Does the name "Autopilot" cause people to overestimate the abilities of Tesla's driver-assistance technology? It's a question that comes up in the Ars comments almost every time we write about Autopilot.
Critics warn that some customers will assume something called "Autopilot" is fully self-driving. Tesla's defenders counter by pointing out that autopilot capabilities in planes aren't fully autonomous. Pilots still have to monitor their operation and intervene if they have a problem, and Tesla's Autopilot system is no different.
A new survey from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety brings some valuable hard data to this debate. The group asked drivers questions about the capabilities of five advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS). They identified the products only by their brand name—"Autopilot," "Traffic Jam Assist," "Super Cruise," etc. Survey participants were not told which carmaker made each product, and they did not learn the capabilities of the products. There were 2,000 total respondents, but each was asked about only two out of five systems, leading to a few hundred responses for each product.
The One Mix 3 Yoga is a compact laptop with an 8.4 inch display and a 5 watt Intel Core m3-8100Y processor. It’s designed for portability more than bleeding-edge performance… but it’s actually a surprisingly capable laptop for most da…
The One Mix 3 Yoga is a compact laptop with an 8.4 inch display and a 5 watt Intel Core m3-8100Y processor. It’s designed for portability more than bleeding-edge performance… but it’s actually a surprisingly capable laptop for most day-to day tasks. It has one of the best keyboards of any sub-10 inch laptop I’ve […]
We talk to Bryan Sellers, currently in second place in the eTrophy.
Bryan Sellers behind the wheel of his I-Pace racing car. He currently lies second in the championship for Pro drivers. [credit:
Jaguar
]
"Win on Sunday, sell on Monday." Like many aphorisms from an earlier time, this no longer works quite as well as it did. But for an auto industry trying to persuade people it's OK to buy one of their newfangled electric vehicles, some racetrack glory never hurts. That's the thinking behind the Jaguar I-Pace eTrophy, which sees a grid of identical electric Jags duke it out as a support act during a Formula E event.
One-make series like the I-Pace eTrophy aren't exactly new. And for a manufacturer like Jaguar, you can see the appeal: whoever wins on Sunday (technically Saturday in the case of most ePrix events), they'll be driving an I-Pace. But that doesn't mean they aren't good entertainment.
The annual Toyota pro-am race at IndyCar's Long Beach Grand Prix was always a highlight of that weekend, until the company called time. The International Race of Champions series showcased drivers from different disciplines in identical Porsche 911s, then Chevrolet Camaros. Even Formula 1 crowds have been entertained by one-make races. BMW's M1 Procar series traveled with the F1 circus for a couple of years and drew in some of F1's then-stars to compete. Jaguar even gave us the short-lived but dramatic Intercontinental Challenge, a three-race series for the XJR-15 supercar that offered a $1 million prize for the winner.
At first glance, one of the most famous figures of Peru's Nasca Lines looks like a fairly generic hummingbird. But the details of the drawing—and those of several other ancient drawings, paintings, and sculptures of animals and plants around the world—reveal a lot of information about the actual species. The bird has three toes, all pointed in the same direction, a long, thin beak, and the feathers at the center of its tail are long and straight.
Those are trademarks of birds called hermits, a genus in the hummingbird family. Other hummingbird species in Peru have forked or fan-shaped tails (which is the kind of detail the Nasca artists likely would have gotten right).
"Until now, the birds in these drawings have been identified based on general impressions or a few morphological traits present in each figure," said zooarchaeologist Masaki Eda of the Hokkaido University Museum and his colleagues in a statement. That team examined the hermit and 15 other bird geoglyphs in detail, noting the shapes and relative sizes of their beaks, heads, necks, bodies, wings, and feet. Like biologists trying to identify a new specimen in the field, the researchers compared those details to the birds that live in Peru today.
Nearly two years ago, Vice President Mike Pence made the administration's space policy official, saying NASA would re-focus its program around "establishing a renewed American presence on the Moon, a vital strategic goal." In December 2017, President Trump signed a space-policy document codifying this human-exploration plan.
