That new group is people who aren't at the frontier of trying out new tech.
The way this will manifest is the drunk idiot who'll puke all over the car. The bored asshole who carves his initials in the seat. The edgelord who gets their jollies out of destroying other people's stuff.
Good chance you had some in the original group as well, but early adopters are usually mostly people who deeply understand tech. Once that falls away, you have a less thorough understanding of tech, and a very surprised realization that booking something under your name that has cameras all over will likely result in you being held accountable for what you did. But after you did it.
How that'll play out in the long run is anyone's guess. If Waymo maintains rigorous enforcement and the courts actually play along, it might just work out. It's still going to be capital-intensive because we seem to have created a world where being a major asshole in public without consequences is kind of an entitlement people expect to have, and Waymo will need a very strong "yeah, not here" vibe to prevent that. Which requires a number of high-profile incidents.
Yes, the subtext of the question likely was "are you discriminating against the poor!?" If it was indeed, the answer to that question is "no, the ride pricing will do that".
I don't know what 'deeply understanding tech' has to do with any of that. Plenty of people who 'deeply understand tech' get drunk and puke in places. Honestly, you sound like a Victorian-era petty lord looking down his nose at 'commoners'.
You read the part where I said the understanding constrains the existing user base from antisocial behavior, right?
This isn't about "commoners". It's that any large group of people contains assholes, assholes restrain themselves depending on circumstances, and the new users might well lack that understanding.
It's fundamentally not about "commoners", but about a knowledge-based restraint falling away. (As for the "commoners", you might also want to read the last part of my comment, instead of outraging)
That person did read it, and the fact that you believe anything you wrote in the entire comment would not contribute to the notion that your are a classist snob is hilarious.
A loaded question is a trick question, which presupposes at least one unverified assumption that the person being questioned is likely to disagree with.
That's a loaded question, but sure, let's go there. The problem with public transportation is that the public is allowed to use them, and the rules, legal and social, are not well defined or enforced. Assaulting other passengers is generally tolerated by the system, depending on the type of assault. Physical assault is considered too far and doesn't go unnoticed, but chemical and audio assault on fellow passengers usually goes unreported. The types of people are those who would assault others on some fashion.
Whether this translates to Waymos smelling like meth or fentanyl when you get in them thanks to the previous rider remains to be seen. Or just needles, foil, or used condoms left behind. They record video, so Google could close the person's account so they won't be able to book Waymos with that account again, so we'll end up having to see how hard it is to create new accounts to use Waymo on to ban nuisance riders.
Breaking news, google introduces social credit system that "only applies to waymo and think of the childen". More at 9
/s
I agree with your point about the approach to the argument, but I think google has enough info to make a way to vet passengers by identifying if you are likely to trash a vehicle.
Granted in my work I've never made the attempt to smell fentanyl, but it isn't one with a reputation of having an odor. I assume you mean the smell of recreational users of fentanyl.
I Guess you must not be riding it as much as you think you do. I’m an infrequent rider and I’ve seen 2 altercations and multiple (10+) disturbances since January.
The funniest (or not if you’re not from SF) was a guy boarding a full bus with a 7 foot long dining table with the legs attached, arguing and threatening anyone who protested. Eventually he dropped the thing on someone’s foot and starting an altercation which delayed everyone by 15 mins.
I've ridden the 22 through the Mission at midnight every Tuesday for much of the last seven years. I assure you that's exactly as much as I thought I do.
You might be magic. Crazy, crazy shit goes down on Muni. I used it to commute from outer Richmond to downtown for years and the bystander effect was fully powered up on many of those rides. And it wasn't always the homeless people, little old Asian ladies could be hella scary.
I might be. I also commuted downtown from the outer Richmond for years, on the 31, the 38, the 1, and the 5. Oh, I've seen plenty of crazy stuff, but only one assault.
Okay, the point I think the poster up there was trying to make is that there are degrees of assault. I never saw anyone murdered, and only twice some sort of physical struggle. The number of times crazy yelling broke out is uncountable by me, though.
