The Driverless Digest

Ah John, how I've missed you lol..

In LA, when it rains it pours 🌧️🤖

🚗🗽 New York’s Robotaxi Plan Pulled in Blow to Waymo Expansion.

📖👀 Check it out here 👉 www.thedriverlessdigest.com/p/uber-to-in...

📰📢 The latest edition of The Driverless Digest newsletter is out - Here are the top 3 stories:

⚡️🚘 Uber to spend $100 million on charging for electric robotaxis.

🤖⏳ ‘Robotaxi’ status check: 8 months in, 19% availability, and all of Musk’s promises are missing.

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@davidzipper.bsky.social on the disinterest that AV companies have shown in rural America:

"The places where robotaxis could do the most good are not the places where robotaxi companies can make the most money."

From the new episode, coming later this week.

AV companies are ignoring rural America. That's a shame. Today’s post comes from David Zipper, a Senior Fellow at the MIT Mobility Initiative known for his writing on transportation policy, technology, and urban planning.

Here is the story David wrote in @driverlessdigest.bsky.social about the untapped potential of rural AVs

What the Headlines About Waymo’s “Offshore Drivers” Are Getting Wrong Today’s post comes from John Deniston, co-founder of Repair Ally, an AI startup tackling the skilled labor shortage in automotive repair (disclosure: Harry is an investor in Repair Ally).

His core argument: the real question isn’t where support staff are located — it’s whether autonomous vehicles are delivering safer outcomes at scale.

Check out the full article here 👉 www.thedriverlessdigest.com/p/what-the-h...

John also notes that autonomous operations are designed with layered human support, where more sensitive situations may involve highly trained specialists, while simpler classification tasks can be handled by other teams 🧠⚙️

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The system remains fully autonomous, using human input as just one signal in its decision-making 🤖🚗

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In our latest piece on The Driverless Digest, John—who spent eight years working on autonomous vehicles at Cruise and Embark—explains human remote assistants don’t drive the car. Instead, they help resolve rare edge cases, more like confirming a visual CAPTCHA than controlling the vehicle.

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Recent headlines have claimed Waymo uses “offshore drivers” to control its robotaxis — but Repair Ally co-founder John Deniston believes that framing misses how these systems actually work.

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Aftermath of yesterday's rain in Los Angeles with some Waymo vehicles 🤖🌧️

Waymo service was paused in LA yesterday evening due to the rain, although it hadn't been raining hard for 7 hours.

But I noticed this waymo just hanging out in the same residential parking spot for 30+ minutes when I was walking around 🤔

Lidars also spinning which seemed like a waste of battery.

👨‍⚖️ Spotted an Instagram ad here in Los Angeles for ‘Waymo Personal Injury Lawyer’ via Jonah Bliss

👀 Just spotted my first Waymo Zeekr robotaxi here in Los Angeles without a driver.

🌴🏜️ Baidu and Uber Partner to Bring Apollo Go Autonomous Ride-hailing to Dubai in Collaboration with Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority.

🚘💸 Hyundai reportedly plans to supply 50,000 vehicles to Waymo by 2028.

📖👀 Check it out here 👉 www.thedriverlessdigest.com/p/waymo-is-p...

📰📢 The latest edition of The Driverless Digest newsletter is out - Here are the top 3 stories:

🚪🤖 Waymo is Paying Doordash Drivers to Close Robotaxi Doors.

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