<story><title>Veteran developer Steve Lacey (Google, Microsoft) Killed in Auto Accident</title><url>http://www.loopinsight.com/2011/07/25/veteran-developer-steve-lacey-killed-in-driving-incident/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>abduhl</author><text>&lt;i&gt;And what about the culture where drinking and driving is, in many states, acceptable? Why isn&apos;t there a dramatic and meaningful campaign to demonstrate that there is really only zero-tolerance to drink-driving that is acceptable?&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;States have been cracking down on drunk driving for the past decade or two. If there ever was a culture where drinking and driving was &quot;acceptable&quot; on a state level it has long since disappeared.&lt;p&gt;If you don&apos;t mind me asking, where do you currently live (you&apos;re clearly from the Queen&apos;s domain) and, if it isn&apos;t in the US, how did you get this idea that the US doesn&apos;t take drinking and driving seriously?</text></item><item><author>imajes</author><text>Why? Plenty of people are able to drive a vehicle, and drive it well. It&apos;s the many who aren&apos;t, or choose to ignore the rules who are causing danger.&lt;p&gt;The &quot;every vehicle should be automated&quot; line is lowest common denominator FUD.&lt;p&gt;How about we start by actually applying a proper, rigorous upgrade to the new driver education from the DMV, and stop treating driving as a right, and instead a privilege?&lt;p&gt;How about we improve mass transit and spend more money fixing roads (which is a bigger cause of accidents than you might imagine).&lt;p&gt;What about Signage, which is over abundant and people ignore - or important signage which is entirely missing (many median lines are faded away - not repainted due to lack of funding)?&lt;p&gt;And what about the culture where drinking and driving is, in many states, acceptable? Why isn&apos;t there a dramatic and meaningful campaign to demonstrate that there is really only zero-tolerance to drink-driving that is acceptable?&lt;p&gt;The United States approach to driving is embarrassing and smacks of largesse, but for much of the country, where there is an abundance of space and empty roads, is tolerated.&lt;p&gt;Accidents happen routinely in city centers and suburban areas where the laws and driving regulations are not more stricter, but often just as (if not more) relaxed.&lt;p&gt;There isn&apos;t consideration given to heavy traffic, patterns of driving, preparing for exits - it&apos;s just expected that as long as you know how to steer and stop at a sign, you are qualified to drive.&lt;p&gt;Computer controlled cars is a stupid argument (mostly because they are almost already there, in the full part, and certainly the car you are driving is doing more work than you are to get you to your destination). Never mind the fact that the better answer is amazing and undeniable mass transit, obviating the need for personal car ownership in densely populated areas, and  a 2-3 magnitude leap in driver education to prevent such stupidity on the roads as a basic requirement to even begin to address this problem.</text></item><item><author>amichail</author><text>It&apos;s time to have mandatory computer controlled cars.&lt;p&gt;Driving manually should be illegal unless done on a race track.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>imajes</author><text>Oh. and one more point.&lt;p&gt;There was an attempt to broadcast a drink driving psa in the US, which was filmed in the style of a UK drink-drive campaign advert.&lt;p&gt;It was banned. No network was willing to show it, and went so far as to get the FCC to ban it as it would scare people.&lt;p&gt;How is that in any way a serious attitude to drink driving?&lt;p&gt;If you haven&apos;t seen them, here are a few interesting PSAs from the uk. They are shocking, disturbing - horrible. But they work.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQtTREndJKk&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQtTREndJKk&lt;/a&gt; - drink driving
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iqCcMDByLA&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iqCcMDByLA&lt;/a&gt; - using your phone
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qm8yyl9ROEM&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qm8yyl9ROEM&lt;/a&gt; - speed (a classic)&lt;p&gt;from ireland:
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om9qq2d4DRk&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om9qq2d4DRk&lt;/a&gt; - drinking
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzvzqaicMz0&amp;#38;NR=1&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzvzqaicMz0&amp;#38;NR=1&lt;/a&gt; - seatbelts&lt;p&gt;from australia:
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8QxZJZfU5Q&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8QxZJZfU5Q&lt;/a&gt; - speeding/mixed&lt;p&gt;And for comparison, this one won an emmy as a PSA from tennessee:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miqGOGv7QPs&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miqGOGv7QPs&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;Seriously?</text></comment>
