Speaker 1: Get in text with technology with tex Stuff from hosts
Speaker 1: dot com. Heather, Guys, welcome to tech Stuff. I'm Jonathan Strickland,
Speaker 1: and I wanted to continue my podcast about the story
Speaker 1: of Uber, and I brought Scott Benjamin into talk for
Speaker 1: a little bit. Originally this was going to be uh
Speaker 1: in the first episode, but Scott and I talked for
Speaker 1: about forty five minutes and it turned out that that
Speaker 1: was gonna be way too long to tack onto the
Speaker 1: end of part one. So here is part two, where
Speaker 1: I end up asking Scott some really tough questions about
Speaker 1: Uber and autonomous cars and a future where car ownership
Speaker 1: may become a thing of the past. If you listen carefully,
Speaker 1: you can hear the exact moment his heartbreaks. Here we go,
Speaker 1: you know, to really dive into this topic. I decided
Speaker 1: I could not do this as just a solo episode,
Speaker 1: so I have brought in the foremost mind on automotive
Speaker 1: issues here at How Stuff Works, Scott Benjamin. Scott, thanks
Speaker 1: for coming in. Oh, thank you much. The foremost mind
Speaker 1: maybe on this floor in this building, I think for
Speaker 1: How Stuff Works was a fair clarification. Yeah, we're we're um,
Speaker 1: We're happy to have you on again, And of course,
Speaker 1: I mean I love having Scott on the show because
Speaker 1: Scott is game for anything. Thank you appreciated. I'd love
Speaker 1: being here. It's a fun conversation usually. Yeah, this was
Speaker 1: great because I actually I came up to Scott today
Speaker 1: this morning a little peek behind the curtain and said,
Speaker 1: would you mind jumping in? You said sure. So we're
Speaker 1: gonna talk a little bit about the implications of Uber
Speaker 1: and sort of I want to I want to kind
Speaker 1: of find out what your thoughts are on Uber the
Speaker 1: service in general, and also more specifically this proposed future
Speaker 1: of Uber where we have a fleet of electric robo
Speaker 1: cars taking us wherever we go, and we don't own
Speaker 1: any of them with no driver. With no driver, yeah,
Speaker 1: because you know, you want to get rid of that
Speaker 1: pesky person that you have to pay, so autonomous Uber
Speaker 1: vehicles is what we're talking about. Yeah, all right, Uh,
Speaker 1: well it's an interesting thought, isn't it. Yeah, I figured so.
Speaker 1: So for those who don't know you, Scott, I think
Speaker 1: it's fair to say that you enjoy cars. I've really
Speaker 1: enjoyed Yeah, yeah, every every aspect of it. And you know,
Speaker 1: I I initially when I when I started doing our
Speaker 1: own car stuff podcast years ago, seven, eight years ago,
Speaker 1: whatever it is now. Um, I was a nonbeliever in
Speaker 1: the self driving vehicles well, and especially at that time.
Speaker 1: I mean the technology was so young, right yeah. I
Speaker 1: think we've talked about that that it required so much
Speaker 1: infrastructure at that time, even even seven years ago for
Speaker 1: it to work. You know, they've been toying around with
Speaker 1: this for a long long time, I mean decades, and
Speaker 1: I've seen some of the older vehicles, you know, from
Speaker 1: the early in eighteen seventies, late nineteen sixties that had
Speaker 1: enormous boxes that were tied to them and they were
Speaker 1: there were embedded wires in the road, and you know,
Speaker 1: even then they sort of worked, but not really. You know,
Speaker 1: it was it was kind of just a mixed match
Speaker 1: of all different types of components that were added to
Speaker 1: the vehicle, add ons to a standard vehicle. And now
Speaker 1: they're designing cars to be autonomous in different ways, like
Speaker 1: with um you know, the lane departure systems and the
Speaker 1: you know, the the adaptive cruise control systems and you
Speaker 1: know all that stuff that exactly all those little components
Speaker 1: that are now starting to come together starting to gel
Speaker 1: I guess into one vehicle that is doing all that
Speaker 1: stuff with much smaller, smaller components. Try. I guess, you know,
Speaker 1: because the technology is getting better, you no longer have
Speaker 1: these like gigantic cones or periscopes or things necessarily, although
Speaker 1: depending on some of the vehicles, like Google's approach tends
Speaker 1: to have, you know, a noticeable protrusion on the top
Speaker 1: of the vehicle, and you realize that's where a lot
Speaker 1: of the brains or at least the senses of this
Speaker 1: vehicle reside. Sure, but their cars out there that have
Speaker 1: that same stuff and it's all embedded within, you'd never
Speaker 1: know that it's there. And the biggest thing about this
Speaker 1: whole thing, and I know that I do that kind
Speaker 1: of lead in for every time I talk about autonomous vehicles,
Speaker 1: but the biggest thing is the the the removal of
Speaker 1: the requirement of the infrastructure for this to work. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the fact that the early vision of autonomous cars were
Speaker 1: it really wasn't about the cars. It was about the freeways, right,
Speaker 1: Like the idea of these autonomous highways that cars would
Speaker 1: kind of link into almost like a slot car, and
Speaker 1: and the vehicle itself would be largely a dumb machine
Speaker 1: that would respond to the the needs and the commands
Speaker 1: of the highway. We we moved away from that where
Speaker 1: all of that ended up being internalized into the vehicle.
