back to article The Quantum of car lists: Storage firm drives into autonomous vehicle data logging

Quantum has stepped sideways into the autonomous vehicle testing market with a data logging system integrated with its StorNext multi-tiered workflow file management product. Known as an entertainment-and-media and oil-and-gas workflow file management supplier, Quantum's scale-out StorNext hub system supplies and manages files …

  1. Ken Moorhouse Silver badge

    So thinking ahead to what is happening in the printer market...

    If one of the tyres wears faster than the others then the whole lot including spare will need to be replaced. If your tyres aren't genuine then you won't be able to start the vehicle and you will invalidate the manufacturer's guarantee.

    ---

    Insurance companies will have a field day. Log submission will be part of the process for making a claim, and woe-betide you if you exceeded a monitored parameter by even a smidgeon.

    1. Chris G

      Re: So thinking ahead to what is happening in the printer market...

      Wot 'e said above but include the likelihood of the police requiring access for anything more than a routine stop and consider a system like this opens the door for a pay/tax per mile revenue system for road use.

      There will still be plenty of room for other authoritarian abuse.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: So thinking ahead to what is happening in the printer market...

        You're suggesting that in future people won't have any control over any aspect of their personal transport except for where it goes. Plenty of SF written along those lines, BTW.

        I suppose it's inevitable. Cars are big hurtling objects, full of legal liabilities. Underwriting such large risks affordably requires full control over the whole process.

        Why fight it? The bean counters will win, if only by outlasting the rest of us. And once everything is properly maintained according to spec, it's only a minor step to an autonomous car requirement, once the associated risks are reduced to a reasonable level.

        My SciFi reader childhood wants to "thumbs-up" the whole thing, but the shadetree mechanic in me wants to blow it all up. What to do, what to do...

        1. Ogi

          Re: So thinking ahead to what is happening in the printer market...

          > You're suggesting that in future people won't have any control over any aspect of their personal transport except for where it goes.

          That's a dangerous assumption to make. Firstly I suspect the only "control" over where it goes you will get will be a nicely curated and filtered choice, you won't be able to overrule what locations are available, or if you want to take a route it does not list.

          Secondly, you won't be able stop a third party overruling where you go. When you are not in control, someone else is. In the case of a car, it is the "driver", which would be automated and under direct control by a third party (company, government, whatever) in this case. That is completely different to you being in direct control over the vehicle.

          I sure intend to never set foot in an autonomous car, and what gives me hope is that pretty much everyone I have talked about it agrees with me. It seems there is only a minority of nerds who really are into this dystopic future (and nerds are a minority themselves), the others pushing for it are authoritarians salivating at the control they will have over others.

          The freedom to move yourself (and loads) great distances however you want is one of the few base freedoms left for people, and most really care about it.

          The closest I have seen to people being happy with an "autonomous" car is one that can do basic things like follow traffic on a motorway or handle stop-and-go rush hour, both of which are tedious and not particularly enjoyable. However in these cases the autonomy does not supersede the human, it is there to assist when requested.

    2. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Re: So thinking ahead to what is happening in the printer market...

      "Insurance companies will have a field day. Log submission will be part of the process for making a claim, and woe-betide you if you exceeded a monitored parameter by even a smidgeon."

      If the car is autonomous, then you are only the passenger. It's likely you won't be the owner either. Most of us will use them like taxis, some will lease a personal one and only the very rich will be able to afford to own one.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    One question

    How does the SEC feel about it?

    'cuz that is what REALLY matters @ Quantum!

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