A retired Penn professor has been blocking Uber Eats robots for months. This week, she got arrested for it
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/53250107
Police confirmed they had responded to a report of "criminal mischief involving a robot" on the 1200 block of Filbert Street around 1:16 p.m. on Wednesday. A woman on the scene ignored "multiple commands" to move, they said, resulting in a criminal violation notice for disorderly conduct.
Uber declined to comment.
Marvin, who plans to contest the charge on the grounds of her First Amendment right to protest, has been undeterred by the arrest. She plans to continue blocking Uber Eats robots and chatting with curious passersby who ask what she's doing.
"It allows me to talk to people about what's going on," she said. "It's always very interesting conversations that we have, and I think it's good to have those kinds of conversations in public space."
https://www.phillyvoice.com/philly-woman-arrested-uber-eats-robot-protest/Open linkView original on lemmy.world
254 replies
If you can block bots online, why can't you block them in the physical world?
Because robots in the physical world are legal, and in this case using public sidewalks. Online bots are violating terms of service as defined by the human owners of websites.
Cars and motorcycles aren't allowed on sidewalks. What makes those robots so special that you think they should be allowed to occupy an already crowded and very definitely human space?
They don't have to be special, they just have to be allowed, which depends on local laws that restrict their weight, speed, and other things. This whole line of argument misses my point that giving workers a share of the benefits of innovation would be better than treating the innovations as the enemy.
This is your opinion and I disagree. They're free to sort it out with the heavy machinery on the tarmac, though, if and only if they're taxed as other vehicles are taxed too.
We're talking about uber eats, do you think they will give any worker a share of any benefit? Get real.
There's a difference between do and should. They should. That requires regulation.
Of course they should, but they won't. Regulation means an elected representative would have to propose the law, it would have to be approved, then signed into law. Won't ever happen because of regulatory capture.
And yet a huge body of regulatory law exists.
Companies will only give workers a share of the benefits of innovation if they're forced to - a goal I'd rather try to achieve than call it impossible. People have taken your attitude about all sorts of real things - worker safety rules, food quality standards, the right to unionize... even the idea that people would obey lines painted on the road was originally scoffed at. And yet we have them. So get real yourself.
You're very wrong if you think I'm being defeatist because I enjoy it. I'm just jaded after a lifetime of enduring the apathy of everyone around me. If you're not like me yet and don't want to lose that spark, keep fighting. I'm just too tired to do it myself. Good luck.
Sorry you're so burned out, and I hope something comes along to reignite your passion - there's always that chance.
They are not explicitly illegal. That doesn't mean they or their owners have rights that supersede those of the general public.
The general philosophy of US law is that not being explicitly illegal means legal. Robots have no rights whatsoever, but their owners have the same rights as everybody else. Refer to my example of blocking someone's car into a parking space.
You blocking bots ona platform has nothing to do with ToS. Blocking a robot is just standing in front of it, it's not human. You are allowed to stand on a public sidewalk. If it stops moving because you stand in front if it, how is that illegal?
That's the kind of bland rationalization an asshole would make for blocking your car into a parking space. The difference is only in the details.
the "detail" is the fact one is a human and one is a robot. That's a pretty big detail if you ask me
You know.. I'm surprised that no one has.. Done more? I'm surprised hunting these things isn't a trend..
I imagine that the non-violent sport of 'Robot-hassling' will emerge from pioneers like this before long. Tying a rope around it and to a tree will only be the start, with championships and awards for the simplest, cleverist and most-effective. Getting one to lose it will be high-ranking. There'll need to be a special section for electronic tricks and traps, and another for reality-shifting. Getting one to forget it's job and help you with gardening would be one fine example.
I wonder what a hand-held stun gun would do to it.
Has it been set illegal to disobey "multiple commands" of a privately owned robot?
When police say somebody ignored commands, they mean from them. They don't get paid to enforce robot commands.
But can they order you to move because you are standing in the way of a robot? Disobeying an order is arrestable, fair enough. Blocking a person is probably illegal (depending on how it's done). So I'm uncertain of the activity necessary to block such a robot. Just standing straight up an down in front of it sounds legal. Actively and continuously stepping in front of it to block it at least sounds worse. But how do you enforce this? What if a dog blocks or attacks a robot? What are robot/corporations rights?
Cops love to kill dogs.
Police get a lot of leeway when telling people to move. I suspect her blocking the robot, may be considered a public nuisance (like blocking traffic or a sidewalk). Her ingore a lawful command to move = jail.
note: this is not support of the robots, just indicating the fact that they are probably allowed under current laws.
"Public nuisance" is definted as an illegal act, condition or thing that interferes with the rights of the general public.
Robots are not members of the general public, and have no rights.
It's not the rights of the robot in question. You're legally allowed to get delivery, she is stopping you from receiving that delivery.
It has nothing to do with robots having rights - which they don't. It's about deliberately obstructing what another person is doing. Calling it "just standing straight up an down" doesn't change that, any more than if you refused to make way for somebody pushing a cumbersome shopping cart. How do you enforce this? Well, in this example the cops tried to tell the woman to move along, and arrested her when she refused. If a dog damages property you can sue the dog owner. If you have more questions please look them up yourself.
Of course it changes that. No where in time or space on earth have there been autonomous deliveries moving about in the same space as you or me. So the interesting philosophical and practical question is "who has the right of way". And as you say - "deliberately obstructing what another person is doing" when there is no person being obstructed. Someone may if may not be waiting. If I was on the receiving end of that meal, I would expect another drone delivering my food. Just as I expect packages to be rerouted if a delivery truck has a break down.
