October 09, 2005
Holy Smoke, they did it. Robot cars cross the desert!
It was the DARPA challenge. Navigate through 240 km of rocky desert terrain for a prize of $2M. The results this year were amazing. Four robots made it. Even more so considering the fiasco of last year's race.
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I seriously can't believe they didn't just make this in to a reality show or at least a documentary (a la Discovery Channel). Shit, even a mediocre web site would have been nice...
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BBC video direct link (low quality)
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Robot Cars across the Desert, isn't that a song by Emerson Lake & Palmer?
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"It's a no-brainer that 50 to 60 years from now, cars will drive themselves." Too bad it's going to take so long, since I've always wanted to be able to tell my car where to go and to have it do it without any further instruction when the end point was one I'd driven to too many times.
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"It's a no-brainer that 50 to 60 years from now, cars will drive themselves." Yeah, well they'll have to be running on fuel cells, because I think the robots might not be able to afford petrol.
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"We can now see a future where these vehicles will take the place of soldiers in harm's way," said Ron Kurjanowicz, manager of the Darpa Grand Challenge race. Well shit.. that's gonna take all the fun out of it!
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Something to celebrate. How many years will it be before robot cars can cross desert whilst shooting evil foreigners?
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Reminds me i have to tell my evil foreigner to stay indoors.
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Aquarobot cars across the desert.