Speaker 1: Although you know, there's some discussion about making smart roads
Speaker 1: and um, larger systems that are made up of these
Speaker 1: individual components, almost like the cars become neurons in a
Speaker 1: brain that's made up of highways and other vehicles. But
Speaker 1: for the most part, we've we've kind of moved all
Speaker 1: of that technology into the vehicle itself, which definitely removes
Speaker 1: a lot of the problems that we saw seven or
Speaker 1: eight years ago, when the thought was in order for
Speaker 1: this to work, we'd have to make such a huge
Speaker 1: change in existing infrastructure that it's too large of a
Speaker 1: job and too expensive of a prospect for it to
Speaker 1: ever become a reality. Sure. Yeah, And I mean we
Speaker 1: still are seeing little bits of this and that. You know,
Speaker 1: there's self parking cars and they only work in certain
Speaker 1: parking lots, uh, you know, parking lots that have that
Speaker 1: technology embedded within the within the pavement or in the
Speaker 1: walls or however it works. Um. But yeah, I'm now
Speaker 1: a firm believer in the idea that this can This
Speaker 1: is possible, this can happen, and the the idea that
Speaker 1: somebody would summon a taxi an Uber, I guess, an
Speaker 1: Uber vehicle instead of a taxi, and I have it,
Speaker 1: you know, arrive on the scene within thirty seconds. I
Speaker 1: think that's the goal here, right, arrive in thirty seconds
Speaker 1: and you get in and it takes you to where
Speaker 1: you want to go automatically and lets you out your charge, which,
Speaker 1: of course, you know, the way Uber normally does. There's
Speaker 1: no cash transactiontion has to happen or anything like that,
Speaker 1: um aside from having to have an awkward conversation with
Speaker 1: the driver. Uh, this this seems like it's a good
Speaker 1: way to go, right. I mean, just imagine that you
Speaker 1: throw in as long as you throw in the ability
Speaker 1: to have voice commands, to have the radio station of
Speaker 1: your choice playing. Yeah. Did I say that right? Because
Speaker 1: what I was saying was, you know, you usually, I
Speaker 1: guess in a typical cab, I always feel that that
Speaker 1: pressure to kind of chat with the guy. I would
Speaker 1: I would say that for at least the first two
Speaker 1: miles of any trip in any vehicle, I feel there's
Speaker 1: a social obligation to attempt a conversation and based upon
Speaker 1: how awkward that conversation is. At the end of two miles,
Speaker 1: you then have to make a very tough decision do
Speaker 1: I continue this awkward experience or is it okay for
Speaker 1: me to trail off at this point. I've had many
Speaker 1: enjoyable conversations with cab drives chest and I'm sure that
Speaker 1: Uber drivers are the same way I've had. I've had
Speaker 1: conversations that, for one, don't involve working for Uber, that
Speaker 1: that you have to get through. There are a couple
Speaker 1: of things you gotta get past right there, the typical conversations.
Speaker 1: So this is true for taxi drivers as well. Uh,
Speaker 1: there's there's the weather, and there's traffic. Those are the
Speaker 1: two you gotta get past first. Then with Uber you
Speaker 1: have to get past the so yeah, I love Uber
Speaker 1: or whatever, or you don't love Uber, or however you
Speaker 1: want to breach that, and then after that you can
Speaker 1: get into other areas of conversation. I've had some great ones,
Speaker 1: but I know a lot of people who say that's
Speaker 1: one of those elements about this that they are looking
Speaker 1: forward to saying goodbye to the the uh, the feeling
Speaker 1: that you are forced to have a social interaction which
Speaker 1: might say a lot about are continuing journey on this
Speaker 1: pathway where we compartmentalize everything and we no longer have
Speaker 1: to deal with people like we we can do all
Speaker 1: our shopping online, we can do all of our we
Speaker 1: can ride around in a robot car. That says a
Speaker 1: lot about who we are as people. But at the
Speaker 1: same time, you think, well, if you just want to
Speaker 1: you just want to get to where you're going, and
Speaker 1: you're not looking to have that kind of interaction, You're
Speaker 1: you know, you just you're just literally you just need
Speaker 1: to get from point A to point B. I can
Speaker 1: see the appeal in it. Yeah, I can't too. I
Speaker 1: can understand that. Now. I wonder, I just wonder how
Speaker 1: many people are gonna be really comfortable the first time
Speaker 1: they get into a vehicle that has no driver that
Speaker 1: then sets out onto New York City street and uh
Speaker 1: and all the congestion and traffic and people and all
Speaker 1: that that comes with that, you know, knowing that, and
Speaker 1: I would assume they know already that this is going
Speaker 1: to be an autonomous vehicle. It's kind of pick them
Speaker 1: up because the Apple tell them that. You know, because
Speaker 1: normally a spot that shows you shows your driver, you know,
Speaker 1: who it is. If it just shows you a picture
Speaker 1: of a vehicle, then that's that's an indicator right there. Ye, well,
Speaker 1: I mean it's it's really going to be incident, interesting
Speaker 1: or fascinting to see how people react to that, especially
Speaker 1: if they're not really accustomed to it, you know, the
Speaker 1: very first ride that they ever take. I would be
Speaker 1: just be excited to see what people's reaction to be, like,
Speaker 1: you know, an in car camera view of people kind
Speaker 1: of laughing, giggling about it. You know, it's got to
Speaker 1: be kind of scary in a way, but also fun. Yeah, exhilarating. Yeah,
Speaker 1: almost like an amusement park right at first. Really, I
Speaker 1: think I think wherever when we get to the point
Speaker 1: where Uber is ready to launch a prototype version of this,
Speaker 1: like a beta version of this, that will definitely be
Speaker 1: part of It will probably end up being one of
Speaker 1: those things where you use the app it asks would
Speaker 1: you be willing to do this? And if so, do
Speaker 1: you agree to allow video of this to be displayed
Speaker 1: because obviously otherwise you've got this whole privacy issue about
Speaker 1: a person getting into a vehicle and having their their
Speaker 1: video image taken. But I would I would jump at
Speaker 1: that chance. You know, you make a good point. I
Speaker 1: was thinking about this. What happens? Okay, so, um, let's
Speaker 1: say that a group of people are out drinking at night,
Speaker 1: and uh, invariably there's gonna be somebody who gets sick
Speaker 1: in the car car sick? Right? What happens in Drivel's car?
Speaker 1: Because there's nobody there to say this car is out
Speaker 1: of service right because of this issue? You know, like
Speaker 1: an uber driver or taxi driver would say, I gotta,
Speaker 1: I gotta take an hour off and get this cleaned up.
Speaker 1: What happens in an autonomous vehicle that has another stop
Speaker 1: scheduled forty five seconds away from where they just dropped
Speaker 1: that Person's an excellent question. I wonder. I don't know
Speaker 1: how that's gonna have to have you have to have
Speaker 1: puke sensors inside the vehicle, because that would be to
Speaker 1: be an unpleasant surprise. Yeah, no, I definitely I would not.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm sure one way one thing you could
Speaker 1: do to address that. It's not the ideal version, obviously,
Speaker 1: is that you build into the app the ability to
Speaker 1: say the car that was sent is needs to be serviced,
Speaker 1: and then the robot car would immediately high tail it
Speaker 1: back to h Q and then another vehicle would be
Speaker 1: sent out. But that requires the person to already have
Speaker 1: experienced the unpleasant scenario of opening up a door and going,
Speaker 1: whoa that is not fit for human beings to get
Speaker 1: into right now, that's true, and you can't rely on
Speaker 1: the person before that too, you know, I don't know,
Speaker 1: hit a button or something that said send back to
Speaker 1: main service brand. You certainly wouldn't want anyone to be
Speaker 1: able to abuse, such like someone just being a jerk
Speaker 1: and saying, all right now for haasake, I'm gonna push
Speaker 1: this button and the car is going to go offline,
Speaker 1: which is going to affect possibly someone else down the
Speaker 1: line by making them wait an extra minute and a
Speaker 1: half or however long it might be. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: an interesting question that I don't think there's an answer
Speaker 1: to yet unless you do have, um, some other weird
Speaker 1: sensors in there. Even if you have a camera, you
Speaker 1: still have to have someone watching it to see what's
Speaker 1: going on, right, So you know, some of the other
Speaker 1: things that I was just thinking about a few different
Speaker 1: scenarios of things that could happen. And you know, there's
Speaker 1: a limit in cabs when you when you get in,
Speaker 1: there's a you know, a seat limit, you know, a
Speaker 1: number of people that are allowed to share affair, and
Speaker 1: otherwise they're charged more. How do they how do they
Speaker 1: protect against something like that in in an autonomous vehicle
Speaker 1: where there's not a driver to say, hey, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: you can't put eight people in this car? Well, you know,
Speaker 1: and I've seen for for that because as Uber does
Speaker 1: not add an extra fee for the number of people
Speaker 1: who are right, I've actually seen the suggestion that for
Speaker 1: the Uber app, you would end up indicating how larger
Speaker 1: party is when you would request it for for an
Speaker 1: electric autonomous service if we ever get to that point.