So the answer is "no one knows right now". Or to be presice, "no one, and especially not you, knows right now. And I for one will find it interesting when it is solved. Just not from you".
If you want more answers, please go look them up you yourselves - don't waste my or others time posting it here.
Act surprised when it's revealed Uber sells the camera feed to flock.
I mean fuck. Do we want people working as delivery drones? Really? The other post in fuckai about this doesn't even mention she's been doing this for month which obscures why she's been arrested.
And climate change is real you know? A small robot takes little energy compared to a full sized car.
Ideally delivery robots should be state owned and accountable to democratic processes. They are a valuable and useful innovation to solve logistic problems. A way to reshape how neighborhoods are build and planned and make them more energy efficient.
This dogmatic opposition to anything AI is really becoming more and more irrational, less and less grounded in facts and rational arguments. AI needs to be regulated. Like China currently does AI regulations best, but we can't even imagine things like that any more because people just accept neoliberalism as the new world order and screaming is the only thing left to do apparently instead of demanding regulations or nationalization of certain AI infrastructure. Maybe this is linked to some kind of anti-democracy propaganda campaign. Divide and conquer, and don't even let talk about regulation enter the public discussion.
It's replacing a dude on an ebike, not a car
You should dream bigger. We have the technology to not need delivery drivers any more, but you want to keep them? Why? Because you think neoliberal capitalism can't be replaced with something more just and socialist? That is my charge against this whole critique. Why the fuck do you want people working crappy delivery jobs?
All of this should be replaced by a national post office type of delivery service.
This kid is the difference between idealism and reality.
In an idealist world, automation would fund UBI, which would fund a higher quality of living for everyone. Which is effectively parallel to what you're arguing here, in it's fundamental mechanics.
As you can probably see, many Western nations don't have UBI. Why? Because automation doesn't give back to the people, automation provides more wealth to a few corporations and individuals.
The same thing goes with delivery robots. It largely benefits the corporation, which can cut additional expenses by not having to pay a human. Where does that money go? It goes to line someone's coffers. If it was taxed appropriately, then that money could go back into the public, but it doesn't.
People don't want to work crappy delivery jobs. They do it out of necessity in order to buy food and pay rent, and the buying of that food and the paying of that rent also increasingly goes to smaller set of large corporations.
That's the reality.
I mean yes, but climate change is also a reality and presumably most deliveries are done via car. Or maybe scooter. And for scooter or bike this is also a dangerous job in traffic.
I would also say that it is ideology vs amorality, which is the prevailing system of belief currently in the west, and increasingly so. People do not believe that democracy works any more so you do not see any attempt at demands for regulations any more. That is not realism, that is fatalism.
Liberalism / neoliberalism and the "international liberal order" can (I believe) be understood as a system that only allows capitalism to control government and society, and fundamentally no ideology. Ideology only serves as a facade or shield or distraction but there is no core.
So the hysteria and willingness to abandon reality we see from fuckai (and other recent dividing frameworks) reflect that. Maybe it is even something that is deliberately pushed by the dark enlightenment around Peter Thiel, to erode belief in and functionality of democracy. But that is speculation.
And even Musk understands that we're going to need UBI the more automation and as demand plummets due to poverty.
The reality is that some wacko professor attacking bots on street corners won't do shit.
Counterpoint: this comment is shit, and some wacko professor attacking bots on street corners caused it.
Something that takes less energy than a robot, and the communications manufacturing and infrastructure, microprocessor manufacturing and infrastructure, datacenter manufacturing and infrastructure, that handles the orchestration and real-time video beamed halfway around the world to an under paid worker who drives the robot/when it encounters an obstacle:
Walking.
Ideally, the neighborhood would be designed to be walkable, and the things one would otherwise have delivered would be close by. Ideally, one would have the time to walk to get things, for leisure and health, and to interact with people in their community because they aren't crushed by the pace needed to make a living wage. Ideally, an option would be for a local worker to be paid to walk something over, so the community knows their rights are ensured and a community member is taken care of financially, instead of having a rent seeking conglomerate siphoning money to a top that already has too much money.
The thing about the robot service and who will inevitably own it, is that they would just have the robots run you over if they could. They would create campaigns to deride people who get in the way of the robots that make them money, putting the blame on people subject to them. Just look at how the term "jaywalking" came to be. Look at what really happened with the McDonald's hot coffee lawsuit.
The robots could take another path to get around this person, like any other neutral obstacle, and it's telling that they don't. They stop short of running you over instead. The person has a right to exist in a public space on public infrastructure meant for people and to stand where they like, it doesn't matter how many times this has happened to a robot before; the robot can go a different way. By having someone arrested for being in a robot's way, is the equivalent to running someone over in terms of rights lost. These are vehicles after all, perhaps they should be on the road where they belong.
Yes, very close. It's the class war, and that is part of how it operates.
These robots were doing this even before AI, underpaid people in other countries were driving these, and may still be; we don't know, because it's opaque, and that is the whole point and problem. AI could be driving these, consuming all kinds of energy and causing more climate change, but we don't know. Just like how practically nobody knows about the insane volume of CO2 the obscenely rich generate. If it were regulated properly, it would no longer be opaque.
