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San Francisco is considering a ban on delivery robots, those cute little boxes on wheels that are being tried out in Washington by Starship Industries and now in San Francisco by Marble. A supervisor used the same words I have used on TreeHugger in Sidewalks are for people. Should we let the robots steal them? April Glaser writes in Recode:
"Our streets and our sidewalks are made for people, not robots," said Supervisor Yee in an interview with Recode. "This is consistent with how we operate in the city, where we don't allow bikes or skateboards on sidewalks."... Yee worries that the robots aren't safe, saying that seniors, people with disabilities and children won't be able move out of the way quickly enough as these machines roll down city sidewalks at walking speed.
Representatives for the robots had no comment.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Friday June 02 2017, @10:53PM (6 children)
Why go through all that trouble? Booting one of those fuckers into the street would be a million times more gratifying with 99% less cost and effort.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday June 02 2017, @11:25PM (1 child)
Or simple add some dog shit to the load compartment.. ;)
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Saturday June 03 2017, @04:51AM
by poking your finger in the back of your throat.
Or take a piss on it.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by Arik on Saturday June 03 2017, @12:50AM (3 children)
Look these things are full of cameras and microphones and speakers and antennas and they're always connected and they'll call the cops.
If you think playing games with the cops is fun then sure, EMP the fucker and do your thing and run. Enjoy that adrenalin rush. Don't try to keep doing it or you'll get caught and they'll throw the book at you though.
I wouldn't do that. Maybe I would have when I was much younger, but I'm not even sure of that. Seems a bit over the top.
What I would do is stand my ground though. And absolutely kick this thing out into the street on its side if it gave me an excuse. And not have any fear of talking to the cops about it afterwards if they have the balls to call them. Very different situations, no matter how similar they might look from just the right angle.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 4, Funny) by edIII on Saturday June 03 2017, @01:38AM (2 children)
I'm thinking in the sense of hacking them all, rerouting the delivery addresses, and sending them all to the end of the piers :)
Maybe a robot flash dance in the middle of the street. Maybe have them all hide for awhile. Maybe route all deliveries to a single Chuck E Cheese's.
It's just one zero day away from a couple thousand robots losing their minds in the streets....
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday June 03 2017, @02:44AM
Bonus points if you can get them to sing the Turret Opera from the end of Portal 2 :D
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 03 2017, @02:26PM
Would the delivery bots be fooled by a fake "Walk/Don't walk" sign/projection that's only visible to video cameras and not the human eye? How about other markings/signs? At what point does it go from "free speech" to illegal speech?
I was wondering about a related thing for those robot cars. Would wearing a t-shirt with speed limit or other traffic signs confuse them? What does it take to fool them, or do they ignore signs? If they ignore signs then it would be dangerous, if they don't then they might be vulnerable to fake signs or even "fake tunnel/road markings" graffiti or similar.
Remember those fake signs don't have to look recognizable to the human eye:
https://arxiv.org/abs/1412.1897v4 [arxiv.org]
https://www.theverge.com/2017/4/12/15271874/ai-adversarial-images-fooling-attacks-artificial-intelligence [theverge.com]
https://www.wired.com/2016/07/fool-ai-seeing-something-isnt/ [wired.com]