Why can't they build a mechanism where the car can close its own doors. I thought that would be the smaller part compared to autonomous self driving
this post was submitted on 13 Feb 2026
352 points (100.0% liked)
Technology
81208 readers
3705 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related news or articles.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
The gig worker is the mechanism. Very innovative tech.
I know I can shut a passenger side car door with just the accelerator and brakes. If it's not latched completely then a bollard or a curbside tree will suffice.
Human driven taxis have mechanically closing passenger doors for decades. It's a big bug software and a management a failure . This can't be street legal. Autonomous cabs are billionaires snake oil
Hell, the Mexican colectivo van driver closes the sliding doors on his rattly 20 year old van simply by hard braking.
Putting aside all the late stage capitalism going on here, I still can't get over the fact that Alphabet (Google) spent billions of dollars developing self driving car technology only to arrive at, "Oh shit. Someone left the car door open. What do we do now?"
Giving them the ability to close their own doors just screams "kid's arm smashed in automatic car door failure".
I used to have a Tesla (traded it in). In the app you could open, but not close, the windows. It could be inconvenient at times but I assume the reasoning was similar.
That’s weird. Most of the cars I have had can open and close the windows from the fob. (Usually double press then hold unlock or lock, though one car I had [Accord] required the key in the door for the windows to go up.)
load more comments
(1 replies)
load more comments
(5 replies)
Just make the motor not slam the door but close it slowly with not enough force to harm someone and put like two sensors + 1 backup in there
load more comments
(3 replies)
Behold the miracle of the slipping clutch, millenials. See It working without being digital and all without an app by the ancient secrets of mechanics!
load more comments
(8 replies)
This shows you just how strong our culture is an influence here. You can leave a door open and cause enough trouble that they need to hire someone else to go manually shut it. I’m willing to bet there are a lot of seemingly innocuous ways to cause friction with these companies. The more people know and exploit them, the better.
Supposedly a salt circle drawn like "no entry" road markings can trap them.
load more comments
(5 replies)
load more comments
(1 replies)
Even if this thing was left on a single city block for 8 hours with its door open, the data it collects about nearby cars, Bluetooth devices, phones, WiFi SSIDs, recorded video/audio, etc. makes it worth it for alphabet, I imagine.
When I was a kid my dad would drive forward and slam the brakes to close our van door.
It was really fun until that became the only way that closed the door.
Clearly that's why it's called DoorDash. /s
Take my upvote and gtfo 😂
They have self-driving cars, but self-closing doors is still at least 10-15 years away.
I imagine there would be a gigantic list of safety concerns for self-closing doors.
You're right! Tech companies need to stick to the easier problem to solve, self-driving cars! 😆
I've seen cars with self-closing doors though. Also I'm not sure where the safety consideration would come in since we have self closing building doors right now and no one seems to get cut in half by those.
Minivans have had self-closing doors for decades bro
They already exist though? There are a bunch of EVs with servos in their doors. You can still overpower it just like you can an auto closing trunk
Eh, we already have self closing trunks. As long as they are programmed correctly (not by Tesla) they sense resistance and stop.
load more comments
(3 replies)
load more comments
(1 replies)
Does it charge extra to the last person that used the Waymo to cover the cost? Because if not, might as well just leave the door open every time, now you're a job creator.
Just keep the door and you're creating even more jobs in the door factory.
Give people a dollar discount off their ride if they close the door on the way out.
Why are people leaving the doors open in the first place that's just wild. The super excited to get to work or something I don't get it.
Wouldn't the simplest solution be to just ban people who leave the doors open, it's not that hard to close them.
Probably the doors are in the "unlatched" position rather than wide open.
load more comments
(1 replies)
But charge an extra dollar first
have a friend stalk Waymo’s and give the passenger $5 to leave the door ajar a bit .
load more comments
(1 replies)
Hmmm…so it costs Waymo $11.25 if you “forget” to shut the door.
Maybe people will become very forgetful.
Or, upon reflection, just don’t use Waymo, and don’t play into it at all.
If you leave it all the way open, the car just needs to drive a couple feet with decent acceleration to close it.
If you ALMOST close it, but not all the way, that would require some sort of intervention.
load more comments
(4 replies)
load more comments
(3 replies)
so from now on leave all waymo's doors open and if you see one open no you don't
load more comments
(2 replies)
The cost of doing business is to pay a poor to close a door and keep the wheels of progress spinning.
see? ai does create new jobs. checkmate ai doomers /s
Its funny because in the US, there are regulations that make it such that, even if they have the capability to close the doors remotely and anti pinch sensors etc, they are not allowed to unless it is done by someone from a device nearby while they hold down the close button.
load more comments
(2 replies)
view more: next ›