This headline reinforces gender expectations that only men participate in car races and only men are mathematicians, engineers, and tinkerers. But many women are in the autonomous car industry! This contest truly is like "hot-rod modders of old"--it apparently excludes women.
2
Looks like super fun event. I love DIY hacks. When the Self Racing Cars contest get to the point of multiple self racing cars, multiple static obstacles, and various random markings on track, I would love to be there to watch. Hope that by then, it will be opened to walk-in public.
3
A race track, with it's smooth surface, one-directional traffic, and a complete absence of hazards like pedestrians and bicycles, is the perfect place to develop vehicle-control skills -- but it's nowhere near as complex and unpredictable as an ordinary road. The fact that most of these competitors can't complete a lap underlines the challenges faced by those who would put full self-driving vehicles on the road. It also goes to show how wildly optimistic auto industry CEOs were when, just a few years ago, they told us we'd have 'Level 4' autonomy by 2020. As useful as this research is, for now, engineers' time is better spent helping humans to drive better, because for the foreseeable future we'll need to do the driving ourselves. We need augmented driving, not autonomous driving.
11