Speaker 1: Part of the idea is that they would deploy a
Speaker 1: fleet of vehicles that would meet the general needs of
Speaker 1: the average day. So uh for New York City, for example,
Speaker 1: most cab rides require are are for one or two
Speaker 1: people and that's it. Um then you have a few
Speaker 1: that need you know, it's a larger party, like a
Speaker 1: family with luggage, And the idea being that the app
Speaker 1: itself would have it built in so that you could
Speaker 1: say I need a cab for two people, or I
Speaker 1: need to have a van for a group of six
Speaker 1: and the reason being is that that way the service
Speaker 1: can have just the size vehicles it needs for the
Speaker 1: region it needs, and the people who are using the
Speaker 1: app will have the experience that is still a positive experience,
Speaker 1: as opposed to, well, you know what, we're gonna save
Speaker 1: some money, We're just gonna cram eight college students into
Speaker 1: the sedan. That's what I was thinking, is how did
Speaker 1: they guard against something like that? They do? They do
Speaker 1: summon a sedan, and then they decided to cram eight
Speaker 1: or ten people into that sedan, even though that it's
Speaker 1: not even though it's not supposed to do that. I mean,
Speaker 1: would there be sensors that somehow indicate the number of
Speaker 1: people to come in, you know, come into the vehicle,
Speaker 1: or that you know, the weight of the vehicle has
Speaker 1: been exceeded or something. At least in that case, you
Speaker 1: can rest assured that the vehicle itself will still operate
Speaker 1: as safely as possible. It's just the interior will not
Speaker 1: be so safe for the people already, right again it yeah,
Speaker 1: I wonder, I just wonder where this is going, Like,
Speaker 1: is it gonna be a vehicle that doesn't even have
Speaker 1: a steering wheel, doesn't even have controls. Is it gonna
Speaker 1: be something where the driver's area is still there but
Speaker 1: but blocked off somehow, you know, like a cage around,
Speaker 1: or could it even be where the driver's area is
Speaker 1: open for seating. It's just there're no there are no
Speaker 1: accessible controls, right there, Zero controls like that. It wasn't
Speaker 1: that the Google cars like that? Right? Yeah? The little
Speaker 1: prototype car where you look, you've got like a button
Speaker 1: that you press. Essentially, you push a button that says
Speaker 1: go now, and it goes. I'm fully in favor of that.
Speaker 1: I love that idea. One of the reasons why we
Speaker 1: why I think that Uber's plan is more realistic version
Speaker 1: of the future of autonomous cars then say I'm going
Speaker 1: to have my own autonomous car is one of price.
Speaker 1: And we were talking about this before we started recording. Uh.
Speaker 1: The The commonly quoted figure is that autonomous technology will
Speaker 1: add about a hundred fifty thousand dollars to the price
Speaker 1: tag of any vehicle. So take a vehicle, any vehicle,
Speaker 1: and then say, all right, convert that so it's an
Speaker 1: autonomous vehicle. You add a hundred fifty dollars to the
Speaker 1: price tag of that. That puts most cars well out
Speaker 1: of the range of most people's budgets. Cars are expensive
Speaker 1: to begin with, right, And we were trying to find
Speaker 1: a good example of this, Yes, And the example that
Speaker 1: I came up with was the car that is probably
Speaker 1: the closest to a self driving vehicle that's on the
Speaker 1: road right now, Yeah, that that consumers can purchase exactly right,
Speaker 1: there's a Mercedes Benz S five hundred that has a
Speaker 1: system called intelligent Drive and intelligent drive and if we
Speaker 1: haven't already mentioned this on this podcast before, it's basically
Speaker 1: a self driving vehicle, but they can't legally call it that.
Speaker 1: It's still you still have to have a driver in
Speaker 1: the driver position. Driver doesn't have to do anything programming
Speaker 1: the coordinates, and the car goes. I've watched videos of
Speaker 1: it in action and it's flawless and the way it works. Um.
Speaker 1: But the cost of a a s An S five
Speaker 1: hundred with intelligent drive is about two hundred and eighty
Speaker 1: six thousand dollars. That's a that's a that's a lot
Speaker 1: of chedder. Yeah, that is a lot of shudder, that's right. Um.
Speaker 1: And just to try to compare that, we were looking
Speaker 1: for a version of that car that doesn't have the
Speaker 1: intelligent drive. And the closest we could get was another
Speaker 1: S series vehicle and instead of the five hundreds of
Speaker 1: five fifty, but the M S R P on that
Speaker 1: vehicle is only dollars now, so nearly two dollars less.
Speaker 1: Nearly yes, And so that shows you just how much
Speaker 1: technology is packed into that S S five hundred with
Speaker 1: intelligent drive. And again this is a car where everything
Speaker 1: is really streamlined. I mean it's it's mostly tucked away.
Speaker 1: You still you do see a few uh controls and
Speaker 1: you see if you, um, modules, I guess you wouldn't
Speaker 1: find on a normal S five hundred that that have,
Speaker 1: you know, the the electronic I type stuff. I guess
Speaker 1: it's for lack of better term, but um, it's really
Speaker 1: well tucked away. It's well designed. It's it's it's not
Speaker 1: you know, the big boxes on the hanging off the
Speaker 1: front fenders like you know, the old style stuff that
Speaker 1: we've seen. Right, people aren't going to look at this
Speaker 1: vehicle and say, hey, what's that for necessarily unless they're
Speaker 1: really paying close attention. And if you didn't know this
Speaker 1: car intelligent drive, and unless it has a badge on
Speaker 1: it that says intelligent drive. You wouldn't even know that
Speaker 1: it was one of these vehicles, you know, versus a
Speaker 1: regular S five hundred. So the conclude SHO I come
Speaker 1: to with this is that these cars are likely not
Speaker 1: going to be something that that the average person is
Speaker 1: going to be able to afford any time in the
Speaker 1: near future, even even assuming that car manufacturers build what
Speaker 1: are fully autonomous vehicles and put them out on the market,
Speaker 1: because we're getting you know, this car, like you say,
Speaker 1: is about the closest that we have to that, and
Speaker 1: it's it's pretty much capable of doing it. Yeah. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's other manufacturers that are toying around this too, but
Speaker 1: but Mercedes Benz is one that's been out there in
Speaker 1: the forefront, and so is UM well BMW and Audie
Speaker 1: and of course Tessa is working on something. Nissan is
Speaker 1: testing a leaf for autonomous vehicle, for autonomous drive. Um.
