The Center for Internet and Society at Stanford Law School is a leader in the study of the law and policy around the Internet and other emerging technologies.
By Bryant Walker Smith • December 18, 2013 at 3:15 pm
Some ninety percent of motor vehicle crashes are caused at least in part by human error. This intuitive claim is a fine place to start discussions about the safety potential of vehicle automation. (It is not an appropriate place to end these discussions. Read more » about Human error as a cause of vehicle crashes
By Bryant Walker Smith • December 18, 2013 at 10:33 am
SAE International's On-Road Automated Vehicle Standards Committee, on which I serve along with experts from industry and government, will soon release an information report defining key concepts related to the increasing automation of on-road vehicles. Central to this 12-page report are six levels of driving automation: 0 (no automation), 1 (driver assistance), 2 (partial automation), 3 (conditional automation), 4 (high automation), and 5 (full automation). Read more » about SAE Levels of Driving Automation
By Bryant Walker Smith • October 6, 2013 at 12:00 am
Thank you for reading my posts this week. If you happen to be Eugene Volokh or Ken Anderson, thank you in particular for making them possible. And if you were one of my thoughtful commenters, thank you for questioning and challenging; I have read your remarks with great interest. Read more » about Looking at My Vehicle Automation Entries in the Rear-View Mirror
By Bryant Walker Smith • October 4, 2013 at 12:00 am
By Bryant Walker Smith • October 3, 2013 at 2:38 am
By Bryant Walker Smith • October 1, 2013 at 12:00 am
Cross-posted from Volokh Conspiracy.
Since the 1950s, the Long Beach Freeway has linked the massive Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles to, roughly, the rest of the continental United States. Because much has changed in trade and traffic since then, California’s relevant transportation authorities have decided that perhaps this freeway should change as well. Read more » about The Impact of Automation on Environmental Impact Statements
By Bryant Walker Smith • September 30, 2013 at 12:00 am
By Bryant Walker Smith • May 27, 2013 at 5:25 pm
"Will lawsuits kill the autonomous car?" That's a dramatic expression of a common question. (And one to which Twitter has a short retort.) Here’s the conceptual answer that I’ve been giving for a year, now in blog form (with bonus Italics). Read more » about Uncertain Liability
By Bryant Walker Smith • April 15, 2013 at 11:58 am
By Bryant Walker Smith • July 31, 2012 at 1:58 pm
In honor of anyone who just took a bar exam, here's the wholly hypothetical scenario I used at last week's excellent multidiscliplinary workshop on road vehicle automation (with slight modifications): Read more » about A Self-Driving Crash Test
By Bryant Walker Smith • July 10, 2012 at 6:16 pm
A century later, driverless cars and trucks have the potential to revolutionize society as much as the horseless carriages that preceded them. This emerging technology raises important questions -- about legality and liability, privacy and security, even intellectual property and land use -- that demand thoughtful analysis from a variety of perspectives. For these reasons, I am excited to be teaching an inaugural seminar on the legal aspects of autonomous driving. This Fall 2012 course is open to Stanford University students who want to meaningfully advance that analysis. Law students should preregister by this Friday, July 13th, 2012; others should follow these steps. Read more » about Stanford Students: Fall 2012 Course on the Law of Autonomous Driving
By Bryant Walker Smith • June 20, 2012 at 7:06 am
California's autonomous driving bill (SB 1298) has undergone further amendment. Two observations: Read more » about Amendments to California's Autonomous Driving Bill
By Bryant Walker Smith • May 28, 2012 at 3:52 pm
In the United States over the next ten years, governments may spend some $1.5 trillion on their roadways, consumers may purchase vehicles worth nearly $3 trillion, property owners may develop millions of acres of rural land, and the US Postal Service may drive its cars and trucks approximately 12 billion miles (with FedEx alone adding 10 billion miles more). How might these massive numbers—and others like them—be harnessed to smooth the deployment of self-driving vehicle technologies? Read more » about Planning for Autonomous Driving
By Bryant Walker Smith • March 30, 2012 at 5:41 pm
Google has posted an inspiring video (with audio captions) of a legally blind individual riding in the front left seat of one of its self-driving cars as that car travels along a “carefully programmed route.” As the company prudently notes, the video is “a promising look at what autonomous technology may one day deliver if rigorous technology and safety standards can be met.” Both Google and a local police officer who assisted with the demo believe it to be legal. Read more » about On Blind Drivers and Base Maps
By Bryant Walker Smith • March 11, 2012 at 3:20 pm
• “Nothing is going to catch this car by surprise…. It’s going to see hundreds of feet in all directions. [You’re] not going to have a pedestrian ‘come out of nowhere’ or the ball coming to the middle of the street. This car senses a lot.”
• “Our cars are designed to avoid the kinds of situations that force people to make last-minute value judgments while driving.”
• “[Our car] always does the right thing.” Read more » about Driving at Perfection
