Fact is Google will never break even on the investment and it’s more or less a white elephant. I don’t think it’s even accurate to call it a Beta product, at best it’s Alpha.
... followed by speculation about the future.
> [not everywhere]
The standard you proposed was "on the road". In their service areas (more than "one", they've been in Phoenix for some time) anyone can install their app and get a ride.
I shouldn't have poked my nose in here, I was just kind of croggled to see someone answer "ideological battle" by bringing up another argument where they don't seem to care about facts.
And despite everything, Waymo is not quite there yet. It's able to handle certain areas at a limited scale. Amazing, yes, but it has not changed the reality of driving for 99.9% of the population. Soon it will, I'm sure, but not yet.
This is just not true. My reaction to the second challenge race (not the first) in 2005 was, it was a 0-to-1 kind of moment and robocars were now coming, but the timescale was not at all clear. Yes you could find hype and blithe overoptimism, and it's convenient to round that off to "everybody" when that's the picture you want to paint.
> 20 years later that’s still not the case
Also false. Waymo in public operation and expanding.