 | |
| Author | Paris Marx |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Verso Books |
Publication date | 2022 |
| Publication place | Canada |
| Media type | Print (hardcover and paperback) |
| ISBN | 978-1839765889 |
Road to Nowhere: What Silicon Valley Gets Wrong about the Future of Transportation is a 2022 non-fiction book by Canadian author Paris Marx. [1]
The book covers a number of emerging technologies in mass transportation, particularly those that have been widely advocated for by corporations in Silicon Valley, such as ridesharing companies, electric cars, and the Hyperloop. Analysing those technologies, Marx criticises the vision of transportation put forward by Silicon Valley corporations, saying that they fail to resolve many of the issues facing mass transportation, such as environmental and cost-of-living concerns. Marx further advocates for a greater emphasis on collective methods to tackle those issues instead, including public transportation and more democratic urban planning. [2] [3]
Alastair Dalton of The Scotsman said the book offers "a nightmarish vision of the direction in which technology is taking transport" and "underlines the extraordinary toll exacted by motor vehicles." [4] Rob Larson of Jacobin noted that there were some relevant topics that Marx failed to discuss, namely the use of private jets, but that the book was a "fun read" that "pairs brutally realistic analysis with a consummately Canadian level of indictment." [5] Matthew James Seidel of Protean Magazine described the book as "a sharply rendered, compelling, and illuminating text that combines diffuse histories and complex processes into a clear narrative" and that its "most essential message is its insistence that, whatever the promise of new technologies, they will never serve anyone but the privileged—unless decisions about their use are made in a democratic manner." [6]
Vinod Khosla is an Indian-American billionaire businessman and venture capitalist. He is a co-founder of Sun Microsystems and the founder of Khosla Ventures. Khosla made his wealth from early venture capital investments in areas such as networking, software, and alternative energy technologies. He is considered one of the most successful and influential venture capitalists.
Elon Reeve Musk is a businessman and investor known for his key roles in space company SpaceX and automotive company Tesla, Inc. Other involvements include ownership of X Corp., formerly Twitter, and his role in the founding of The Boring Company, xAI, Neuralink and OpenAI. He is one of the wealthiest people in the world; as of June 2024, Forbes estimates his net worth to be US$210 billion.
Masayoshi Son is a Japanese billionaire technology entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist. A third-generation Zainichi Korean, he naturalized as a Japanese citizen in 1990. He is the founder, representative director, corporate officer, chairman and CEO of SoftBank Group Corp. (SBG), a strategic technology-focused investment holding company, as well as chairman of UK-based Arm Holdings.
X.com was an American online bank founded by Elon Musk, Harris Fricker, Christopher Payne, and Ed Ho in 1999 in Palo Alto, California. In 2000, it merged with competitor Confinity and in 2001, the merged company changed its name to PayPal. Starting in 2023, the x.com internet domain name began to be used for Twitter which was acquired by Musk in 2022 and subsequently rebranded to X.
Tesla, Inc. is an American multinational automotive and clean energy company headquartered in Austin, Texas, which designs, manufactures and sells battery electric vehicles (BEVs), stationary battery energy storage devices from home to grid-scale, solar panels and solar shingles, and related products and services. The company is also developing artificial intelligence and robotics products.
Ashlee Vance is an American reporter, writer and filmmaker. He wrote a biography of Elon Musk, titled Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future, that was released on May 19, 2015.
Jennifer Justine Musk is a Canadian author.
Łukasz Nosek is a Polish-American entrepreneur, notable for being a co-founder of PayPal.
Kimbal James Musk is a South African restaurateur, chef, and entrepreneur. He owns The Kitchen Restaurant Group, a collection of restaurants located in Colorado and Chicago. He is the co-founder and chairman of Big Green, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that has built hundreds of outdoor classrooms called Learning Gardens in schoolyards across America. Musk is also the co-founder and chairman of Square Roots, an urban farming company growing food in hydroponic, indoor, climate controlled shipping containers. Musk currently sits on the boards of Tesla Inc. and SpaceX, both of which his brother Elon is the current CEO. He was on the board of Chipotle Mexican Grill from 2013 to 2019. He is the brother of Elon Musk and Tosca Musk, son of Errol and Maye Musk, and a major shareholder in Tesla.