Speaker 1: It seems like all manufacturers have something in the works,
Speaker 1: but it's always ten years out. It's always gonna be
Speaker 1: ten years away, and and I just really wonder when
Speaker 1: they're gonna finally say this is an autonomous vehicle. You
Speaker 1: don't have to have a driver in the driver position.
Speaker 1: You could you could have everybody in the back seat
Speaker 1: if you wanted and go to church or go wherever
Speaker 1: you're gonna go. Yeah, I think it's I think it's
Speaker 1: a combination of the cost. That's a big one where
Speaker 1: they're trying to figure out, well, how can we get
Speaker 1: this down to a cost where it's worth it for
Speaker 1: us to even build the thing, because if we if
Speaker 1: we build, you know, a thousand of these, and we're
Speaker 1: only able to sell ten, there's no point in doing it.
Speaker 1: Then there's also policy, you know, making sure that it's
Speaker 1: actually legal in in the places where you sell the
Speaker 1: vehicle for someone to be able to ride in that
Speaker 1: vehicle without being in control of the car. I think
Speaker 1: that's the big one. That's that's a big one. It's
Speaker 1: why I think the price and the legality are the
Speaker 1: two biggest obstacles. It's not the technology. The technology is
Speaker 1: pretty much there, and technology is definitely there. I think
Speaker 1: the highest hurdle right now is is the legal issues, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, the regulations that don't allow for something like that, right,
Speaker 1: and so assuming that we get to a point where
Speaker 1: the regulations are no longer an issue, the price then
Speaker 1: becomes the chief obstacle. And I think that as processes
Speaker 1: continue to improve, you know, we see prices come down
Speaker 1: when we start streamlining those manufacturing processes and things like that,
Speaker 1: and the technology continues to evolve. But even so, a
Speaker 1: hundred fifty is a huge amount of money, so so
Speaker 1: reducing that I don't think we're ever going to get
Speaker 1: it where that ends up being a five thousand dollar
Speaker 1: price hike on a car. And I don't think so either.
Speaker 1: But and in our our case is extreme. That's a
Speaker 1: Mercedes Ben's S class. That's a that's a big luxury
Speaker 1: such sure, I mean that that's already a luxury vehicle.
Speaker 1: It's it's going to be expensive no matter what it
Speaker 1: really is. But and and the price to upgrade to
Speaker 1: that type of system is always going to be more
Speaker 1: than it would be. Let's say, if they if they
Speaker 1: did build a Nissan Leaf that has a system like this, um,
Speaker 1: it's just going to be that much more. It's a
Speaker 1: you know, within scale. I guess it's going to be balanced,
Speaker 1: I would hope. So, I mean, it's still is going
Speaker 1: to be a very expensive vehicle compared to one that
Speaker 1: would not have the autonomous controls, which is why I
Speaker 1: think the Uber approach. This idea of having a fleet
Speaker 1: of autonomous vehicles is more realistic a fleet operated by
Speaker 1: a service. I think that's more realistic than and personal
Speaker 1: vehicles that are autonomously controlled, at least in the near future.
Speaker 1: So I think, say, let's say it's five years into
Speaker 1: the future, and we've we've ironed out the legal issues,
Speaker 1: we've ironed out the the technology, so everything on that
Speaker 1: side is fine. I think the price is still going
Speaker 1: to be prohibitive for the majority of car perspective car owners,
Speaker 1: but for services like Uber, it makes perfect sense. You
Speaker 1: go out and you buy a whole bunch of these,
Speaker 1: and sure they're expensive, and before you weren't necessarily we're
Speaker 1: worrying about maintaining a fleet of cars because your drivers
Speaker 1: did that for you. But now you don't have drivers
Speaker 1: to pay, so right now, Uber takes between of every
Speaker 1: fair so that's their commission, which means that seventy two
Speaker 1: percent goes to the driver and it varies depending upon
Speaker 1: the market. Uh, well, you cut out the driver. You
Speaker 1: don't pay robots, Scott, I don't know if you know this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: robots robots are are. I mean, you know, they're expensive
Speaker 1: to buy, but they work for free since sophisticated that root. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess. So if you have a robot that doesn't
Speaker 1: do much other than maybe walk a few feet before
Speaker 1: falling over, it may not be as expensive as one
Speaker 1: that can drive a vehicle. But the point being that,
Speaker 1: you know, even though the the initial cost is high, uh,
Speaker 1: and you do have to worry about maintaining the vehicle.
Speaker 1: Obviously you don't pay so all of that money instead
Speaker 1: of instead of taking affairs, goes to the company. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and and maintenance. But you you figure, well, if if
Speaker 1: on the paper on paper, if it makes sense, then
Speaker 1: let's make this change because now we don't have to
Speaker 1: worry about drivers. Also, I mean, there are a ton
Speaker 1: of issues that I've talked about about how Uber drivers
Speaker 1: have had. There's been some terrible incidents with Uber drivers
Speaker 1: and passengers. You don't have to worry about that with
Speaker 1: a robot like that. Yeah. So there there's that as well.
Speaker 1: So there's a very attractive case to be made for
Speaker 1: a service like Uber to make the switch. And I
Speaker 1: think that for autonomous cars to become a reality where
Speaker 1: we can jump into one on any given day, at
Speaker 1: least in the near future, it's going to be through
Speaker 1: something like if it's not Uber, it's going to be
Speaker 1: something very similar to Uber. And it's not likely to
Speaker 1: be a world where I go out to the dealership
Speaker 1: and I buy an autonomous car. I mean, I hope
Speaker 1: to make enough money where that could be a reality
Speaker 1: for me. But I'm not being honestly in you know,
Speaker 1: as they always say ten years, you never know. I mean,
Speaker 1: you really never know what's gonna be out there and
Speaker 1: what's what's the what what the price point is going
Speaker 1: to be on it, because they may bring it down.
Speaker 1: I know, the cars are continually getting more and more expensive.