<story><title>Veteran developer Steve Lacey (Google, Microsoft) Killed in Auto Accident</title><url>http://www.loopinsight.com/2011/07/25/veteran-developer-steve-lacey-killed-in-driving-incident/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>abduhl</author><text>&lt;i&gt;And what about the culture where drinking and driving is, in many states, acceptable? Why isn&apos;t there a dramatic and meaningful campaign to demonstrate that there is really only zero-tolerance to drink-driving that is acceptable?&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;States have been cracking down on drunk driving for the past decade or two. If there ever was a culture where drinking and driving was &quot;acceptable&quot; on a state level it has long since disappeared.&lt;p&gt;If you don&apos;t mind me asking, where do you currently live (you&apos;re clearly from the Queen&apos;s domain) and, if it isn&apos;t in the US, how did you get this idea that the US doesn&apos;t take drinking and driving seriously?</text></item><item><author>imajes</author><text>Why? Plenty of people are able to drive a vehicle, and drive it well. It&apos;s the many who aren&apos;t, or choose to ignore the rules who are causing danger.&lt;p&gt;The &quot;every vehicle should be automated&quot; line is lowest common denominator FUD.&lt;p&gt;How about we start by actually applying a proper, rigorous upgrade to the new driver education from the DMV, and stop treating driving as a right, and instead a privilege?&lt;p&gt;How about we improve mass transit and spend more money fixing roads (which is a bigger cause of accidents than you might imagine).&lt;p&gt;What about Signage, which is over abundant and people ignore - or important signage which is entirely missing (many median lines are faded away - not repainted due to lack of funding)?&lt;p&gt;And what about the culture where drinking and driving is, in many states, acceptable? Why isn&apos;t there a dramatic and meaningful campaign to demonstrate that there is really only zero-tolerance to drink-driving that is acceptable?&lt;p&gt;The United States approach to driving is embarrassing and smacks of largesse, but for much of the country, where there is an abundance of space and empty roads, is tolerated.&lt;p&gt;Accidents happen routinely in city centers and suburban areas where the laws and driving regulations are not more stricter, but often just as (if not more) relaxed.&lt;p&gt;There isn&apos;t consideration given to heavy traffic, patterns of driving, preparing for exits - it&apos;s just expected that as long as you know how to steer and stop at a sign, you are qualified to drive.&lt;p&gt;Computer controlled cars is a stupid argument (mostly because they are almost already there, in the full part, and certainly the car you are driving is doing more work than you are to get you to your destination). Never mind the fact that the better answer is amazing and undeniable mass transit, obviating the need for personal car ownership in densely populated areas, and  a 2-3 magnitude leap in driver education to prevent such stupidity on the roads as a basic requirement to even begin to address this problem.</text></item><item><author>amichail</author><text>It&apos;s time to have mandatory computer controlled cars.&lt;p&gt;Driving manually should be illegal unless done on a race track.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>imajes</author><text>I live in New York, where the average driving skill is one of the poorest i&apos;ve ever had to be around in the western world.&lt;p&gt;I know that states are &apos;cracking down&apos;. But till you see some of the PSAs that the UK and European countries have issued to &apos;crack down&apos; on drink driving, you&apos;ll note that there&apos;s simply no question as to the laissez-faire approach to drink-driving in this country.&lt;p&gt;Whilst attorneys can still advertise quite so blatantly to help you &apos;get off&apos; your DUI/DWI convictions, without any social consequence, and where major motion pictures make light of it (Bad Teacher recently features a scene where Cameron Diaz&apos;s character suggests it&apos;s ok to drive home as she&apos;s only &quot;Buzzed&quot;), it&apos;s CLEAR that the attitude here is inadequate.&lt;p&gt;To be clearer: there&apos;s now a healthy social stigma in the UK to go out and drink and drive; friends will forcibly remove you from your keys if you&apos;ve been drinking - and it&apos;s ok. The punishment is also more significant, where drink driving is considered dangerous driving - not a misdemeanor or less.&lt;p&gt;And most importantly (which somewhat counters my arguments-- but only tangentially) much of the US land mass is a single, lonely road from a bar to your house. When you don&apos;t see another car for ages, it might seem ok to drive home when you&apos;ve had a bit too much - what can go wrong, you might run off the road and take a nap?&lt;p&gt;But this doesn&apos;t apply in mountainous regions, or other places where you have to have your wits about you because the terrain isn&apos;t a wide, open plain.&lt;p&gt;and it certainly doesn&apos;t hold true when you&apos;re near/on Long Island (for example, as I see stories like this at least ONCE A MONTH), where you &apos;accidentally&apos; get on the expressway the wrong way, and ram some innocent family&apos;s car.&lt;p&gt;[ and as an aside, to reinforce my signage point: off-ramps have &quot;WRONG WAY&quot; signed on the back of the exit-info signs. So that you know you&apos;re going the wrong way, if the angle of the ram and the difficulty you&apos;ll have experienced in entering it wasn&apos;t enough. Why there isn&apos;t the tire bursting heavy-duty spikes on off-ramps is totally beyond me. ]</text></comment>