Are we Waymo's Tests?
from UX Murder Mystery Hosted by Brian J. Crowley and Eve Eden
A driverless Waymo rolls within a few feet of a guns-drawn felony stop in downtown Los Angeles while officers shout directions at a car with no one inside. The company says the whole encounter lasted about 15 seconds. Months later in San Francisco, passengers film themselves pleading with their robotaxi as it drives directly over lit fireworks on the Fourth of July, while a bystander waves at the car to stop. Nobody is hurt in either case. But these are not isolated moments: a robotaxi cutting through a DUI checkpoint with nobody to ticket, 50 vehicles pranked down a dead-end street, dead-battery Waymos towed out of holiday gridlock tell a bigger story. In this episode, Brian and Eve dig into the latest state of Waymo: over 100 million driverless miles, zero reported fatalities, a rapid expansion into new cities and freeways, and a growing pile of edge cases the system was never designed to meet. What happens when the service works exactly as designed and still fails the moment? Who is accountable when there is no driver? And Eve asks the question every rider should be sitting with: are we the tests? For informational/entertainment purposes only. Views are commentary and speculation, not statements of fact. Discussions of real companies/individuals use publicly available info for critique and education. Not factual assertions about motives or intentions. Creators disclaim liability for damages from reliance on content. Events may be dramatized for illustrative purposes.
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