Speaker 1: And then to add that autonomous feature onto it, as
Speaker 1: we said, it's going to add quite a bit of money.
Speaker 1: But if that's a feature that you have to have
Speaker 1: in a vehicle or you really want to have in
Speaker 1: a vehicle, it's a it's probably more of a want
Speaker 1: thing if you're buying a car. UM I think that
Speaker 1: I think plenty of people will buy a car that's
Speaker 1: autonomous from a dealership. I mean individuals, not just fleet
Speaker 1: managers that are you looking to save money on delivery
Speaker 1: vehicles or something that can make um you know, instead
Speaker 1: of delivering people, they're delivering products, right, Um, yeah, like
Speaker 1: like Amazon or ups or fed X or whatever. Yeah,
Speaker 1: imagine having an automated FedEx truck drive up to your
Speaker 1: house and and somehow get that package to your door.
Speaker 1: I guess maybe you'd have to come out and get
Speaker 1: it yourself, and would be an awful system. Yeah there
Speaker 1: my catapult, I mean exactly, or or or you know,
Speaker 1: just it's a truck that's just carrying drones. Oh that's
Speaker 1: the drones fly out the back and drop the package
Speaker 1: off and then drive back in and the drones make
Speaker 1: last thirty feet is what you're saying. That's a good idea, Yeah,
Speaker 1: because then you just end up having to you know,
Speaker 1: like I said, if you have the charging stations inside
Speaker 1: the vehicle, then the drones are constantly recharging their batteries.
Speaker 1: They don't have to worry about running down after one trip.
Speaker 1: Not bad, I mean, you know, I'm just saying, if
Speaker 1: you want to use that idea, I can be paid.
Speaker 1: All right. So well, well, let me let me paint
Speaker 1: for you what I what I think would be Scott's
Speaker 1: dystopian future, the Nightmarish future. So let's say that you know,
Speaker 1: one of the arguments I've seen about about the uber
Speaker 1: electric autonomous fleet UH. In support of it is that
Speaker 1: it would negate the need to own a car in
Speaker 1: dense urban environments. So UH. In in New York City,
Speaker 1: for example, the average of the number of people who
Speaker 1: own vehicles is well below that of the national average.
Speaker 1: National average, I think it's somewhere in the range of
Speaker 1: of households own a car. In Manhattan it's at it's lowest.
Speaker 1: It's somewhere like around or so. Parking is at a premium. UH.
Speaker 1: And you know, there are other alternatives to getting around.
Speaker 1: And if if most of your travel is within you know,
Speaker 1: just a few miles of where you live, then you
Speaker 1: can take cabs, the subway, or walk to a lot
Speaker 1: of your desk nations, you don't need a car. UH.
Speaker 1: There the other boroughs in New York the numbers are higher,
Speaker 1: I think, like in Brooklyn it's slightly higher. And then
Speaker 1: by the time you get to Long Island and it's
Speaker 1: it's closer to the national average. It's still below it,
Speaker 1: but it's closer. UM. So let's say we go into
Speaker 1: a future where, at least for dense and urban environments,
Speaker 1: the need to own a car is completely removed because
Speaker 1: you've got this fleet of electric vehicles will come and
Speaker 1: pick you up on demand. You don't have to worry
Speaker 1: about where you're going. You know, the fact that you
Speaker 1: own a piece of property that is incredibly expensive and
Speaker 1: nine of the time is sitting idle, would mean that
Speaker 1: you would be able to use that space, that and
Speaker 1: that money for something else, assuming of course, that the
Speaker 1: cost you would incur taking these trips from this service
Speaker 1: would be less than what it would be to own
Speaker 1: and maintain a vehicle. And if you want to go
Speaker 1: outside of the city, you would rent the vehicle for
Speaker 1: the day, or for the week, or however long you
Speaker 1: need it, right right, So, so let to say that
Speaker 1: we are on in this future where you no longer
Speaker 1: need to own a car because of the reasons I've said,
Speaker 1: and because it's been demonstrated that that autonomous vehicles are safer,
Speaker 1: is now illegal for humans to operate a car. What
Speaker 1: do you think of that, fat, I do not like
Speaker 1: that that. I mean taking that out of the hands
Speaker 1: of individuals. I mean, to be able to drive, they
Speaker 1: have the freedom to drive a vehicle. Yeah, oh man,
Speaker 1: that's that's an awful thought. Jan Yeah, it's it's coming Scott.
Speaker 1: That day is con be illegal to drive. I'd say
Speaker 1: within fifteen years. Fifteen years it will be illegal for
Speaker 1: a human operator car because the the can't believe what
Speaker 1: I'm hearing, the demonstration of how you know the fact
Speaker 1: that that there will be a dramatic reduction in UH accidents.
Speaker 1: There will be that. Thus, there will be this whole
Speaker 1: change in the insurance landscape, there will be a big
Speaker 1: change in the medical escape. It will cost less money
Speaker 1: for across multiple industries to have this in place, that
Speaker 1: the idea of a person operating a vehicle would be
Speaker 1: such a huge monetary cost, let alone the ability or
Speaker 1: the the potential for an accident to happen. It will
Speaker 1: be illegal for a human being top right a car.
Speaker 1: I really can't believe that here in fifteen years. I
Speaker 1: think is being really super aggressive with that prediction. But
Speaker 1: it is going to happen. I don't think that there
Speaker 1: are enough people that would give up that freedom, you know,
Speaker 1: that would say, well, you know, you say that, but
Speaker 1: you may get legal and then suddenly, I mean granted
Speaker 1: that there are votes held on it. I'm sure there
Speaker 1: will be a lot of resistance, but it will become
Speaker 1: more and more difficult to hold out against that, and
Speaker 1: keep in mind we also have a generation behind us
Speaker 1: Scott of people who don't want to own cars. Okay,
Speaker 1: there's a boy, Where do I start with this one?
Speaker 1: I don't think that's true either. I really don't think that.
