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Uber Seeks Patent For AI That Determines Whether Passengers Are Drunk (cnet.com)
In an effort to "reduce undesired consequences," Uber is seeking a patent that would use artificial intelligence to separate sober passengers from drunk ones. The pending application details a technology that would be used to spot "uncharacteristic user activity," including passenger location, number of typos entered into the mobile app, and even the angle the smartphone is being held. CNET reports: Uber said it had no immediate plans to implement the technology described in the proposed patent, pointing out the application was filed in 2016. "We are always exploring ways that our technology can help improve the Uber experience for riders and drivers," a spokesperson said. "We file patent applications on many ideas, but not all of them actually become products or features."
Hell, so that explains it! Here I thought text messages like "wut r u doing 2nite?" were because of the monumental failure of our educational system. Now I know it's from the monumental success of our alcohol industry.
Being drunk is why I am getting an Uber FFS. If they wont pick me up drunk then they have lost my business.
...because isn't that more important?
Wait a second, I am confused? You weren't supposed to file a patent for an idea. Ideas were supposedly unpatentable. What you were supposed to file a patent for was a method of using or achieving the said idea, but otherwise ideas had no place in patents
While they're at it, can they patent a car that doesn't kill pedestrians?
As someone pointed out on Twitter, this isn't AI but an if statement.
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
I'm no patent lawyer, so maybe I'm not up on the jargon, and maybe "Systems, methods, and vehicles for taking a vehicle out-of-service" means "detecting if someone is drunk", but the link here and in the article seem to point me to an unrelated patent.
Since when were we equating someone's upholstry with diversity? The threat is that you are more likely to damage the vehicle you are going to be a passenger in. You are more likely to be pain in the ass in any number of ways as a drunk passenger.
If the technology can reliably pick out the drunk from the sober, with no false positives then I'm all for it. No false positives is a bit of a dream, though, and I worry about quite what will happen to the poor folks who hold their phone in a 'drunk' way.
-- Gaxx
Discrimination....
And you think it's sober people Uber is picking up between midnight and 4AM on a Friday night? Drunk people already pay a premium when they often find their drinking schedule aligns with "peak" rates...
So, training a machine learning with sampled data is now patentable? .......'?
Does that also mean I can patent 'Training a person to
That has never been allowable before, why is it allowable now?
Oh, I forgot, the US patent office allows large US companies to patent ANYTHING, totally ignoring actual patent law.
what could've been solved with a simple air sensor detecting alcohol in the air, now it has to be "AI".
But what I'm talking about... if it was for the sensor practical and 100% working solution, it wouldn't have made it to the news.
meanwhile at Uber HQ: "Hello idiot investors. We have to use AI for this solution. Pliz gib more moneeh."
Just your daily dosage of faux tech.
Maybe they should have one fir drivers first tho !!
Why would Uber care? It is 2am Especially on a weekend. Save your computing cycles, probably drinking. One of the attractions to ride services can drink and not drive. Why not just ask the passengers instead of going into creepy mode?
I'd like an AI that tells me if the _driver_ is drunk, the passengers are almost always legally drunk after a certain hour, that's why they take an Uber instead of driving under the influence.
Disabled people, particularly those with cerebral palsy, Parkinson's disease, and other neuromotor conditions, are absolutely going to be misidentified as drunk and discriminated against by Uber. Uber currently has a crappy track record serving the disabled, refusing service to those with wheelchairs, guide dogs, and so on. The drunk hail an Uber when they shouldn't be driving. Many disabled hail an Uber because, sober or drunk, they cannot drive at all.
I thought personal responibility was in the fact that you were drunk and you called an Uber instead of driving the first place. Now they want to discriminate againt you for doing that? What bullshit.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
It doesn't take a whole lot of AI to know that pretty much EVERY passenger is drunk when you're driving Uber at 2AM in a university area.
I now need a "designated Uber-summoner"? :P
That said, the app is so bad and frustrating (keeps deleting input, etc.) that I probably would look drunk using it even stone sober...
I'm willing to bet that you'd get a better ratio of honest answers by simply presenting an "Are you drunk?" checkbox than all the false positives you'd get from trying to use AI to determine drunkenness.
Is passenger drunk? "Yes"
Very few false positives.
We're just high on life.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Almost everybody can tell when somebody is really bad drunk. You know the obvious signs - nearly falling down, slurred speech, etc.. The people who have been drinking and are not obviously drunk are not a problem. So what does the AI add that humans can't do?
If they're calling for an Uber... yep, they must be drunk!
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
Too bad Foster Brooks is no longer available to test this AI.