I wanted to love driverless taxis, but then my ride took a sinister turn
San Francisco is being used as a living laboratory for robotaxis, with mixed results. A recent incident means it might be some time before I climb back into an autonomous vehicle.
For the past two weeks, I’ve been zipping around San Francisco in driverless taxis, transfixed by the way they can navigate busy streets so smoothly. If you came to meet me in the city, there was a high chance I’d ask you to come with me for a ride. That was until I got into a car that had a meltdown, came to a standstill and wouldn’t immediately open its doors.
There is a saying in tech that if you are not paying for a product, then you are the product. In the case of driverless cars, you are not the product, you are the guinea pig. San Francisco is being used as a living laboratory.