Dogmatic opposition to AI isn't irrational, just from your CO2 concerns alone, let alone economic worry, and now human rights. It should be regulated for all kinds of reasons. Neoliberal policy of under regulating (but not limited to) tech is an enormous problem, I agree.
(State owned) delivery robots make sense once everyone is taken care of, energy is plentiful, and it doesn't drown the planet in CO2 to get it.
I remember all the opposition to Uber as a taxi service back in the day, and the same thing happened with Uber Eats and other food delivery services.
Now we're taking their side because fuck AI?
And it's becoming much harder to defend the anti-AI rhetoric we've been hearing in recent weeks. Just look at what it's doing to Sony's stranglehold on the gaming market. We're seeing the PS5 get completely jailbroken and games being decompiled in record time.
So which is it, folks? Is it AI slop? Or is it some kind of hero we didn't know we needed?
Obviously it's a tool that should be used in service of humanity and responsibly. We need clear goals for a positive future, not a fervent "butlerian jihad".
This is one of the rare times I've heard more than one person say something reasonable about ai.
I am also over it with people who stuff their heads up their asses and declare all ai useless, likely having never done any meaningful reading about the topic. As stated, it is a tool and like all tools it can be used for important work, it can be used for nonsense or it can be weaponized.
Until people collectively understand what it is and that its not going away, getting effective regulation is going to be very difficult.
Until then, it will be the tool of those who understand it, the plaything of the lumpenproletariat and the weapon of the ultra wealthy. If that's the status quo y'all want, then just keep doing what most of you are doing--nothing.
Except that under capitalism, it will only ever be used to replace humans and benefit capitalists. It’s not that we want people working deliveries, it’s that these companies will roll out the robots with no plans or care for the people who are now jobless. The people who are now added to the unemployed labor pool and competing with every other laborer, driving down wages for everyone.
It would be one thing if we lived in a socialist society that actually cared about service to humanity, then we could treat AI as merely a tool. But in a capitalist world, this tool will have real negative impacts for millions of people.
So call for good AI regulations, and call for end to capitalism. Do a revolution.
But in defense of the worst kind of gig economy delivery jobs? Or completely banning AI? That is wasting any political energy we have. And maybe that is the purpose of fuckai. To divide and paralyze us until it's too late.
More important make it fair. Robots or anything with ai has to pay the same amount of taxes as a human.
Isn't it usually taxed when the company buys a robot? Robots are expensive so the tax is high although it is only upfront. The other taxes that I can see are taxes paid for by the paid crew maintaining the robots (very unlikely that a robot will maintain another robot in today's time) and taxes paid by the people who buy food through Uber during checkout.
Don't know about your county but here buying does not come with taxes. All taxes paid are given back. Value added tax. Or what tax are you talking about?
That the company still hires people does not invalidate my claim that currently human labor is more expensive because of the taxes and social contributions.
If your arguments then shift to it does not need to have social contributions because it does not need those. then I would go further. A robot does not need to do anything for humanity and companies can put robot waste directly into the environment. Put pollution's into the air as it does not need it too.
I think the robot problem is more influential to reduction of factory workers due to robots as manufacturing creates more value. For logistics, people love their free shipping and most of the time, companies pay very little to the delivery staff for cost reduction to achieve the free shipping. In this case, robots might actually be more humane for cheaper deliveries than delivery staff in minimum wage. People get their free shipping while no human becomes a sacrifice for that free shipping. If people really want wages and do not want robots to takeover, people should be willing to pay up for delivery fee which will unlikely happen.
I don't think the robots get paid. They're forced to work for no pay, just like people used to.
I don't know if OP edited the comment after your comment, but I think it's pretty clear that OP means that companies should have to pay the same taxes that a human employee would pay per robot. IMO, that doesn't go far enough because it leaves out the secondary spending that sustains the local economy, like spending on groceries, other goods, and services.
Uh... and what about current machines? When do they even become a robot?
When a momma robot and a papa robot love each other very much....
There's a lot of automation that has taken people's jobs. It goes back all the way to the Luddites.
I think taxing them per robot misses the point. The real problem is that companies monopolise the means of production and privatise the profits from increased productivity. Worrkers barely benefit from their own increased productivity. That's the real problem.
It's almost like a religious movement. Like a... jihad. A Butlerian Jihad. If you think RAM prices are high, imagine the price of a Mentat. I'm saving my pennies.
I think that to trully give urgent delivery services a purpose we need:
Fetch quests, when optimized, provide some persons with meaningful labor that keeps up their physique, and their, and then others' involvement ties the community together and makes personal connections between people in it. Drones navigating the sidewalks humans use are irrelevant if the amount of labor needed is not overwhelming to begin with, and doesn't need to be optimized by producing expensive robots and computer vision models.
i wish there was "quest board" system for small tasks irl :/
There are plenty of apps for that.
that is kind of the problem, userbase is so fragmented and small
Those are some very interesting ideas! I'd love to see this for city planning. Maybe China lol. The "Urban planning in communist states" had similar benefits but our current technology e.g. just smartphone apps could also help or optimize or solve a lot of these issues for free.
But I don't think these robots actually need to be expensive. I believe a local model on a smartphone could basically do this already and then you just have an RC car with a different gearing and a box. Like if a country had state owned facilities with regular open optimization challenges this would cost basically nothing.
A lot of things should be rethought. And thanks to climate change and migration we will have to build a lot of cities.
or like someone sets a ride, you accept , you pick them up, drop them off, collect pay and move on to the next person...... file taxes at the end of the month..... make a federal minimum and rely on deliveries to make up the rest like servers/waiters who make the majority of their paycheck based on tips...... make it so anyone anywhere with a car and clean driving background can do the job as long as they're over a certain age and have a license and a car to use........