Under this space-policy directive, a sustainable presence on the Moon would then become a stepping stone to destinations further out in space, such as Mars. The president recently made clear his preference for getting to Mars quickly, tweeting a few weeks ago: "For all of the money we are spending, NASA should NOT be talking about going to the Moon—we did that 50 years ago. They should be focused on the much bigger things we are doing, including Mars."
A new poll suggests this talk about sending humans back to the Moon or on to Mars is out of step with the views of most Americans. The survey of 1,137 US. adults by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research suggests only about one-in-four Americans believe sending humans to the Moon or Mars is "very" or "extremely" important.
The second season co-stars George Takei, who also consulted on historical accuracy.
AMC's The Terror: Infamy is set in the Japanese-American internment camps of World War II.
Shape-shifting spirits terrorize a Southern California community of Japanese Americans in the first trailer for The Terror: Infamy, the second season of AMC's horror anthology series. And the hauntings are likely related to horrifying events in the Japanese internment camps of World War II.
(Some spoilers for season 1 below.)
The first season of The Terror was based on the eponymous 2007 novel by Dan Simmons that was a fictionalized account of Captain Sir John S. Franklin's doomed Arctic expedition to hunt for the Northwest Passage in 1846. His two ships, the HMS Erebus and the HMS Terror, became icebound in the Victoria Strait, and all 129 men ultimately died. Scientific studies of the evidence that survived showed that pneumonia, tuberculosis, lead poisoning, or a zinc deficiency contributed to the high death toll, along with hypothermia and starvation. There were even hints of cannibalism in the form of cut marks on human bones. Simmons' telling added the threat of a mysterious monster (dubbed a Tuunbaq) stalking the men across the Arctic.
The Federal Communications Commission will vote next month on whether to preempt a San Francisco city ordinance that was designed to promote broadband competition in multi-unit buildings.
San Francisco's Article 52, approved in December 2016, lets Internet service providers use the existing wiring inside multi-unit residential and commercial properties even if the wiring is already used by another ISP that serves the building. San Francisco's Board of Supervisors and then-Mayor Ed Lee approved it in order to spur competition in multi-unit buildings where occupants often have only one option for Internet service.
The ordinance only applies when the inside wiring belongs to the property owner. Under the rule, property owners who have outfitted their buildings with Internet wiring cannot deny access to ISPs, making it harder for them to strike exclusive deals with Internet providers.
If you’re in the market for a Google-branded Chrome OS device, right now you have two choices: the Google Pixelbook laptop or the Google Pixel Slate tablet. But according to a report from ComputerWorld, Google had been working on two new Chrome O…
If you’re in the market for a Google-branded Chrome OS device, right now you have two choices: the Google Pixelbook laptop or the Google Pixel Slate tablet. But according to a report from ComputerWorld, Google had been working on two new Chrome OS tablets… and according to that same report, Google has scrapped those plans […]
A new study published by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Global Innovation Policy Center and NERA Economic Consulting, estimates the effect of video piracy on the U.S. economy. With a revenue loss of at least $29.2 billion the impact is significant, but this could have been worse, as a major source of video piracy isn’t covered.
Despite the growing availability of legal options, online piracy remains rampant. Every day pirate sites and services are used by millions of people worldwide.
This is a serious problem for major content producers, Hollywood included. At the same time, it’s also seen a threat to the wider U.S. economy, which generates hundreds of billions of dollars from video entertainment.
How copyright infringement affects the economy in actual numbers is hard to measure, especially since the piracy landscape changes rapidly. That said, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Global Innovation Policy Center, in partnership with NERA Economic Consulting, attempted an estimate.
In a report titled “Impacts of Digital Piracy on the U.S. Economy” they combine multiple data sources, paired with a broad range of assumptions, to estimate how much revenue video piracy is costing the U.S. economy.
In order to calculate how much piracy costs, the researchers first had to determine the global piracy volume. They did so by combining data from two known piracy tracking firms.
Specifically, the number of pirated movies and TV-shows are estimated using data from the German BitTorrent tracking outfit Tecxipo. These are then extrapolated to estimate the volume of other piracy sources, such as streaming and direct downloads, based on data from the UK outfit MUSO.
