Groupthink
Groupthink
Posted Sep 17, 2025 13:34 UTC (Wed) by nim-nim (subscriber, #34454)In reply to: Groupthink by alfille
Parent article: Fighting human trafficking with self-contained applications
Posted Sep 17, 2025 13:55 UTC (Wed)
by pizza (subscriber, #46)
[Link] (4 responses)
A considerable amount of that "overweight and overfeatured" is driven by government regulation.
For example, any passenger vehicle sold today has to have a pretty long list of safety [1] and emissions/efficiency [2] features that considerably drive up the minimum production cost of any vehicle. (And that's before manufacturers try to game the metrics..)
Additionally, thanks to the joys of competition folks expect an ever-greater degree of baseline sophistication and functionality, and there is an ever-wider gap between what-they-say-they-want vs what-they-actually-purchase.
[1] Half a dozen or so airbags, lane departure detection, adaptive cruise control, forward collision warnings and automatic braking, stability control, camera systems (which effectively mandates having a infotainment screen), etc. Granted some of these aren't required _now_ but will have to be present within the next few years.
Posted Sep 17, 2025 14:39 UTC (Wed)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link] (3 responses)
I damn well hope not. The driver is legally obliged to be in full control of the vehicle at all times. How on earth is he supposed to do that if his car accelerates unexpectedly without any driver input whatsoever? And he has no way to over-ride other than to turn the whole damn thing off?
Or equally the car brakes unexpectedly on a motorway without any driver input whatsoever?
(Both usually caused because the car has an internal database and also reads external signs. Throw roadworks into the mix and I've had the car run the pretty much the entire gamut of every legal value between 20mph and 70mph in the distance of maybe 100 yards ... talk about getting confused. Oh, and this is in an area where the City Speed Limit is 50mph.)
My car does both. Fortunately, it's usually on familiar roads and I'm expecting it, but adaptive cruise control is a complete liability. My wife hated the basic cruise control on our previous car. I sure as hell hope she never accidentally activates it on my new car because she'll just lose control ...
Classic feature creep where nobody actually does a risk assessment on each individual creep until we have a major accident ...
Cheers,
Posted Sep 17, 2025 14:44 UTC (Wed)
by jzb (editor, #7867)
[Link]
Posted Sep 17, 2025 14:54 UTC (Wed)
by pizza (subscriber, #46)
[Link] (1 responses)
You reveal a fundamental misunderstanding of what "adaptive cruise control" actually refers to:
https://mycardoeswhat.org/deeper-learning/adaptive-cruise...
> Classic feature creep where nobody actually does a risk assessment on each individual creep until we have a major accident ...
On the contrary, the regulatory bodies have done _exhaustive_ assessments (including multiple rounds of public comments) to establish the operational requirements for these systems, and after being widely deployed for the better part of a decade data unequivocably shows them to be objectively safer (ie lower accident rate per distance driven).
...I'll leave it at that.
Posted Sep 17, 2025 18:31 UTC (Wed)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link]
But unfortunately, my car provides no way to have one without the other :-(
Cheers,
Groupthink
[2] More stringent requirements require more advanced (and expensive, and less reliable) designs.
Groupthink
Wol
End here, please
Groupthink
Groupthink
Wol