Maybe we just like make it make sense and leave them all as gig economy services that people can make money from.....
Like maybe we just leave it the fuck alone and take drones out of the equation?
"regulation bad" appears to be just an american thing. everyone else is doing it... but it takes time and is not necessarily done well.
these extreme voices get more head space online because that's the only thing that can get any meaningful attention nowadays. you won't see the vast majority of people stuck at "well, some of the things it does are kind of impressive but the practical results are not there for us, i'm not sure why and i don't understand the impact and background entirely so i just don't know". you'll only ever hear from people that are either "AI evangelists" and are backed up by a huge amount of marketing money and propped by the algorithm or from the people who sound like they are about to fire bomb a data center.
there are many people who are much more sober about these things. look at this video for an example: https://youtu.be/xwXM2pHj0g4
IMO the real problem is that both regulation and the so called "free market" are susceptible to being taken over by players that just don't play fair. we all know that LLMs and many other tech "improvements" would not be viable if they had to play by the same rules as everyone else (e.g. source training data, resources and energy in a moral way and charge a fair price for the actual measured contribution they provide). but that's kind of their game, right? they find a way to be more efficient... not necessarily by improving a product but sometimes simply by finding a hole in the rules. and then they haul in the money and use it to put out any competition and poke more holes in the rules.
Afaik self driving delivery robots or robo-taxies is relatively distant from LLMs. Or maybe there will be breakthroughs by merging these two.
But yeah the amount of labor you can actually save by using LLMs is quite small so far. It'll only get better at that, but maybe there will be a technological wall. But maybe not.
Most of the harm being done right now comes from the AI bubble and crazy high marketing budget that you have to understand is mostly aimed at businesses, presentations where they dazzle and hypnotize the C-suits with magic beans. So AI psychosis is real on both sides of the spectrum.
In that sense fuckai can be seen as a useful distraction from actually talking about either useful regulation (because even that is seen as heresy), discussion about dangers (because LLMs aren't really intelligent at all it's heresy too) or capitalism as the root of all evil. And it's useful to further divide and conquer and create new fault lines within the masses that need to be controlled.
"AI" doesn't exist. But the "opposition" contributes to the grift by promoting the same pseudo-science. That's why there's no rhyme or reason. "Both sides" are based on the same fantasy.
Gig economy. You're saying that the state(s) should be making all the money and that they should have control over when people can order goods by saying that they should be the owners of the drones.
Currently, the owners of the vehicles are the delivery drivers. Uber, GrubHub, Seamless, DoorDash, Lyft, UberEats and InstaCart, are all outlets for people who have downtime to make extra money and it's also a great starter job to get experience for a resume.
I think that drones taking jobs is going to push people to disrupt another market and sorry not sorry but fuck anyone who brings up the car thing when you and I know go damn well who ever is reading this uses rideshare services and delivery services. You also got people who don't drive and use rideshare services and people who use them to cut the cost of getting somewhere if you don't want to spend money on fuel from traffic in the inner cities.
This is basically the start of the counter to automation. We still tell fables about people who stood againt the devaluation of workers like this.
All hail forced labor? The only “value” AI strip away is a value stamped on the top of your head derived from capitalism. Flipping burgers at McDonalds has value, but it’s no first choice, and the value isn’t extracted by the burger flipper. It’s extracted by the top as the labor is exploited.
If anything, I’m hoping AI is a fuck you to the current broken, down hill rolling system. The world will never be rid of exploitation, but we can point the harm at machines instead.
lol, well, considering the system is currently licking AI's nasty little clit like there's no tomorrow.... I just don't think AI is going to do whatever it is you think it's going to do, lol.
You've been drinking too much cool aid.
No, just extrapolating out where we’re headed.
Broke: "Uber should hire real humans, not robots!"
Woke: "Uber is a complete rip-off with a deceptive pricing model that is doing nothing but fueling obesity rates, regardless. Never use it."
please move
Uber Eats has fucking robots?
No, just delivery ones
The little nub on the top is a LIDAR module.
I wonder if an upside down cup will fit over it.
They can be remotely piloted from call centers overseas. So this would be a very temporary hurdle.
Large googly eyes slapped onto the cameras. Using suction cups. Or cheap dollar store Christmas lights powred by two AA lightly wrapped around it and over it's cameras to blind them.
Both would be non destructive and non damaging.
Me, with an empty takeout soup bowl: “I’m a job creator!”
No
Steal one and inject a virus into it and then make it run into a wall a bunch of times, ensuring the complete destruction of the device.. 😜 Call the nearest news outlet and claim that the robot was suicidal-homicidal and was trying to smash you and it into a wall and wait for a news report. The robots get pushed back by skepticism of safety towards humans.
And then everyone claps
i see you don't know how the news works recently...
If there's people who believe the rogue ai news reports, there's people who will believe that a delivery drone was trying to kill them.
my point was that the news will happily push a story like the "rogue AI" bullshit, since it is in the best interest of the people who own the media companies, but will completely ignore or actively suppress stories that are afainst their interests...
Well I think the rogue Ai thing was also pushed so that the owners of Ai company's can have the platform to get people to listen about how we shouldn't be accelerating the use and expansion of Ai but rather, trying to make more regulations surrounding it.
