Grand Challenge Map Leaked

Posted 6 Jan 2004 at 15:41 UTC by steve

Bill Carlson tipped us off to the latest in a series of setbacks for DARPA's Grand Challenge competition. The course map (PDF format) has been leaked to the web. The map was supposed to be kept secret until hours before the race to insure that the robots were able to navigate autonomously rather than being preprogrammed for the specific course. A story in The Register has more details about the leak.

This is ROBO DUNG!, posted 7 Jan 2004 at 07:25 UTC by WhoPhlungPoo » (Journeyer)

I had originally planed on competing in this event, for no other reason than to have some robot desert fun, however, due to some financial difficulties I was unable to even think about building something for the race and decided to put it off until next year in the event that no one grabbed the win. I was extremely upset that I wouldn‛TM]t be able to compete, however, I couldn‛TM]t imagine how upset I would have been if I actually put effort into it and was turned away. In light of what DARPA has done to this event for whatever reason, I turn my back on the entire thing and think poorly of anyone who would take part in this CF!