Speaker 1: You don't think that. The only thing that there's a
Speaker 1: generation of millennials who are uh not as interested in
Speaker 1: owning a vehicle because of the costs and and other
Speaker 1: things things associated with it. I'm not buying that. I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't really get the I don't think the numbers
Speaker 1: are what they say they are. I think that I
Speaker 1: think there are more kids that still want that freedom,
Speaker 1: still want to be able to go out and you know,
Speaker 1: go somewhere on their own. I don't think that the
Speaker 1: cell phone or the uh, you know, the smartphones has
Speaker 1: completely replaced the automobile, because that's what the argument is, right,
Speaker 1: is that you know, if I can you know, Instagram
Speaker 1: or snapchat with my friends all day, I don't really
Speaker 1: need to drive over their house anymore. I don't. I
Speaker 1: don't think that's really the case. I think people still
Speaker 1: will want to interact with each other and still but
Speaker 1: in the future where you have your smartphone and that's
Speaker 1: what brings the car to you, and then you're the
Speaker 1: car goes away and you don't have to worry about
Speaker 1: it again. I'm not gonna win this name. That's the smartphone,
Speaker 1: still the king, just saying welcome to my future. This
Speaker 1: has a bit of a feel of almost like not
Speaker 1: got you journalism, but like I set up like it's
Speaker 1: a trap, grinning like a chess air cat when I
Speaker 1: walked in there, so I knew that something was but
Speaker 1: I didn't. You're gonna me with Cars will be illegal
Speaker 1: in years car ownership and will not not even car ownership,
Speaker 1: but car operation will be illegal in fifteen years. Cars
Speaker 1: themselves will still be perfectly legal. They just have to
Speaker 1: be operated by a machine the government, well by by
Speaker 1: giant corporations, which is one step away from the government.
Speaker 1: Commentary over from Jonathan Strickland. But we're not I was
Speaker 1: mostly winding you up, Scott. We're mostly winding up. But
Speaker 1: I will say that there are a lot of people
Speaker 1: who actually argue that this is in fact the way
Speaker 1: things are going to move, because again, it will get
Speaker 1: harder and harder to make the argument against this movement
Speaker 1: simply from a numbers perspective, if you're able to say, like, well,
Speaker 1: look at the number of deaths that occurred due to
Speaker 1: automobile accidents and see how far they've dropped since autonomous
Speaker 1: cars have become um, you know, increasingly popular, and ultimately
Speaker 1: that may drive legislation. I think that in the United
Speaker 1: States it really will take longer than fifteen years for
Speaker 1: this to happen now, probably because we have such a
Speaker 1: car culture here. It's not gonna happen. It is going
Speaker 1: to happen. So but but I'll tell you what I'll
Speaker 1: put it. I'll put it off far enough where you
Speaker 1: won't have to worry about it, right, Like it's like
Speaker 1: seventy years from now. Well that way, see, I'm in
Speaker 1: case there's some incredible like life prolonging technologies. I want
Speaker 1: you to be comfortable. So I'm glad you didn't say
Speaker 1: like that. I'll put it off into like seventeen years
Speaker 1: you want to, I don't want to tell you, but
Speaker 1: I've got planned for you in sixteen years, you know,
Speaker 1: we'll tell you what. Who's you know who's really mad
Speaker 1: about Uber to begin with is his cab drivers. And
Speaker 1: just wait until you start taking people out of those
Speaker 1: Uber vehicles and yeah, that's going to make them just
Speaker 1: over the top angry. Well, and I actually I did
Speaker 1: an episode of forward thinking about robo taxis, and at
Speaker 1: the end of it I asked the question. I said,
Speaker 1: maybe we should actually have some compassion and think ahead
Speaker 1: of time, say all right, well, if this is in
Speaker 1: fact inevitable, if if this is the future we are
Speaker 1: headed to, and it seems like that's a fair bet now,
Speaker 1: But of course you can never say that for sure. Right,
Speaker 1: That's the thing about the future. It's unpredictable when you
Speaker 1: get down to it. But assuming that that is in
Speaker 1: fact the path we are headed down, and that is
Speaker 1: the destination we will arrive at, maybe behooves us to
Speaker 1: go ahead and have the conversation of what what sort
Speaker 1: of opportunities do we look at? How do we where
Speaker 1: do we look to transition the people who are taking
Speaker 1: on driving as a profession, and what other things could
Speaker 1: we look at as because as making an alternative to
Speaker 1: them so that they can still make a living. And
Speaker 1: the biggest answers I got were why are we worried
Speaker 1: about that? Why are we worried about these people? And
Speaker 1: I said, well, because I have compassion and I worry
Speaker 1: about people who would be impact and they said, well,
Speaker 1: you know, we've never really worried about that in the past.
Speaker 1: Like when the loom was invented. You didn't see a
Speaker 1: huge outcry of what are we what are all these
Speaker 1: poor weavers going to do? And I thought, no, we
Speaker 1: had revolutions instead and riots, and that what I'm saying
Speaker 1: is that perhaps maybe some forward thinking about what these
Speaker 1: folks should be doing in lieu of professional driving could
Speaker 1: be preferable to having riots in the streets. You know,
Speaker 1: there have actually been violent riots in response to Uber,
Speaker 1: specifically in Paris. How certainly, yeah, people get people are
Speaker 1: just outright, well, cab drivers are outraged, and companies are outraged.
Speaker 1: And to some degree of success, uh, they have they
Speaker 1: have kept Uber out of certain cities, certain regions. Spain
Speaker 1: and Thailand have banned Uber. China in Portland, Oregon sued
Speaker 1: Uber for coming into Portland. I got a lot of
Speaker 1: thoughts about Portland save that for Portlandia episode Nevada. I think, um,
Speaker 1: what's another one? New Mexico? Maybe is that right? I'm
Speaker 1: not sure about other states, but I do know that,
Speaker 1: uh what an Anchorage, Alaska Uber pulled out of anchorage.
Speaker 1: They had gone in and then after hitting a lot
Speaker 1: of resistance, decided that it wasn't worth the while of
Speaker 1: fighting that fight and left. And Uh, I feel like
Speaker 1: every week there's another city or another region that says
Speaker 1: we're we're outlawing it in this area. Can't you're not
Speaker 1: allowed to pick up at the airport, You're not allowed
Speaker 1: to you know, deliver guests to this this hotel region
Speaker 1: inside of this convention region. I guess where the center is.
Speaker 1: And there's been a lot of of of battles back
Speaker 1: and forth on that, and some of them just end
Speaker 1: up eventually resulting in regulations being passed that that put
Speaker 1: Uber under essentially the same restrictions and and um responsibilities
Speaker 1: as like a taxi service, so drivers would have to
Speaker 1: go and get a permit from issued by the state,
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. Where where it ends up making
Speaker 1: it a more level playing ground between Uber and existing services. Now,
Speaker 1: there's some people who argue that's the wrong way of
Speaker 1: looking at it, that the taxi regulations are based out
Speaker 1: an old and now outdated mode of thinking, and that
Speaker 1: this Uber approach is really the way we should be
Speaker 1: moving forward. It is pretty antiquated with especially the medallion system.
Speaker 1: And that's something that I know that's a thorn in
Speaker 1: a lot of people's side. Yeah, I heard that. I
Speaker 1: think in two thousand thirteen, a medallion in New York
Speaker 1: costs one and a half million dollars something like that.