I think bad news for good publicity, happens more than we think and I think that in this economy, an economy where people are choosing between groceries and medication people can't afford to lose an opportunity to earn.
I think that making a hacked delivery drone bash into a wall with a person who knows it's gonna happen move out of the way at the last second while the drone goes at high velocity, could be the bad publicity for good purposes. It'll make a lot of companies contemplate the roll out, it'll prolong it from happening and it'll give more people time to protest.
☝🏻 However, it is a crime to steal, hack and destroy a delivery drone and I do not promote nor condone the actual attempt.
Probably within a year Uber starts building these with extendable cattle prods that shock people to the ground that are in their way and then just crawl over them to finish their delivery.
This is the stupidest thing
Next thing to do, put a VR headset on it, and let it take a magical mystery tour!
Why wasn't uber arrested for obstructing this woman's path with their shitty robot?
Should have just built a blocking robot to do it.... Or like... A crate.
Just put a garbage bag over it, then smack it with a tire iron.
The temerity!
https://youtu.be/jJLNurAIrlM
Instead of fighting innovation I think she should be fighting for workers to share its benefits. For example, when automation means less human labor is needed for a task, what if the workers who do that task could benefit by working fewer hours with no cut in pay? In our current system the owners get all the benefits in the form of increased profits - why can't they be shared? I would think a college professor would be smart enough to see that and work on figuring out how to make it happen, rather than simply standing on the sidewalk.
In a world that worked according to her standard, we would still have armies of bookkeepers doing manual arithmetic and writing numbers in ledgers, because businesses that tried to use computerized accounting systems would have been boycotted. As a result the whole computing industry would have developed much more slowly, if it developed at all, and we wouldn't have forums such as lemmy for discussions like this.
It's fine to not order stuff online yourself. Preventing others from getting what they ordered isn't.
She should find a hobby which isn't purely about annoying her environment. Want to be an activist? Well, United Healthcare still exists...
Y'all won't stop supporting fascism otherwise.
Do you really think the person whose food doesn't arrive will regret ordering from a robot and will then elect to stop ordering takeout?
I think they're more likely to end up being against the people who got in between them and their food.
They might complain, they'll definitely call whoever took their money and demand answers.
They'll be told their order was held up because someone messed with the robot delivering their order. They'll maybe ask why a person couldn't have done that job. Maybe they'll ask if a person would have just sit there being blocked by some random lady instead of just going around her or taking a different route.
Customer service won't have an answer for them, and next time they go to order food, they probably won't use Uber eats.
I think that's incredibly idealistic. I imagine the customer more likely demanding better pathfinding.
If you never get your food, I guess you'll stop, no? Y'all won't stop otherwise, it seems.
What she's doing somewhat parallels protesters who block the freeway. Sure, it creates awareness, but drivers are just trying to get home, get to work, pick up kids, etc. I don't think it would endear any commuter to their cause.
My reaction to the accusation and general stance is that I would absolutely not want to defend you if someone steals your stuff.
Btw, I don't see how making people hate you helps you achieving whatever your actual goal is.
I'm tired of people coping themselves out of responsibility, stop feeding the systems that are trying to enslave or discard us. Is that such a difficult thing to do? Stop empower our mutual economic abusers. If you suffering is what to takes to get passed your coping and excuses, so be it.
"liberal activism"... What else should we expect from a prof at Penn? Opposing genocide or ICE? No way, just attacking delivery bots...
Why would you block them? Are they causing issues or something?
yes
Can you explain? I’ve never had issues with delivery bots, especially compared with delivery drivers
Because you're a privileged old professor with pale skin and you're angry at modern technology.
Spending your time inconveniencing delivery robots is 100% jobless behaviour.
Is that really the best thing you have to do with your time?
"Carolyn Marvin, 78..."
Going hazard a guess that this is probably what gets her up in the morning.
It's good to still have purpose and goals at that age.
She's a real hero getting up every day and doing the hard work for the good of humanity... [checks notes]... blocking delivery bots...
Did you not read that she is retired??
Many retired people make productive contributions to society and their own lives.
And many don't do anything. What is your point?
I mean, unironically. She was already retired
I know plenty of retired people who do productive things with their time. Unlike this lady.
Doubtful
Wow you got a job? Working well for your owner? I'm happy for you man 😁
How empty inside are people that value work that much? It's just a job, to many a necessity even. It's just a dumb grind killing your precious sparetime.
Tried jobs some times, i was bored to death.
What is the charge? Blocking a meal? A succulent Chinese meal?!
Looking at the replies to your comment... so many people not getting the reference. 🥲
Lol it's all good. Enough people did that this is one of my top rated comments 😆
I see you know your judo well.
i'm sure most of the luddites here have never used the internet to order a food delivery
like never
but the robot was the last straw
Police exist to protect capital, not people.
They protect capital, sure. They also protect all of us from violent thieves, rapists, and psychopaths.
I see where you're heading, but
Literally no. The real psychopaths are the people who believe this bullshit copaganda.
Cops don't prevent crime. They have no legal obligation to protect us. Cops supposedly help to "punish" crime (ie. torture people in cages) but even that's bullshit. Less than 1% of rapes lead to felony convictions. And anybody who's ever been robbed can tell you that police don't do shit.
what about the court system?
oh i get it you've never been a victim of crime
no no wait i got it you're just one of those special people that comes out with stupid one liners
good stuff
Aaannnnddd then?
Get your hand off my penis!
no
No and then!
