Is Tesla’s Autopilot making the car “drive itself” or just “a fancy cruise control”? The car company has described it both ways – the latter in court. CC-licensed photo by pedrikpedrik on Flickr.
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A selection of 10 links for you. Not for use in airplanes. I’m @charlesarthur on Twitter. On Threads: charles_arthur. On Mastodon: https://newsie.social/@charlesarthur. Observations and links welcome.
Inside the final seconds of a deadly Tesla Autopilot crash • Washington Post
Trisha Thadani, Rachel Lerman, Imogen Piper, Faiz Siddiqui and Irfan Uraizee:
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[Jeremy] Banner researched Tesla for years before buying a Model 3 in 2018, his wife, Kim, told federal investigators. Around the time of his purchase, Tesla’s website featured a video showing a Tesla navigating the curvy roads and intersections of California while a driver sits in the front seat, hands hovering beneath the wheel.
The video, recorded in 2016, is still on the site today.
“The person in the driver’s seat is only there for legal reasons,” the video says. “He is not doing anything. The car is driving itself.”
In a different case involving another fatal Autopilot crash, a Tesla engineer testified that a team specifically mapped the route the car would take in the video. At one point during testing for the video, a test car crashed into a fence, according to Reuters. The engineer said in a deposition that the video was meant to show what the technology could eventually be capable of — not what cars on the road could do at the time.
While the video concerned Full Self-Driving, which operates on surface streets, the plaintiffs in the Banner case argue Tesla’s “marketing does not always distinguish between these systems.”
Not only is the marketing misleading, plaintiffs in several cases argue, the company gives drivers a long leash when deciding when and how to use the technology. Though Autopilot is supposed to be enabled in limited situations, it sometimes works on roads it’s not designed for. It also allows drivers to go short periods without touching the wheel and to set cruising speeds well above posted speed limits.
For example, Autopilot was not designed to operate on roads with cross-traffic, Tesla lawyers say in court documents for the Banner case. The system struggles to identify obstacles in its path, especially at high speeds. The stretch of US 441 where Banner crashed was “clearly outside” the environment Autopilot was designed for, the NTSB said in its report. Still, Banner was able to activate it.
Identifying semi-trucks is a particular deficiency that engineers have struggled to solve since Banner’s death, according to a former Autopilot employee who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.
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Banner died in 2019 when his Tesla, on autopilot (over the prevailing speed limit) drove under an articulated truck. Braking 1.6 seconds before impact could have avoided the collision.
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We finally have proof that the internet is worse • The Atlantic
Charlie Warzel:
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This week, Wired published a story by the former FTC attorney Megan Gray that illustrates the dynamic in a nutshell. The op-ed argued that Google alters user searches to include more lucrative keywords. For example, Google is said to surreptitiously replace a query for “children’s clothing” with “NIKOLAI-brand kidswear” on the back end in order to direct users to lucrative shopping links on the results page.
It’s an alarming allegation, and Ned Adriance, a spokesperson for Google, told me that it’s “flat-out false.” Gray, who is also a former vice president of the Google Search competitor DuckDuckGo, had seemingly misinterpreted a chart that was briefly presented during the company’s ongoing U.S. et al v. Google trial, in which the company is defending itself against charges that it violated federal antitrust law. (That chart, according to Adriance, represents a “phrase match” feature that the company uses for its ads product; “Google does not delete queries and replace them with ones that monetize better as the opinion piece suggests, and the organic results you see in Search are not affected by our ads systems,” he said.)
Gray told me, “I stand by my larger point—the Google Search team and Google ad team worked together to secretly boost commercial queries, which triggered more ads and thus revenue. Google isn’t contesting this, as far as I know.” In a statement, Chelsea Russo, another Google spokesperson, reiterated that the company’s products do not work this way and cited testimony from Google VP Jerry Dischler that “the organic team does not take data from the ads team in order to affect its ranking and affect its result.” Wired did not respond to a request for comment. Last night, the publication removed the story from its website, noting that it does not meet Wired’s editorial standards.
It’s hard to know what to make of these competing statements.
