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Comment by floatingatoll | Hacker News Reader

That’s not our call to make when filing a safety complaint. The NHTSA is tasked with evaluating safety complaints from drivers, interpreting the rules and law, and reaching a judgment on whether a response should occur. Our part in the NHTSA process is to file the safety complaint, not to tell them how to do their job in response to it.

For those of you that file a complaint, please maintain your focus on the safety issues the update has created in your driving, rather than verging into specific demands of outcome. “I can’t find my front defroster while I’m driving since XYZ software update” is really great and specific, “so therefore Tesla and NHTSA should do ABC” is unhelpful and does not strengthen your case. No need to backseat-drive the NHTSA, just please do get the safety report filed.

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> when filing a safety complaint

Please try to widen your focus beyond that one single act. NHTSA and other bodies have a general responsibility to ensure safety of vehicles on the road, including preemptive as well as retrospective actions. That's what I was referring to. I see from other comments that you've been made aware (especially by Syonyk) of the relevant standards and procedures. Ignoring them now seems like just a way to pick a fight with someone who probably agrees with you on the general principle.

> No need to backseat-drive the NHTSA

That's an unnecessarily and counter-productively pejorative phrasing (and it's not particularly clever wordplay either BTW). We as citizens do indeed have a right (if not a duty) to express opinions about the regulations imposed by our government agencies. The fact that Tesla's update affecting safety could go out with no oversight is simply wrong. Raising that awareness - not just within NHTSA via a safety complaint - is part of making the wrong right.

I am absolutely onboard with expressing our dismay at how Tesla altered a core safety feature of our vehicle with neither consent, nor an updated printed owner’s manual (which requires a formal recall).

I’m not onboard with telling them how to respond to that dismay. I know everyone will, but it weakens the problem report and muddies the waters. Filing a bug report without also including suggestions on how to fix the problem is a hard-earned skill for me personally, and I expect I’ll always wish it was more widely utilized by tech folks than it ever will be.

> I’m not onboard with telling them how to respond to that dismay.

I agree that a safety complaint is not the right venue for proposing solutions, but when you used the specific words "our part in the NHTSA process" (as if there's no other) and "no need to back-seat drive the NHTSA" you seemed to be suggesting that people shouldn't make such suggestions at all. As I said, please widen your focus beyond that one simple act. Just as NHTSA is not the same as a software company, the "filing a bug report" analogy only captures one tiny part of their mission and operation as a public agency.

Your interpret my wishes correctly, but take comfort: I already expect near-universal disagreement from my peers here.

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