Can I get a shrimp fried rice?
Annnnd theeeeennnn?
NO AND THEN
👀
This. Is. Democracy. Manifest!
Disorderly conduct.
There are Waymos that drive through my workplace all night long. Like literally every 10 minutes. They cause problems all the time, as we have semi tractor-trailers trying to dock, and they'll block their movement and then just sit there waiting. They started putting up cones so they wouldn't pull through but now all the legitimate traffic has to get out and move them around every time they want to come through.
One time I blocked 3 of them in for several hours by trapping them by putting more cones behind them, such that there was no exit. That was fun.
Robot cones that block the bots but move out of the way for cars would be fun.
Narrator: Little did @Acid_Burn know that his innocent comment would kick off The Great Robot War and subsequent collapse of civilization.
You missed two thorns! Don't let the haters get you down, keep doing thorns and let the dweebs that hate it for no reason seethe
Yes; I don't use þem when I'm quoting or using proper names like, Thomas. Even if I'm making up þe quote. It probably doesn't make sense to anyone else, but it's easier for me when deciding to use it or not - I just try to be consistent.
I makes me happy to see tolerance!
You missed a thorn opportunity for "that"
Easy: mount that cone on a children's RC toy car.
Your company needs to charge Waymo a toll for usage of your premises.
Alternatively, get a button-operated rising-arm barrier. All a driver needs to do is push the button to get in or out. Unless they're an AI that can't get out of the car, anyway.
Edit: Sometimes I a word.
...and send Waymo the bill for it.
What you do is tell the contractor that WayMo already agreed to pay, repeat until you find one of Trump's dumbass jobbers and hire him.
This definitely happened.
I found absolutely nothing in their comment hard to believe.
What is so outrageous here?
If you don't ever do anything, everything becomes unbelievable and outrageous.
Whatever you need to believe that this guy stuck it to the man.
Whatever you need to believe that he didn’t.
Waymo’s have hitl. When you see a Waymo stuck for “hours” that’s the exception that gets blasted across the internet to confirm biases.
They didn’t do any of this. It’s the nerd version of internet tough guy.
You mean they do hitl? They have hitled? They are hitlers?
I heard hitling is bad.
You:
I bet you op looked like this while he was definitely trapping cars 🤣.
God you people are gullible.
I don't care if the story is real or not. In fact, I'm inclined to agree with you that it's probably fake. Doesn't change the fact that you're all over this thread running defense for fucking Waymo, of all corporations
It’s really not that hard to believe. Waymo will use any available roads to navigate between fares, and it can become especially bad when they’re waiting for fares. Because they don’t just return to a home parking spot and wait between fares. The point is that they want to spread their potential reach (and ensure there are cars nearby regardless of where they’re requested) so they spread out until they need to return to charge/refuel.
They cruise around random backroads and residential areas until a fare requests them. They also avoid U-turns whenever possible, which means they’ll often path through some interesting places just to avoid turning around. They quickly clog residential roads when fares are slow, by all driving in a holding pattern around residential areas that aren’t designed for that kind of through traffic.
Yeah they also have human intervention which kicks most cases far before this could happen but I’m sure this random internet commenter definitely trapped a bunch with cones and held them hostage🤣
Human intervention only automatically kicks in when the car actually thinks it is trapped. Which can easily take a while for larger parking lots.
Also, it's not a stretch to assume Waymo cuts costs by not having 1:1 coverage of humans to cars and that they triage which cars actually need humans.
👍 definitely happened. In a small internet space you found the edge case. They won’t have video or any evidence but they definitely trapped some Waymo’s
If she was not touching the thing then why didn’t it try and get out of her way? It should not be on the sidewalk in the first place, and should not have right of way.
Maybe the robot should be charged for blocking her way
Cops will violent attack anyone who threatens capital. It has almost nothing to do with "laws".
That's always one of the tricks these companies pull. They take some communally-owned thing that used to have a clear purpose and start using it for their different for-profit use.
Take sidewalks. They're surprisingly expensive to build, but they're built from community tax money so that people walking don't have to walk on the road. Now Uber is using them as a place where they can drive their robots. Are they paying anything? I assume not. Sidewalks have also become a favourite parking spot for rental scooters. Do the scooter companies pay for that? Of course not. Even when they're parked well they reduce the space available for walking, and when they're parked badly they can force pedestrians out into the street.
Ugh the rental scooters. Thankfully I’ve seen this dying down. A more common sight in my city now is parking spaces getting turned into bike rental stations. I’m all for that.
Ugh, what? The scooters are awesome, and they cut down on car traffic.
No they don’t. They cut down on walking.
Um, no. They cut down on car traffic. Hoooooooly shit you people are unfucking real. I see bitching about car culture on here constantly, but when an urban area has municipal tools for reducing it, you still bitch. God fucking damn.
Oh well that string of profanity really convinced me. Thank you for clearing that up.
The scooters are so much better though? Just park near where you need to go, not where the bike station is. Just take photos of the poorly parked ones and whoever last parked it gets a fine.
A proper bike system is better though, my city has a city-run bike system with stations on practically every street corner, so it's much better and just as practical
Yeah the scooters are great, it's the lack of enforcement for proper parking that sucks.
Like they make you take a picture to prove you parked it properly. One time I screwed up and took a picture of only my feet. Nothing happened.
Better only for the person who drops it right where they arrives at their destination. That is almost never also a sensible place for these things to be. What if everyone just got out do their car the second they were in front of the building they want to go to? That would be so much “better” for them!
