I can only imagine that these are illegal.in the Netherlands as they would be too distracting in traffic
Why would this be legal at all?
this post was submitted on 15 May 2026
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It will be illegal in a lot of places. But the US doesn't really have traffic laws, they have guidelines, that nobody follows.
Certainly isn't legal for a moving vehicle. You can have a billboard strapped to a flatbed but you cannot have a moving screen.
I wonder how well those hold up to bottles and rocks
I wish they get hacked and someone starts displaying porn while the driver drives normally without a care with 10 cars following behind him and every boomer dropping dead from heart attacks.
such a waste of fuel. These are idiotic (and polluting).
Thank goodness this is illegal here in Europe.
Stuff like this is banned in my country because it totally is not safe in traffic. Elect some not-crazy people, dear Americans, and they might give you sensible legislation.
Unfortunately Republicans have spent the better part of a century brainwashing morons into believing that all government is inherently bad and the only things that can be trusted are corporations and billionaires. Somewhere around 30% of the population over here can be reliably counted on to vote in favor of Republicans that run on a campaign of literally destroying the government and allowing corporations to do whatever the hell they want and the morons think that will fix all our problems.
Even more unfortunately our only other viable party the Democrats are by and large bought and paid for by corporate interests so they also tend to do a crap job writing sensible legislation. Generally if they do manage to get something passed without Republicans gutting it there are almost always giant gaping loopholes in it that were inserted by corporate lobbyists to ensure the legislation is either completely toothless or increasingly commonly actually enshrines the destructive policies of the major market leaders.
Dang. This is such a great summary of what's been happening that I will copy this for all future political discussions I have with anyone.
And attribute @orclev@lemmy.world, obviously.
Is that like, an abbreviated reference to orcs levitating or something?
Their name is Oscar Ronald Clev
Underglow is illegal, but these aren't. It's wild.
Someone please correct me if I am wrong. The article does not say where this is happening.
AFAIK these might be illegal in the US but only by technicality since we have laws against flashing lights. Especially ones that could be mistaken for police lights. (yes I know they are box trucks not police cars. But while you are driving and just see the lights in your mirrors you might mistake it for police).
I havent seen this specific 3d advertising truck but i have definifely seen ad box trucks in my city with flashy ads
My city had the absolute worst one. Some bigoted pieces of shit ran a transphobic one around a pediatric hospital that has a clinic for trans youth.
I was strongly tempted to lose a box of roofing nails off the back of my bike.
Same in Europe, it's generally not allowed to have distracting lights or signals on cars. Advertisements on trucks are only allowed if they are passive (e.g. painted or printed).
Not a slam dunk, but I can confirm that the street markings look American, the license plates appear to me to conform to American sizing and placement, and there is an American flag (amongst a few others) hanging from a pole. Gonna say it's most likely somewhere in the States.
The company is a multinational, HQ in Florida in the US and Paris in the EU. We all get to share this one.
Tesla without a LIDAR: Ugh, is this for meee? 🥹
Are they going to remake that 1 mobile billboard that's been doing laps of the LV Strip for at least 30 years, with the same 3 bikini-clad women?
Any sensible country would have traffic/vehicle laws banning something like this already.
Here in Finland? Blue and green lights are not allowed on motor vehicles. Blinking blue gets you a huge fine for impersonating an emergency vehicle.
Technically, a lot of states do ban driving distractions which this obviously is.
But I'm sure that it'll have to be decided in court or in amendment to current legislation to carve out/specify that this actually counts as that.
In the state I'm from, underbody light kits are illegal for use on public roads because they're a driving distraction and you actually can't use LED signs and so on for the same reason.
That being said I'd also like this to apply to billboards. LED billboards should be outlawed.
But I'm sure that it'll have to be decided in court
Too bad :)
Around here, the police could stop the vehicle and then not let it drive even 1 more meter.
The driver gets fined (which the company probably pays), the freight may be loaded to another vehicle, this vehicle must be repaired to a road safe state, then certified by the appropriate agency before it can drive again - or they can carry it home and do it all there.
I think you will find that NYC hasn't been sensible for decades. Mamdami claims to have reduced the deficit to zero and permanently funded libraries already, so maybe he can turn that juggernaut a bit.
I hate to say it but he “fixed” the deficit by deferring pension funding obligations for a few years. It’s kinda like paying the electrical bill with your 401k contribution and saying you’re ahead. I hope they figure out the funding in the interim or it will reflect poorly on leftist policies.
These are gonna be all over the Vegas Strip.
I've never been to Vegas, but from what I've seen how would a person even notice the addition of these trucks?
Thanks, I hate it, the people who invented it, the people who assembled the panels, the people who wrote the software, the people who sold it, the people who bought it, the people who installed it, the people who designed the ads for it, the people who maintain it, and the people buying ads for it.
None of them deserve to find happiness.
Draco-REX has a point.
The current strategy with new business models like this is to immediately roll it out and THEN deal with the legalities. The hope is that the immediate investment return will offset any pentalies.
This "Push it out now and let the slow legal system deal with it later." is a popular tactic these days...
That's the administrations business plan too.
It's like a firehose.
I’ve seen these running in East Asia for several years now, admittedly not in 3D but still really annoying, as they can get extremely loud sometimes.
They play sounds??
Yes. The one they had for promoting Squid Game a couple years ago was especially loud.
Well I hope it's not so loud that if it's driving by it distracts me from listening to the video ad playing on my gas pump.
FYI, on many pumps if you hit a button (I've found typically bottom right) it'll mute the ad
That stopped working years ago in my region
Where I live, even those billboard trucks need to keep covered while driving and can only reveal the billboard when parked. There’s no way this would be legal.
Welcome to Night City.
If I'm walking down the street and see one of these I'll introduce them to my pocket rocks
I don’t think showing your balls would help
Americans lmao
Bad news:
I want to see them try Estonia.
If you replace your halogen or incandescent side markers or license plate bulbs with LEDs of the same brightness to get a nicer colour, that's illegal because "it could blind someone".