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As Warzel points out, Gray seems wrong on the facts (Google is very vocal on that point; I’ve removed that link from the site archive, and would ask readers to ignore the claims previously made by Gray) but the broad concern is that monetisation now beats utility. And ditto for Amazon.
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23andMe user data stolen in targeted attack on Ashkenazi Jews • WIRED
Lily Hay Newman:
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The genetic testing company 23andMe confirmed on Friday that data from a subset of its users has been compromised. The company said its systems were not breached and that attackers gathered the data by guessing the login credentials of a group of users and then scraping more people’s information from a feature known as DNA Relatives. Users opt into sharing their information through DNA Relatives for others to see.
Hackers posted an initial data sample on the platform BreachForums earlier this week, claiming that it contained 1 million data points exclusively about Ashkenazi Jews. There also seem to be hundreds of thousands of users of Chinese descent impacted by the leak. On Wednesday, the actor began selling what it claims are 23andMe profiles for between $1 and $10 per account, depending on the scale of the purchase. The data includes things like a display name, sex, birth year, and some details about genetic ancestry results, like that someone is, say, of “broadly European” or “broadly Arabian” descent. It may also include some more specific geographic ancestry information. The information does not appear to include actual, raw genetic data.
The company emphasized in a statement that it does not see evidence that its systems have been breached. It also encouraged users to use strong, unique passwords and enable two-factor authentication to keep attackers from compromising their individual accounts using login credentials exposed in other data breaches.
…the [23andme] spokesperson said that verifying the data is pending and that the company cannot currently confirm whether the leaked information is real.
This point is significant both for everyone whose information may have been compromised and because the data posted by the actor claims to include “celebrities.” Entries for technologists Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, and Sergey Brin are all visible in the sample data, including “Profile ID,” “Account ID,” name, sex, birth year, current location, and fields known as “ydna” and “ndna.” It is unclear if the data for these entries is legitimate or was inserted. For example, Musk and Brin appear to have the same profile and account IDs in the leak.
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You could imagine a blackmail or similar plot if someone’s DNA had warning signals, such as a liability to degenerative illness.
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Misinformation about Israel and Hamas is spreading on social media • NBC News
Elizabeth Chuck, Ben Goggin and Anna Schecter:
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As one of the largest invasions in 50 years unfolded on the streets, sea and skies over Israel, misinformation about the assault proliferated on social media.
In one instance, a widely circulated video of an Israeli airstrike was said to show a retaliation to Saturday’s surprise attack by Palestinian group Hamas, which has left hundreds dead.
“BREAKING: Israeli Air Force is striking terror targets in Gaza,” read the caption of the video, which was shared on Facebook and social media platform X. But the video was from airstrikes that happened in May, Reuters reported.
In another, numerous users on X and TikTok shared a video that showed two jets being towed by ground. Some users claimed it showed Israeli Defense forces evacuating air bases near Gaza. One user said it showed Hamas forces towing Israeli jets.
That video, however, was published last month, appearing on YouTube on Sept. 19, according to Reuters. The reposted version of the video had been viewed hundreds of thousands of times by Saturday afternoon.
Many of the misleadingly labeled videos were shared by verified users on X, who are eligible for monetization of their content.
Meanwhile, both fighting parties turned to social media and tech platforms to engage in information warfare.
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Did we ever expect TikTok to be better than Twitter? I’m not sure I did, so haven’t been disappointed. Twitter, though, at least didn’t previously operate like this.
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The tyranny of the marginal user • Nothing Human
Ivan Vendrov:
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Nearly all popular consumer software has been trending towards minimal user agency, infinitely scrolling feeds, and garbage content. Even that crown jewel of the Internet, Google Search itself, has decayed to the point of being unusable for complicated queries. Reddit and Craigslist remain incredibly useful and valuable precisely because their software remains frozen in time. Like old Victorian mansions in San Francisco they stand, shielded by a quirk of fate from the winds of capital, reminders of a more humane age.
How is it possible that software gets worse, not better, over time, despite billions of dollars of R&D and rapid progress in tooling and AI? What evil force, more powerful than Innovation and Progress, is at work here?
In my six years at Google, I got to observe this force up close, relentlessly killing features users loved and eroding the last vestiges of creativity and agency from our products. I know this force well, and I hate it, but I do not yet know how to fight it. I call this force the Tyranny of the Marginal User.
