DARPA Urban Challenge In Progress

As with the Space Elevator Games and Lunar Lander Challenge, I'm not able to do justice to the DARPA Urban Challenge - there's too much going on here while all these big prize events take place. I have a huge stack of Urban Challenge links I'll probably never get a chance to sort through. Fortunately, this one is also being covered in great detail. Cosmic Log points to the DARPA Urban Challenge coverage by Michael Belfiore for Wired Danger Room. You might want to start with his preview article. The latest news is that 6 teams have been eliminated during the National Qualification Event. More will be cut before the finals on November 3.

Michael explains the most important rule of the game (after all these are supposed to be logistics vehicles, not RoboCop tanks):

DARPA director Tony Tether outlined the basic rules for competing teams in a briefing last night, concluding with the most important rule of all: "Don't hit anyone!!!"

That's with three exclamation points, in about a 10,000-point font size, just so no one would miss it.

Yes, the exclamation points about about 4 feet tall.

tgdaily is also covering the event with a lot of posts, videos, and slide shows.