That is kind of how taxis work though
The taxi doesn’t just get dropped on the curb when you arrive. It leaves to go serve someone else.
Yeah, it sucks when I get out of a taxi and the driver just gets out and leaves their car there.
I don't need to repeat dark onions response but did you even think for a moment before commenting?
Except you jjust know they are taking audio and visual, and scanning wifi and phone and other freqencies and sending it all back to base, that's the problem.
Throw them all into the river! Why rent everything we used to own anyway?
Even if I had my own, I wouldn't carry it across country for a visit of a few days, but I did rent in such a case more than once.
It's really more about unenforced safety rules, people sometimes drive like crazy and they always do that on the scooters they own, because rental have a speed limit
Rental makes sense for this because not everyone wants to take a scooter back home and charge it
Not the way it's being done it doesn't make sense. A locally owned place that had rules against spying on everyone, and sweeping electronics, yes. A silicon valley operation whose purpose is as much collecting data as it is rental fees, is not.
I found myself wondering about this. If you stand blocking the entrance to a building, and won’t move when the police tell you to, I guess I can see them turning that into a disorderly conduct charge. Of course we are solely debating whether blocking a robot is a crime, but their rationale iin court is probably going to be more based around obstructing a place of public accommodation or something like that.
They should've given her a warning, the police. To go right to arrest, is a favour that waymo called in to the local policians, probably followed by others donating some cash.
It really is like that, even with prosecuting attorneys that drop charges against the rich, like former manhattan city da with several people, including Weinstein was it? 30k or something donation right after he drops charges. There were several incidents, they didn't even bother to use intermediaries there.
She did have multiple warnings but she stood true to her rights
What a badass.
That is the crime she was arrested for? Not yielding to a clanker using the sidewalk? Wow, what a joke.
Say it with me everyone: police exist to protect capital.
The police arrest protesters for refusing to move on all the time.
You can fight it in court
You can't stand on a sidewalk? That's criminal mischief? This level of bullshit should make everyone's blood boil.
You can’t intentionally impede someone/something’s progress repeatedly, I think is the point. She’s welcome to stand off to the side and protest all she wants, but not deliberately and continually preventing the robot from moving.
If she didn’t like buses and just stood in the bus lane one day and blocked traffic, she’d be arrested just the same.
That's nowhere comparable. A sidewalk is ostensibly an area for pedestrians to be, whether in movement or stationary. It is not a road, and definitely not a robot road. If the robot is too stupid to navigate someone standing in an area designed for people to stand, that's not the person's fault.
You want a comparable situation? This is like you sitting on a public bench in a park, then I come up to you and demand you to move so I can sit. After you say no, I call the cops and they arrest you.
I don’t disagree about the robots using the sidewalk, but for now, that’s allowed, even if it’s dumb. The law hasn’t caught up.
I think the park bench is analogy is wrong because a person sitting isn’t equivalent to a traveling delivery robot. Surely one does not expect the entire sidewalk for their own use, robot or not, just like no reasonable person could demand a bench from someone actively using it.
I think a better thought experiment would be you walking down the sidewalk to work, and then me getting in your way specifically and preventing you from moving any further forward. Then you get mad (rightly so) and call the cops because someone’s bothering you and you can’t get by. If I were to continue to block you when they arrive and tell me to step aside repeatedly, and I still don’t move to let you past, of course I’d be arrested.
It’s stupid because I agree with her and your position about the robots, but not the method used here. It’s very old man yells at clouds energy to me.
I can just walk around you. Why doesn't the bot do it?
She ought to be careful about blocking the wheelchair ramp, otherwise she's all good
It was incredibly courteous of her to allow it onto the sidewalk before stopping it.
I think hungry people are going to start stopping these because they have food in them.
I predict they will begin to arm the robots.
We are closer to skynet every day.
The robots have food AND GUNS IN THEM! THE REVOLUTION WILL BE PAID FOR BY UBER EATS
More RoboCop than Skynet.
Who's the narc who called the cops on her?
Probably the device itself or it's pilot
I'm sure they have a whole call center in India or something that gets reports when a vehicle isn't able to move towards its delivery, so they check the cameras and then call the local cops if someone is in the way.
They have pilots? Like, I could get paid for driving an FPV RC car all night instead of not getting paid for that like I do now!? I figured they were autonomous.
I imagine they are self driving and someone monitors several remotely. If one appears to be stalled or throwing an error code it likely pops an alert, you select the device view the cameras to see what's gone wrong and place a suggested input of how to resolve the situation. That's essentially what they did for their self driving cars when they start out, then eventually the alerts become less and less but someone still exists.
Or AI: Actually Indians
That's what I had assumed, oh well.
"criminal mischief involving a robot"
Sounds like a cool name for an upbeat song by an avant garde electro-jazz group.
it sounds like a opportunity for jury nullification
Ah see that’s where she went wrong, making a scene standing there.
Just spray paint the sensor and move on with your life. Or tip it over. Or put a cone over the sensor. Then disappear.
That's not legally protected activity
Your rights are being slowly pulled tighter around your neck, and the legal system is not your friend anymore.
When communicating online, like we are right now, is longer considered a legally protected activity, do you roll over like a good puppy and stop communicating with others online in information free forums?
It was legal to kill Jews. Does that mean it was okay, since that was a legally protected activity? Does that mean living as a Jew, no longer being a legally protected activity, requires that you turn yourself in because you are no longer allowed to exist where you are?