Simply put, companies building apps have strong incentives to gain more users, even users that derive very little value from the app. Sometimes this is because you can monetize low value users by selling them ads. Often, it’s because your business relies on network effects and even low value users can help you build a moat. So the north star metric for designers and engineers is typically something like Daily Active Users, or DAUs for short: the number of users who log into your app in a 24 hour period.
What’s wrong with such a metric? A product that many users want to use is a good product, right? Sort of. Since most software products charge a flat per-user fee (often zero, because ads), and economic incentives operate on the margin, a company with a billion-user product doesn’t actually care about its billion existing users. It cares about the marginal user – the billion-plus-first user – and it focuses all its energy on making sure that marginal user doesn’t stop using the app.
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“X” axed headlines. That sucks for accessibility • Mother Jones
Julia Métraux:
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Yet again, X, the social media firm formerly known as Twitter, has gone through an abrupt design change. As of Wednesday, users can no longer see headlines to links shared on the platform. While it’s a blow to news sites, the change also hampers the site’s accessibility to screen readers, software that people who are blind or have low vision use to read text and other features of web pages.
Alexa Heinrich, creator of resource and education hub Accessible Social, says Musk’s latest update “further proves that the platform does not prioritize accessibility anymore.”
Now, when a screen-reader user encounters a link, “all their device says…is ‘link, image,’” Heinrich explains. That lack of descriptive information, she says, is “horrible for accessibility and user experience in general.”
The oversight is perhaps not that surprising: Musk did lay off the site’s accessibility team last fall. As Kate Knibbs wrote for Wired at the time, “there may be no one left to ensure the site complies with laws like the Americans with Disabilities Act.” Since then, the platform has made a series of drastic changes that slashed accessibility. The decision to charge a lot of money to operate Twitter-based apps meant the end of multiple services that helped disabled people use the platform, such as bots that created alt-text descriptions or captioned videos.
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A classic mistake, as the next conversation (by the same writer) explains.
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“Elon is learning the hard way”: Taylor Lorenz on Twitter’s collapse • Mother Jones
Julia Métraux interviewed Lorenz:
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Métraux: You trace the rise and fall of social media platforms such as Vine. What has Elon Musk missed about the rise of Twitter that’s led to whatever its current state is?
Lorenz: Elon Musk makes the classic mistake pervasive among Silicon Valley executives, which is a deep disrespect for their users. This is how Clubhouse died. It’s how Vine died. This is how app after app is killed by Silicon Valley hubris: “I don’t care how users want to use this product. I’m going to tell them how to use it, and I’m going to decide who’s popular on this app.”
Of course, social media apps will boost people that they think might be interesting to users, but you can’t force-feed users content that you want them to see. Overall, that’s not going to be a compelling app to the majority of users, and so it is going to fail. Elon is learning that lesson the hard way. He’s alienated all the big content creators. Twitter’s an ideological project for him. It’s not about building a sustainable business.
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Good thing, because as you’ll see, he certainly doesn’t have a sustainable business. (Extra points for still calling it Twitter, MoJo.)
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US ad revenue at Musk’s X declined each month since takeover, data says • Reuters
Sheila Dang:
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Monthly US ad revenue at social media platform X has declined at least 55% year-over-year each month since billionaire Elon Musk bought the company formerly known as Twitter in October 2022, according to third-party data provided to Reuters.
The company has struggled to retain some advertisers since the takeover, as brands have been wary of rapid changes under Musk’s ownership. X’s chief executive, Linda Yaccarino, is expected to meet on Thursday with bank lenders who helped finance Musk’s acquisition to outline the company’s business plans, according to a person familiar with the plans.
US ad revenue dropped by 78% in December 2022 compared with the same month the previous year, the steepest monthly decline since the acquisition, according to ad analytics firm Guideline, which tracks advertising spending data from major ad agencies.
Ad revenue in August, the latest data available from Guideline, declined 60% year-over-year. X declined to comment on the data.
Musk has previously acknowledged that the platform has taken a hit on revenue and has blamed activists for pressuring advertisers. Last month, he accused the Anti-Defamation League of being the primary cause behind a 60% decline in US ad revenue, though he did not provide a time frame.
