rest of us will be driving just like we always have (although with a lot of driver assist gadgets helping us).

    Two things will push autonomous vehicles into the typical suburban middle class garage:
    1)  The cost comes down (which it will)
    2)  Autonomous vehicles become safer than non-autonomous to the point where a human driven vehicle becomes recognized as a danger to others.   But, I think that will take government intervention for things such as roadways designed for autonomous vehicles and perhaps including communications between the vehicle and roadway as well as vehicle to vehicle.
    JWSCbadmonkStrangeDays

  • How we ended up with the 'Pregnant Man' Emoji

    GeorgeBMacGeorgeBMac
    RudolfGottfried said:
    darkvader said:
    "Pregnant man" and "pregnant nonbinary person" are actual real-world things that happen.  They exist.  Sure, they're uncommon, but they are absolutely 100% real world people.

    To not intentionally not include them would be incredibly bigoted.

    Trans women are women.  Trans men are men.  Right wing nutjobs are easily offended snowflakes.
    Left-wing nutjobs, on the other hand, are oppurtunist zeitgeist surfers who are anxious to say what is supposedly in vogue at the right time and always swim with the current of what is supposedly good and true. For them, minorities are merely projection surfaces, interchangeable freaks in the circus of do-gooders. Yesterday the gays, today transgender and tomorrow the fluids. It doesn't matter at all, the main thing is to be able to sail onto the next higher cloud of do-gooderism with the free-spirited utterance of cheap propaganda slogans.
    These people don't give a damn about the actual needs of those affected.
    Transwomen are Transwoman and not women because biological women are unique human beings. But they are also not because they themselves are unique as transgender people. If one ignores this for idelogical reasons, one not only takes away biological women their uniqueness and degrades them to persons with certain characteristics, one also takes away transwomen their history. Because where there is no trans, there is no life in the wrong body. Where there is no trans, there are no trans people and therefore no trans rights.
    The same is true of course for trans men.



    ... and "The Bible" tells us...
    darkvader