Subject: Re: Shellenberger on Cali
Question of the day. WHY do peaceful protestors want to destroy cameras that would prove they are being abused by law enforcement, and they are protesting peacefully? Embarrassed liberals would like to know. Thank you.
" L.A. Protesters Target Waymo Driverless Cars. It’s a Privacy Issue.
Driverless cars are in focus for protesters in Los Angeles not because of potential job losses for taxi drivers, but because of their cameras. The protests began over the weekend in response to immigration enforcement actions, and escalated Sunday evening to the burning of several Waymo self-driving cars.
Alphabet-owned Waymo told Barron’s it was in touch with law enforcement about the matter. Five of Waymo’s vehicles were vandalized. Waymo has stopped service to downtown L.A. People in other surrounding areas can still call for a Waymo taxi.
Burning a Waymo is an expensive version of someone smashing the phone of a bystander videoing something that person wishes to keep private. But data generated by self-driving cars may well become a bigger issue because the industry is in its infancy.
Waymo has a fleet of more than 1,500 autonomous vehicles in a handful of U.S. cities, completing more than 250,000 paid self-driving cab rides a week. While that is impressive, Uber Technologies, the ride-hailing company, completes hundreds of times that number.
Tesla is days away from launching its self-driving taxi service in Austin, Texas. The company intends to scale up its robo-taxi business by using vehicles owned by regular Americans in an Airbnb-type network and eventually expand elsewhere, including Los Angeles."