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Incredible to think it’s been a whole year since he took over. The decline has been much more rapid in the past couple of months, and most noticeable with the current Israel conflict: the lack of verifiable sources, replaced with people trying to make money by amplifying outrage, has made it useless for actually finding news.
Although there is a claim floating around that Visa has only spent $10 on advertising there. I’m inclined not to believe it without direct confirmation from Visa.
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Rishi Sunak’s misguided attempt to woo irritated British drivers • The Economist
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Driving in Britain is often annoying, and at times miserable. There are 33m cars registered in the country; outside the capital, poor public transport means many depend on their cars for every journey. In 2022 drivers in Britain’s ten most congested cities spent 80 hours stuck in traffic, double the amount in Germany. Even with the upgrades, the jams are set to worsen. Traffic could increase by as much as 54% by 2060 because of population growth and cheaper-to-run electric vehicles, according to the Department for Transport.
Yet Mr Sunak’s claim of a “war on motorists” is hogwash. Few groups have been more coddled over the decades than drivers. To take one obvious example, fuel duty has been frozen for 13 years, at a cost to the Treasury of around £80bn ($98bn), almost as much as the price of a high-speed train line. Meanwhile, fares for trains and buses have risen much faster than the cost of driving. The result is what economists call “induced demand”: more people drive because it is easier to do so.
What’s more, Mr Sunak’s ire is directed at policies that aim to curb the worst impacts of cars. London’s ULEZ [Ultra-Low Emissions Zone] is crudely designed but will save lives by making the city’s air less toxic. Cutting speeds in built-up areas is supposed to prevent crashes, which have killed more than 2,000 pedestrians in Britain in the past five years. And because traffic flows more smoothly, studies show that 20mph schemes tend to increase average journeys by less than a minute. Mr Sunak chides the Welsh government for making 20mph the default in built-up areas. But the same policy has been introduced in Edinburgh, much of London and in other areas across England without causing an uprising.
Drivers can feel unfairly targeted when alternative modes of transport are unrealistic: when buses are slow, trains are unreliable and cycling is unsafe. But that is an argument for improving public transport.
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When The Economist, famously right-wing libertarian, is against you, you’re in trouble.
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The poverty of anti-smoking laws • The Critic Magazine
Christopher Snowdon:
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British governments have understood the economics of smoking for decades. In 1971, the Department for Health and Social Security modelled what would happen if smoking rates fell by 20% in one scenario and by 40% in another scenario. In both cases, it found that there would be a small reduction in healthcare costs in the short term but that these savings would soon be greatly outweighed by increases in welfare payments — mostly pensions — as the would-be smokers got older. Economic calculations of this sort were amusingly satirised in an episode of Yes, Prime Minister, but there is many a true word spoken in jest and there is masses of evidence to support it.
There are plenty of open questions in economics, but there are some things that economists have firmly established which the general public gets completely wrong. This is one of them. As the Oxford Handbook of Health Economics notes:
Although it is frequently argued (though not by economists) that prevention will save expenditure on future treatment, the current body of evidence demonstrates that it is more likely to generate additional health care costs.
This is true of preventive health measures in general but is particularly true of anti-smoking measures because the government rakes in a lot of money from smokers. If the sale of tobacco were prohibited tomorrow, the government would lose the £12bn a year it currently gets in tobacco duty and would have to spend more on health and welfare, in addition to dealing with a rampant black market. The upshot is that nonsmokers would have to be taxed more.
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Rishi Sunak has proposed – out of thin air – to make it illegal for anyone born after 2008 to smoke; details tbc. Snowdon is a Tufton St regular: head of lifestyle economics at the (very right wing) Institute of Economic Affairs. But I agree: it’s so arbitrary to deny it to someone who’s 19 but not 20. Just raise tobacco taxes if you want to stop people smoking.
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| • Why do social networks drive us a little mad? • Why does angry content seem to dominate what we see? • How much of a role do algorithms play in affecting what we see and do online? • What can we do about it? • Did Facebook have any inkling of what was coming in Myanmar in 2016? Read Social Warming, my latest book, and find answers – and more. |
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