Hacker News Reader

Comment by teej | Hacker News Reader

> Somewhere along the way Tesla Autopilot became marketed as a fully self-driving system freeing us to tune out

Do you own a Tesla or ever considered buying one? This is a misconception I hear from folks who never planned to own one but not from owners.

View on HN

They literally call it "full self driving". I had a Model 3 with FSD last year, and it's really pretty pointless beyond a party trick. The actually useful stuff (lane-keeping and dynamic cruise control) is available in the base autopilot option, and is not much different from features in other high end cars. The FSD features are so unreliable as to be totally useless. Lane-changing was often scary, with it not spotting vehicles in the blind spot more than once. It somehow managed to miss exits on navigate on autopilot, and in any case the feature is available in so few places it's barely worth using unless you're only driving on highways. They also don't make it clear that advanced summon is basically useless outside the US, because it only works when you're within 10 meters of the car.

When I had to return that car when I changed jobs, I immediately ordered a new Model 3, because it's a great car and I really like driving it, but I didn't get the FSD option because it's dangerous, useless, and a waste of money. I've not missed it once. Now the only issue is that whenever I get in the car and I'm reminded of Elon Musk's antics, which makes me cringe a little, but that's another story.

> They also don't make it clear that advanced summon is basically useless outside the US, because it only works when you're within 10 meters of the car.

Hmm, is >10m a geoblocked feature or is <10m somehow more useful in US than elsewhere?

It's a UN regulation that the US doesn't enforce. Having just checked, it's actually just 6m.

>This is a misconception I hear from folks who never planned to own one but not from owners.

And it's a misconception that Tesla happily took advantage of in their marketing for years.

Their autopilot webpage used to be titled "Full Self-Driving Hardware on All Cars". The marketing copy said stuff like "all Tesla vehicles... have the hardware needed for full self-driving capability at a safety level substantially greater than that of a human driver."

They neglected to mention that the software wasn't at that level yet, which I think is incredibly misleading since the hardware by itself is useless (and without corresponding software, it remains to be seen if the hardware they are using actually is capable of full self-driving)

I’ve test driven one and seriously considered buying one. It’s still on my list but other financial goals are taking priority. I had some opportunity to play with the autopilot and I think it does quite well but I stayed engaged with driving the whole time. Mashing the pedal was just too much fun to leave autopilot on for long.

These repeated accidents of hitting things that should be avoided though seem to indicate that the drivers are out of the loop enough that they don’t intervene when they clearly should. There is definitely a disconnect somewhere either in the attentiveness of the driver or the driver’s understanding of when to intervene or both.

> This is a misconception I hear from folks who never planned to own one but not from owners.

These crashes are direct examples of owners with the misconception.

-> These few crashes are direct examples of owners with the misconception.

I fixed that for you.

If the news headlined every crash a Toyota was involved in, it would seem overwhelming. But when you compare to the total number of cars sold in the same day of each wreck, you realize this is all theatrical outrage.

This says nothing to Tesla deliberately ignoring the misleading marketing they put out, but MOST (arguably 99% and above) of us owners, know exactly the limitations of AP in our cars.

As a Tesla owner I personally find it abundantly clear the system is extremely limited. First, it reminds you every time you turn it on. Second, it reminds you during the drive based on perceived torque on the wheel. But more to the point, the guidance display helps you understand its limits of its perception just driving it day-to-day.

AutoPilot changes how you drive, but does not change the fact that you are indeed the driver. I observe other drivers every day who are distracted with other tasks, impaired, or just driving aggressively, and many thousands die on the road each year because of this.

I fully expect that AutoPilot software driving in a mode where there is not supposed to be a responsible driver with hands on the wheel and looking out the window would actually operate significantly different than the current system. I would not be surprised if false-negative threshold behavior is configured higher in the current software based on operational requirements.

This driver was effectively asleep at the wheel. I’m very glad they were unharmed. Because the current software is expressly designed to require an attentive driver, it’s hard to say even that the software failed.

Teslas on AutoPilot drive safely, nonaggresively, and highly predictably. They are by no means a fully self-driving system freeing the driver the tune out. There are a hundred ways you can crash a Tesla on AutoPilot in a hot minute if you want to. This is clearly apparent upon operating a Tesla AP for the first time, even if you never open the user manual.

Humans don’t alway make smart choices however, whether their car has assistive technology or not. The data does show the average Tesla driver with AP is about 10x less likely to have an accident, and less likely to die or be injured in an accident if they do have one, than the average overall driver. So if a driver is going to make a terrible choice to be distracted or inattentive while driving, I’d rather they did it in a Tesla with AP enabled.

> The data does show the average Tesla driver with AP is about 10x less likely to have an accident, and less likely to die or be injured in an accident if they do have one, than the average overall driver. So if a driver is going to make a terrible choice to be distracted or inattentive while driving, I’d rather they did it in a Tesla with AP enabled

Do you have a source for those statistics? The last time I saw Autopilot safety statistics, they were all very misleading - e.g. comparing "autopilot on" miles [mostly highway] to all miles drive in the US, or comparing pre-autopilot Teslas to post-autopilot Teslas (the pre-Autopilot Teslas didn't even have basic AEB, which is now standard on even entry-level cars), stuff like that

Reply on news.ycombinator.com