Speaker 1: I might be off numbers as of today, Okay, I
Speaker 1: looked at these today. I went to a site called
Speaker 1: New York City cab dot com and that's where they buy, sell,
Speaker 1: and lease medallions. And you can go there right now
Speaker 1: and check out what you know, what the going rate
Speaker 1: is right now. But today the lowest price for a
Speaker 1: single medallion as of this morning was seven hundred and
Speaker 1: thirty thousand dollars for the lowest price one that I saw,
Speaker 1: at least on the top, you know, the front page.
Speaker 1: I think there were several pages. But after you get
Speaker 1: past the first page, he gets into like a lot
Speaker 1: of leasing situations. So um, around eight hundred to eight
Speaker 1: hundred twenty thousand dollars was more typical. So I saw
Speaker 1: several for that individual medallions. And then a lot of
Speaker 1: places are a lot of people were selling sets of two,
Speaker 1: so probably cab companies that have gone under, you know
Speaker 1: company meaning two or four vehicles maybe, but they're still
Speaker 1: in two at a time. The highest prices software set
Speaker 1: it too, was one point seven million dollars a little
Speaker 1: bit over that, and uh, I think the there were
Speaker 1: lots of sets for two of two. Rather they were
Speaker 1: going for about one point six million dollars. So it's
Speaker 1: expensive and medallions are essentially that's the authorization of operating
Speaker 1: a vehicle as a cab, and that's gone way way up.
Speaker 1: Because the another site that I went to, and I
Speaker 1: can't remember where this came from, but I quickly scribbled
Speaker 1: down these notes because I found it pretty fascinating that,
Speaker 1: you know, it wasn't that long ago. You know, they
Speaker 1: weren't a million dollars always. You know, they've become more
Speaker 1: and more valuable. So good for the people that are
Speaker 1: holding onto these medallions because they could sell them at
Speaker 1: that price. Those that bought them early on, they made
Speaker 1: quite a bit of money because um, in mid just
Speaker 1: in mid two thousand eleven, it was less than three
Speaker 1: quarters of that price, so that's reasonable. In two thousand
Speaker 1: eight it was almost half the price, and we're talking
Speaker 1: about the million dollar price, so um, you know, in
Speaker 1: two thousand eight it was about five hundred thousand in
Speaker 1: two thousand four, or was about a third of the
Speaker 1: price of about three hundred thousand, and if you had
Speaker 1: gone all the way back to eight to buy one,
Speaker 1: it's about one thousand dollars one thousand, and right now
Speaker 1: you could sell it for eight hundred thousand dollars. I
Speaker 1: think when they first started selling medallion's way back when
Speaker 1: it first started, it was ten bucks ten dollars, but
Speaker 1: then it was also ten bucks in like nineteen thirties
Speaker 1: or some money, I guess. But there's but there's only
Speaker 1: a certain number of medallions available, and that's the thing.
Speaker 1: It's a limited commodity. So there's what thirteen thousand I
Speaker 1: think that somewhere somewhere in the five hundred neighborhood. And
Speaker 1: not all of those get sold every year, Only a
Speaker 1: very small number exchange hands every year. But every year
Speaker 1: it goes up, up, up, and it gets to this
Speaker 1: astronomical level of where, you know, to buy two of them,
Speaker 1: now you're gonna pay a million six And see, that's
Speaker 1: a that's a that's a world. That's you can understand
Speaker 1: why there's this incredible reaction to Uber because that's the
Speaker 1: world that's been you know, really ensconced and and and
Speaker 1: and almost like a fortress has been built around that business. Well,
Speaker 1: if they're allowed to come in, that means that those
Speaker 1: tokens are essentially worthless. Yeah, yeah, and there are worth
Speaker 1: nothing to them at that point, and that that would
Speaker 1: be so frustrating to see that come in and happen.
Speaker 1: I understand that, I completely get it, but you do
Speaker 1: have to kind of look at the way things are
Speaker 1: going I mean, this is like you I feel, this
Speaker 1: is the way that things are going to change. It's
Speaker 1: going to it's going to uh, it's going to have
Speaker 1: to happen this really Yeah. So that's why I keep asking, like, well,
Speaker 1: what we need to think about these things ahead of
Speaker 1: time so that we can at least make the transition
Speaker 1: as smooth as possible. If it's going to happen, then
Speaker 1: let's not you know, put as much energy into fighting
Speaker 1: it or delaying it. Let's put that energy into, well,
Speaker 1: what are some practical ways that we can make sure
Speaker 1: the people who are going to be negatively impacted by
Speaker 1: this are able to find other means of making a
Speaker 1: living and less worry about you know, let's put that
Speaker 1: off until next year, because we're still gonna have to
Speaker 1: deal with it. Let's just let's let's put the energy
Speaker 1: to dealing with it now, coming up with some answers
Speaker 1: so that when this inevitable transition happens, it isn't like
Speaker 1: an incredibly disruptive, painful time. Well, you know, if your
Speaker 1: game is driving, that's your thing, that's your career, that's
Speaker 1: your your chosen path. Uh, it's not like everything is
Speaker 1: gonna switch overnight either. So you're gonna be able to
Speaker 1: move to something else that you know, it may be
Speaker 1: more or less profitable than what you're doing now, but
Speaker 1: you're still gonna be able to do what you've been
Speaker 1: trained to do or what you have done for the
Speaker 1: last twenty years or whatever. Find a different way to
Speaker 1: use that skill in some other form, in another in
Speaker 1: another industry. Maybe you're maybe you're you know, I hate
Speaker 1: to even say like alternatives to it, but um, let's
Speaker 1: say that you're, you know, running documents across town all day,
Speaker 1: you know, for a law firm. Um, but you're making
Speaker 1: money driving again, or you're working for a hospital delivering
Speaker 1: you know, needed medical supplies or something like that. Fine,
Speaker 1: find other alternative routes to uh, you know, to to
Speaker 1: explore with this, and I don't think you know, the
Speaker 1: camp rivers need to be afraid that they're going to
Speaker 1: be completely shut out, you know, overnight. No, it's not
Speaker 1: gonna happen. Now. That's why I say, like it's it's
Speaker 1: good to think of it ahead of time, so that way,
Speaker 1: as the transition happens, you have a plan in place,
Speaker 1: as opposed to that inevitable day comes where you get
Speaker 1: your pink slip because the robots are taking over. Right.