In addition, the researchers use academic studies to approximate the displacement rate. This is a crucial variable, as it estimates the percentage of pirated files that can be counted as a lost sale. The report settled on a lower bound of 14%, which means that roughly one in seven pirate downloads or streams are seen as lost revenue.
All this information, paired with location data, the average price per source, and a variety of other variables, ultimately leads the researchers to conclude that in 2017 online video piracy resulted in a revenue loss of at least $29.2 billion.
“The study shows that all of the benefits that streaming brings to our economy have been artificially capped by digital piracy. Using macroeconomic modeling of digital piracy, the study estimates that global online piracy costs the U.S. economy at least $29.2 billion in lost revenue each year,” the report reads.
In raw numbers, the researchers put the number of pirated U.S.-produced movies at $26.6 billion, while they estimate that roughly 126.7 billion U.S.-produced TV episodes are pirated digitally each year. This piracy takes place mostly from outside the United States.
The impact on the broader economy is even larger. According to the researchers, online video piracy costs the U.S. economy between 230,000 and 560,000 jobs and between $47.5 billion and $115.3 billion in reduced gross domestic product (GDP) each year.
Jobs ‘lost’
Not all types of piracy are the same of course. A pirated Netflix movie results in lower losses than a Hollywood blockbuster. Similarly, a pirated Bollywood film doesn’t impact the U.S. economy much.
Interestingly, the report notes that piracy by U.S. citizens doesn’t necessarily have to be detrimental to the economy. The money these people ‘save’ by pirating is likely spent locally, which, depending on various factors, could even be beneficial to the economy as a whole.
Or as the researchers put it:
“Consumers spend the income gained from displaced legal consumption on other goods and services, many of which are produced in the U.S.Therefore, the net effect on the U.S. economy of this component of piracy could be either positive or negative, depending on the relative magnitudes of the multipliers for the revenue losses and the revenue gains.”
The most significant impact comes from foreigners who pirate U.S. content, as the money they save is likely not being spent in America.
Overall the report provides a detailed overview of the potential revenue losses. Displacement rates are complex, of course, as there are probably hundreds of other variables that could have been taken into account, but it looks like the researchers did a good job at factoring in the most crucial elements.
Unfortunately, however, there is a glaring error that can’t easily be ignored.
The report specifically set out to provide an up-to-date overview of the new piracy ecosystem, one that includes apps and illicit streaming devices. No surprise, as dedicated streaming boxes are generally seen as the biggest threat to Hollywood.
“These rapid changes necessitate up-to-date estimates of the impact of digital piracy,” the report notes.
The problem, however, is that most app and streaming device piracy isn’t covered by the study. The report relies on category data from MUSO, which only covers regular browser visits to pirate sites.
This typically excludes most apps and pirate set-top boxes. Also, the boom in IPTV piracy isn’t covered by these data either.
TorrentFreak reached out to the researchers, who informed us that they weren’t aware of this. This means that their overall estimate of the impact of video piracy is even more reserved than they initially assumed. Needless to say, that has not been left out intentionally.
Whether it’s complete or not, these types of studies are generally welcomed by rightsholders. As such, the report will likely be mentioned frequently in future lobbying campaigns.
Greetings, Arsians! The Dealmaster is back with another round of deals to share. Today's list is headlined by a sweeping set of discounts on Logitech mice, headsets, and other PC accessories, which Amazon is featuring as part of its one-day Gold Box sale.
The catch here is that most of the items on offer aren't the absolute newest model in Logitech's respective product lines. Instead of the wireless MX Master 2S mouse, for instance, the MX Master is discounted. Instead of the newer MX Ergo trackball mouse, you get the M570. We'd also caution against many of the gaming headsets included in the sale, as we've used other models that both sound better and are less bulky.
Still, much of what's available here is worth owning, particularly when the majority of it is at genuinely discounted prices. The G203 Prodigy, for instance, doesn't have as sensitive a sensor as a pricier gaming mouse, but for $20, it's comfortable, normal-looking (a compliment for gaming mice), and high-performing enough. The C615 webcam is good value for 1080p video at $26, while the aforementioned M570 is simple but still effective for those interested in trackball mice.
Despite the growing availability of legal options, online piracy remains rampant. Every day pirate sites and services are used by millions of people worldwide.
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