The "PayPal Mafia" is a group of former PayPal employees and founders who have since founded and/or developed additional technology companies based in Silicon Valley such as Tesla, Inc., LinkedIn, Palantir Technologies, SpaceX, Affirm, Slide, Kiva, YouTube, Yelp, and Yammer. Most of the members attended Stanford University or University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign at some point in their studies.
LessWrong is a community blog and forum focused on discussion of cognitive biases, philosophy, psychology, economics, rationality, and artificial intelligence, among other topics.
Hyperloop is a proposed high-speed transportation system for both passengers and freight. The concept was documented by Elon Musk in a 2013 white paper, where the hyperloop was described as a transportation system using capsules supported by an air-bearing surface within a low-pressure tube. Hyperloop systems have three essential elements: tubes, pods, and terminals. The tube is a large, sealed low-pressure system. The pod is a coach at atmospheric pressure that experiences low air resistance or friction inside the tube using magnetic propulsion. The terminal handles pod arrivals and departures. The hyperloop, in the form proposed by Musk, differs from tradititional vactrains by relying on residual air pressure inside the tube to provide lift from aerofoils and propulsion by fans; however, many subsequent variants using the name "hyperloop" have remained relatively close to the core principles of vactrains.
Hyperloop Transportation Technologies, also known as HyperloopTT, is an American research company formed using a crowd collaboration approach to develop around the world commercial transportation systems based on the Hyperloop concept.
Hyperloop One, known as Virgin Hyperloop until November 2022, was an American transportation technology company that worked to commercialize high-speed travel utilizing the Hyperloop concept which was a variant of the vacuum train. The company was established on June 1, 2014, and reorganized and renamed on October 12, 2017.
Zip2 Corp. was a company that provided and licensed online city guide software to newspapers. The company was founded in Palo Alto, California as Global Link Information Network, Inc. on November 9, 1995, by Greg Kouri and brothers Elon and Kimbal Musk. Initially, Global Link provided local businesses with an Internet presence, but later began to assist newspapers in designing online city guides before being purchased by Compaq Computer in 2000.
Jim Cantrell is an American entrepreneur, mechanical engineer and road racer. He is the CEO and co-founder of Phantom Space Corporation, which aims to build space transportation technology. After working at the French Space Agency CNES and the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab, he worked as an independent consultant to aerospace companies for fifteen years and was on the founding teams of SpaceX and Moon Express. Cantrell was a consultant for SpaceX and Elon Musk's industry mentor when SpaceX launched in 2002.
The Boring Company (TBC) is an American infrastructure, tunnel construction services, and equipment company founded by Elon Musk. TBC was founded as a subsidiary of SpaceX in 2017, and was spun off as a separate corporation in 2018. TBC has completed one tunneling project that is open to the public, as well as multiple test tunnels.
The Chicago Express Loop was a proposed privately funded urban rail transit rapid transit system that will use underground high-speed rail to connect the Chicago Loop to O'Hare International Airport from Block 37. The line was to be constructed by Elon Musk's The Boring Company and use 16-passenger self-driving vehicles built on Tesla chassis. The proposed vehicles would move through tunnels at speeds as high as 150 miles per hour on a concrete track and complete the journey in 12 minutes, which is 3 to 4 times faster than existing alternatives such as the Chicago Transit Authority Blue Line. The proposed vehicles were referred to as skates and are based on the Tesla Model X. The vehicles would cover an 18-mile (29 km) track with eight guiding wheels, including four traditional grounded wheels and four additional side wheels. It was claimed the Boring Company would pay the costs for the construction of the system in exchange for the rights to the future transit fees as well as advertisement, branding and in-vehicle sales revenues. Chicago Express Loop is the official name of the plan. The vehicles will depart as often as every 30 seconds.
Paris Marx is a Canadian technology journalist, author, podcaster, and critic with articles written for Time, Wired, NBC News, and other publications. Marx is the author of Road to Nowhere: What Silicon Valley Gets Wrong about the Future of Transportation and hosts the award-winning Tech Industry-critical podcast Tech Won't Save Us.
 | This article about a book on transport is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |