Oftentimes, the newest technology just goes to the people who can pay the most for it so they can have the latest "thing" or whatever the reason may be. Pretty soon here (within the next five to ten years or so), self-driving cars will be released to the public. Instead of just the people who can pay the most to get them first, wouldn't it be awesome if those who currently have a need of transportation could easily and directly benefit from the technology of self-driving cars at a low cost?
The idea of bringing crucial assistive technology to those who need it is one of the things that motivates me and excites me about the world in which we live (not to mention the technology itself). Self-Driving MN is an initiative, a non-profit that my dad started in order to accomplish that goal of making reliable transportation accessible and affordable to those who currently rely on sometimes unreliable metropolitan transit systems. There are many options, as far as marketing and distribution strategies go, for vehicles that are capable of driving themselves. They could be temporarily used (or rented) as taxis, or they could also be bought like any other car. The former is already being undertaken by Uber in a growing number of cities across the nation.
Revolutionary technological ideas like these often sound scary to many people. Control, or having control of a situation is a common human trait in any unfamiliar situation. Giving the control of one's own car over to a machine unnerves many, but my dad said something like this to me when I explained how excited I was to have the freedom to drive, to travel wherever I wanted to go: Human beings shouldn't (and they can't) be expected to drive on their own. Us humans, we may get into less accidents than self-driving cars today, but one day, that'll change.
How will we feel about cars driving us around? Riding in a self-driving car could eventually end up feeling just as natural and commonplace as unlocking one's front door and walking into the house. It's even rumored that seats in later models of self-driving cars will completely turn around, so one can actually focus on who else is riding in the car.
Lastly, the race is on! Apple, Ford, Volkswagen, Tesla, and Google are all potential competitors for this futuristic market, possibly with more to come. Ford is predicting that it will be able to release fully autonomous and self-driving cars to the entire public by 2021.
