With a third generation of federal "policy guidance" in the works and national summit on AV regulation taking place today, we turn to one of the most insightful voices on the legal and regulatory issues surrounding autonomous drive technology. Bryant Walker Smith is a professor at the University of South Carolina law school, an affiliate scholar at the Center for Internet and Society at Stanford Law School, an adjunct clinical professor at the University of Michigan Law School and a member of the US Department of Transportation's Advisory Committee on Automation in Transportation. If anyone can provide a clear overview of the tangle of issues surrounding this emerging technology in just 30 minutes, it's this guy.

In what may be the most trend-chasing-est episode yet, Alex, Kirsten and Ed discuss Porsche's new blockchain play (yes, really...), Stanford's research into a steering wheel "avatar," the rise of category-blurring shuttles and (of course) sexual harassment. It's the kind of episode where even the hosts aren't sure when to be snarky and when to be serious.

In the words of Dr Sven Beiker, the important question is not when autonomous vehicles will be deployed but where they will be deployed. As autonomous drive technology matures and companies get closer to deploying, the question of where autonomous vehicles can have the most positive impact is becoming more important than ever. To explore this question, we're kicking off a "City Series" here at The Autonocast that will look at the challenges and opportunities facing autonomous mobility in different cities and regions. To kick off this series,we're joined by Avery Ash of INRIX. Avery explains how INRIX developed a ranking of cities most likely to benefit from shared autonomous electric vehicles, where the data to make these decisions come from and how companies and municipalities alike can work together to ensure that the future of mobility has as positive an impact as possible

On the latest episode of The Autonocast: why Level Four autonomy can mean almost anything, how Nissan plans to make a buck selling electric cars, where you can stick your platitudes about the CASE (connected, autonomous, shared electric) orthodoxy and the worst driverless car video... in the world. 

Mapping has always been an important aspect of autonomous drive technology, but the full range of opportunities for maps in the future of mobility isn't always fully appreciated. This week Dr Sanjay Sood, head of Highly Automated Driving at the mapping juggernaut HERE, joins The Autonocast to explain why maps are so crucial, how they are being used to solve all kinds of mobility challenges and where the future of mapping is headed.

As the last few weeks have confirmed once again, the media can't stop talking about Tesla... and apparently neither can we. Luckily we also managed to squeeze in some discussion of the Uber-Waymo trial, the upcoming AV regulatory summit and the Apple Homepod. In short, this may well be the least autonomous drive-focused episode of The Autonocast ever.

Dr Melissa Cefkin is one of many scientists working on the challenge of developing and deploying autonomous cars at Nissan's Silicon Valley research lab. But she's a bit different than most scientists working in this space: she's a social scientist, specifically an anthropologist. On this episode of The Autonocast, she joins the crew to explain why social science is so important to the development of autonomous cars, and how her team contributes to Nissan's work in this sector.

Dr Stephen Zoepf of Stanford's Center for Automotive Research recently wrote a thoughtful commentary at Reuters about the complex nature of autonomous vehicle safety. Dr Zoepf joins the latest episode of The Autonocast to explain his thoughts on this fascinating topic with Alex, Kirsten and Ed. The conversation continues with a discussion of the California DMV's annual disengagement report, and the recently-promulgated Shared Mobility Principles For Livable Cities.

The massive Tier One automotive supplier Delphi was a relatively early player in autonomy, having completed a cross-country drive way back in 2015. Now the autonomous and future mobility technology side of Delphi has been split off from the more traditional supplier business and is now a standalone company called Aptiv. Kirsten and Ed met up with Aptiv at CES, where they took a ride in one of the company's test vehicles, caught up with its development plans and found out why autonomous cars are a bit like elevators.