Speaker 1: So I mean, then, by the way, when when I
Speaker 1: talk about this, it's not just with drivers. I mean
Speaker 1: there's so many jobs that are going to be replaced
Speaker 1: through automation. And we're already seeing that. I mean, we've
Speaker 1: seen that in lots of industries already. It's a story
Speaker 1: that's happened over and over again. It will eventually hit
Speaker 1: pretty much every job that's out there. And when the
Speaker 1: robo podcast start, I guess I'll subscribe and I'll just
Speaker 1: weep little tears. You think it will happen someday, I
Speaker 1: don't know. Maybe. I mean if we ever, if we
Speaker 1: ever can create an artificial intelligence that can actually innovate
Speaker 1: as in come up with interesting things to say and
Speaker 1: not just parrot them and repeat them. I'm out of
Speaker 1: a job all day. You know, I'm all for a
Speaker 1: robot running the Car Stuff podcast, as long as does
Speaker 1: it stumble around as much as I do, because I
Speaker 1: tend to wander off on you know, um just stories
Speaker 1: they go nowhere, Like I got a story to tell you,
Speaker 1: but there's going to be a fifteen parter to lead
Speaker 1: into the story bar on that issue. Yeah, I'm all.
Speaker 1: I'm all about that myself for for all of the
Speaker 1: podcasts I do. Scott, thank you for coming on here
Speaker 1: and giving your perspective on these things. That was a
Speaker 1: lot of fun to to chat with you about this
Speaker 1: because obviously we come from this from two very different
Speaker 1: points of view, right. I mean I don't drive, um,
Speaker 1: and clearly you hate cars. Yeah, that's it. I despice cars.
Speaker 1: I have. I I hissedet them vampires style and whenever
Speaker 1: I see one. No, I don't hate cars, but I
Speaker 1: certainly don't like driving. So um, in my world, the
Speaker 1: idea of an electric vehicle that can autonomously take me
Speaker 1: from point A to point B as quickly and efficiently
Speaker 1: as possible, and I don't have to worry about it,
Speaker 1: you know, doing the crossword while trying to drive, which,
Speaker 1: by the way, I have been in a cab where
Speaker 1: the cab driver was filling out a crossword puzzle while
Speaker 1: navigating the streets of New York. Yeah, I would never
Speaker 1: have to worry about that. I want that world to happen.
Speaker 1: But then I'm not Also, I'm also a person who
Speaker 1: and I'm in the minority in the United States, I
Speaker 1: would argue person who does not find any joy in driving.
Speaker 1: So for me, this is precisely what I would want.
Speaker 1: You know what, I totally understand that I know that
Speaker 1: there are people that that can't drive that would also
Speaker 1: appreciate this sure and that in fact, I talked about
Speaker 1: that a little bit in the first part of this podcast,
Speaker 1: where one of the big complaints about uber right now
Speaker 1: is that people with disabilities say that it's not nearly
Speaker 1: accessible enough for those people and that that's something that
Speaker 1: needs to change. And if that did change, it would
Speaker 1: be I mean, the amount of independence that gives somebody
Speaker 1: is it's difficult to explain to someone who has taken
Speaker 1: it for granted. And not only disability, You've got to
Speaker 1: think about aging as well. People that you know, are
Speaker 1: simply get to a point where they're unable to, you know,
Speaker 1: maintain their own license. You know, vision or hearing or
Speaker 1: whatever happens to be. It's usually vision or um, you know,
Speaker 1: physical ability. And this would extend the time that they're
Speaker 1: they have a bit of freedom to move around the city.
Speaker 1: And that's that is very I mean, it's it's it's
Speaker 1: incredibly important. We have an increasingly large aging population in
Speaker 1: the United States where giving that amount of independence and
Speaker 1: extending the independence to someone, I mean, it's difficult to
Speaker 1: put into words how important that is. And you know
Speaker 1: how I mean, just one other level to that whole
Speaker 1: thing is that you know, when you get older like
Speaker 1: that and you're not you're not quite as as I
Speaker 1: guess you're a little more frail than you where when
Speaker 1: you're younger. Um, there's also the safety concern into a cab.
Speaker 1: You know what's going to happen. You know, you're you
Speaker 1: don't know who this person is this picking you up. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I would think that a lot of senior citizens that
Speaker 1: are beyond driving age would feel comfortable getting into a
Speaker 1: vehicle that doesn't have anybody in there. It's it's very
Speaker 1: secure it's very safe. You can lock the doors and
Speaker 1: you know the rest of the world's out there. It
Speaker 1: takes you right to the shopping mall or wherever you're going,
Speaker 1: brings you back home. It's it's pretty safe for it
Speaker 1: for you. Really. Yeah, yeah, I definitely see lots of
Speaker 1: positives about this. I mean, you know, you can't ignore
Speaker 1: the the concerns obviously, but uh, seeing as this is
Speaker 1: the way we both feel we're inevitably going to head,
Speaker 1: I think there are worse futures that we could realize.
Speaker 1: As much as I like to resist the idea, UM,
Speaker 1: I do think it's coming. Yeah. I look forward to,
Speaker 1: uh to revisiting this topic in fifteen years to get
Speaker 1: your your tirade on the day when they outlaw human drivers.
Speaker 1: Why did we ever put them in office? Uh, well,
Speaker 1: that'll that they will will We'll have to wait over
Speaker 1: that day. In the meantime, if you want to check
Speaker 1: out Scott's podcasts, and I highly recommend you do, I
Speaker 1: think you need to go over and check out cars stuff.
Speaker 1: You and Ben cover all sorts of topics. Uh and uh,
Speaker 1: they're always incredibly informative and entertaining. Thank you appreciate that's
Speaker 1: a the wonderful compliment, and we try to not make
Speaker 1: it so dry all the time. We can get a
Speaker 1: little history in there, some fun stuff too. It's not
Speaker 1: just uh, you know, nuts and bolts type stuff. I
Speaker 1: still I mean, like I listened to it. I'm one
Speaker 1: of my favorite ones. I loved them. The coast to
Speaker 1: coast racing. Oh yes, the fastest trip across the United States.
Speaker 1: Right yeah, I think it might have been that one
Speaker 1: ye Canniball run Gumball rally. Whenever we start talking about
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff, I'm like, oh, because even though
Speaker 1: I don't drive, I love those that idea, Like like,
Speaker 1: all right, well let's let's let's break a few laws.
Speaker 1: Maybe you're not as much of a hater as I
Speaker 1: thought too. I am not as much of a hater.
Speaker 1: Just I've got I got the hate filled up to
Speaker 1: the threshold. Bits month speaking over the top. Good to know,
Speaker 1: and thanks for having me on your show. By the way,
Speaker 1: well thank you for for for jumping on at the
Speaker 1: last minute. I really appreciate it. Always fun. All right, guys,
Speaker 1: if you have any suggestions for future topics of tech stuff,
Speaker 1: why don't you just send me an email that addresses
Speaker 1: tech Stuff at how stuff works dot com or drop
Speaker 1: me a line on Twitter or Facebook. I am tech
Speaker 1: Stuff hs W both of those, and I'll talk to
Speaker 1: you again really soon for more on this and batons
Speaker 1: and other topics, because it has stuff works dot com