Autonomous Audi TT Conquers Pike's Peak

fergus07 writes "After a year long research program, this week Audi revealed that its Autonomous TTS car had completed the 12.42-mile Pike's Peak mountain course in 27 minutes. An expert driver in the same car would take around 17 minutes — now we have a benchmark, the race is on, and it's almost inevitable that a computer will one day outdrive the best of our species, and it may be sooner than you think."

Robo-Thelma&Louise

[digitaldc]

"It's an old racing adage that it's a lot easier to make a fast driver who crashes safe than to make a slow driver faster. The penalty for error on Pikes Peak is massive as the edge of the circuit is often a massive cliff.
Audi is logically taking a cautious and considered approach because the negative publicity of a car plunging over a fatal drop would hinder the development.".

Actually, the dash-cam video of the Autonomous Audi speeding off the road, going over a cliff and crashing in a fiery explosion would be pretty damn awesome.

Re:Bah! Stupid "the narrative"

[Anonymous Coward]

This is Slashdot, dammit, we're supposed to be talking about the tech the car uses, the sensor fields, blind spots, known bugs, and so forth. What do we get? A typical journalist "the narrative" story, where humanity is in a race against robots which will surely supplant us. Guh, it's like a rejected 1950s sci-fi manuscript.

Well, an automated journalist could be programmed to write about the facts, the technology, like you said. Maybe we should face off a /. writer with a computer to see who writes the most compelling story? As a prize, the winner could enslave the loser's race.

Re:Robo-Thelma&Louise

[kieran]

"All autonomous vehicles are fitted with extra gasoline tanks made out of cheap plastic for explosive awesomeness".

Re:And here I was just thinking...

[dave420]

Huh? You can fully automate NASCAR with a steering lock and a brick on the gas pedal.