Well according to this article the cops don't really give a fuck about what is or isn't legally protected so why should anyone else?
Almost no activity is a legally protected activity in a society and government hellbent on control.
The law did actually use to mean something, as it was, to some degree, written and enforced with care and consideration.
The law means considerably less now that it has been captured and written by those in power without consideration and simply as a tool to selectively enforce their power and target undesirable sub cultures.
Just like flock cameras, no one cares if someone goes and spray-paints or vandalizes some wandering piece of corporate equipment from corporations that are abusing their power and cuddling up to the current regime. It being a legally protected activity or not doesn't matter, because what is considered a legally protected activity no longer matters. The law is no longer something that applies based off the will of the people, but instead is something that applies and is built based off the will of a select few (many of whom are loyal and funded by the same corporations).
So? It might not be a Tuesday… Make your point dumbass…
Welcome to actual protests
Respectfully, you're missing a key piece.
You're making the point that you can't stand up to oppressive powers like Uber while operating within the law.
Crucially: so is she.
This woman is an academic expert on law and our rights, and what she's doing is exploiting a loophole in Uber's control scheme in public and forcing everyone to watch what happens.
She is creating a problem for Uber while denying them a legally justifiable reason to wield law against her. Which will either demonstrate to more people an action that allows protestors to impose harm on a powerful company while remaining out of reach of their ability to impose punishment, or force them to reveal that their ability to impose punishment isn't actually based on law, it's based on power.
In doing so, she helps analyze the strength of various legal rights that can still be used and unmasks which ones no longer exist.
That’s irrelevant.
Not sure this will be either. Just because we agree with it doesn't mean that intentionally stopping a service provided by a company won't make you liable in court if they sued them. "People have increased doubts about ordering products on our platform because they were intentionally stopping the products from arriving"
I can't see a reasonable judge not finding them liable and therby any damages the company can prove plus court fees would be on this person.
So?
She was arrested for "disorderly conduct", for just standing there.
Step aside HUMAN!
After looking at the Philadelphia statute for disorderly conduct I’m assuming it’s based off this:
Yeah, but standing on a sidewalk and allowing people to pass you by is not blocking anything...?
So, even if that's the case, it seems pretty weak.
Police don’t make that distinction unfortunately. The disorderly conduct statute looks pretty broad, its likely it’s used largely as a tool to force compliance.
I want to know WHO was she obstructing? Sidewalks are for people. Are the cops going to make sure stray animals have full access as well?
Anyone trying to navigate that section of the sidewalk.
It's still bullshit, and it's still a first amendment issue as it is a form of protest.
But standing somewhere, blocking a public space is obstructing the flow of traffic, and meets the standard. Being arrested is part and parcel of protest because legal challenges form precedent. Sometimes you want to be arrested for both visibility and that opportunity to challenge a law, or otherwise shift things.
Blocking the robot isn't the same as blocking a human. But blocking robot did block other humans. They had to navigate around it. Rubbernecking is inevitable. You've got the people interested in what she's doing and why standing there too. In terms of whether or not she violated that law, there's zero doubt she did.
And that's part of the process of changing that law, hopefully
Okay, but define standing there, and define public space, and define blocking.
Is standing in a public space for 10 minutes blocking?
What if you're standing in a line? What if you're standing, looking at a parking meter? Perhaps you're waiting for the walk sign on the road, and you're standing on the edge of the sidewalk?
Is there now a large list of exceptions? Does that mean standing in a public space where your activity is not part of the list of exceptions means you are now obstructing it?
What if you're standing in a public space, but you're a worker and are actually tasked with working on that public space? Technically, you are standing in a public space, so you are blocking it, no?
Is there some temporal element to this? If not, then are you technically blocking a public space simply by existing in that public space? If at any point you are in that public space, you are not actively moving out of that public space?
So on and so forth. This can continue forever.
The implications of something like that are pretty far-reaching, and the ambiguities are great.
Man, I'm not defending it, just pointing out the way the system works
Yes, that is what the legal system is set up to handle. Sometimes things are clear cut and there is no issue, but cases are often ambiguous, and that's when you have a trial to determine the outcome. Both parties get to present their case, and a judge makes a decision based on their best judgement of the law and common sense (at least that is the intent). Ambiguity is not a gotcha, it is very much to be expected and what the system is built around.
Of course there can be cases where the law really is too vague to be reasonably followed, but that doesn't seem to be the case here.
The comments section on that article truly was a ride.
Gotta love MAGATs rubbing their two brain cells together to try to come up with a good insult
Thanks for letting me know, I guess… it eroded quite some faith i had in US-kind
I'm impressed you had any left. But indeed, it's even more bleak than I imagined.
You weren't kidding. The amount of confidently incorrect comments in there is astounding.
I want those brain cells back
Kinda ironic for a Marvin to block a robot...
'Brain the size of a planet and here I am, delivering Pad Thai to the same CO-working space so some intern can work through their lunch break.'
I think Marvin would appreciate the sentiment.
I reckon Marvin would find a downside to it.
"Ah, what's the point? You block one robot, they send another. Just my luck they'd send me - brain the size of a planet and I'm delivering your takeaway. Now what have you got? Someone gets cold food and you go to jail. Not a good trade if you ask me."
He would, but we know deep inside he would like it.
It really pisses me off how pristine and undamaged that piece of shit looks.
Now where did I put my taser. /s
Does Uber Eats deliver medicine?