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I really dislike the marketing around "autopilot." The common defense of Tesla's autopilot is that there are disclaimers, and the driver should always be at 100

I really dislike the marketing around "autopilot." The common defense of Tesla's autopilot is that there are disclaimers, and the driver should always be at 100% attention. Well, look at this, copied from Tesla's website: > Full Self-Driving Hardware on All Cars > All Tesla vehicles produced in our factory, including Model 3, have the hardware needed for full self-driving capability at a safety level substantially greater than that of a human driver. [1] An average person is going to read this and think, "This care drives itself, and it's safer than me!" The rest of the page describes space-age features like switching lanes to get to an exit faster and self parking: > All you will need to do is get in and tell your car where to go ... Your Tesla will figure out the optimal route, navigate urban streets (even without lane markings), manage complex intersections with traffic lights, stop signs and roundabouts, and handle densely packed freeways with cars moving at high speed ... and park itself. They're selling a car that full on drives itself. This is not being sold as adaptive cruise control. FWIW, they included a weasel phrase by saying "hardware" is there, as opposed to software, but come on! An average person is not going to understand that distinction. I think they need to dramatically scale back the hype around this feature until it actually delivers what it promises. Edit: I'm also confused by why they need to hype up autopilot so much. They are already selling more cars than they can make, and a sexy electric car appeals to lots of people. I think it would be enough to stick with that. [1] https://www.tesla.com/autopilot https://www.tesla.com/autopilot

phobius 9y ago
could be a well-meaning tech culture screw up; Most tech people know that airplane autopilots weren't end-to-end automated for the majority of their existence
- Barrin92 9y ago
  >Most tech people know most tech people also know how "better than human" sounds to the public and the average driver. This isn't well meaning tech culture, it's a PR statement that is misleading and formulated the way it is precisely because it is a sales pitch. It's irresponsible and unethical. It should be called a 'driver assistant' and have a warning label in font size 100 that tells drivers to not treat it as autonomous and infallible.
  - rohit2412 9y ago
    I wouldn't even ask for the size 100 font, but Elon musk and Tesla to stop hyping their amazing autonomous capabilities (which are all non existent)
- rohit2412 9y ago
  I disagree. Look at what Elon musk and Tesla put out in the event of accidents > https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/04/25/elon-musk-teslas-autopilot-makes-accidents-50pc-less-likely/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/04/25/elon-musk-... > https://www.tesla.com/blog/update-last-week%E2%80%99s-accident https://www.tesla.com/blog/update-last-week%E2%80%99s-accide... Elon Musk has been hyping Autopilot for what it cannot be for a long long time > https://www.reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/83og60/elon_18_months_until_self_driving/dvje4h3/ https://www.reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/83og60/elon_18...
- csydas 9y ago
  As a reasonably self-aware dumb tech person, I would say that this defense would not fly with me any more than "any ____ should know that the product can't actually do that." There's a reason that such consumer protections are in place against claims like this, and especially with something like an auto-pilot, I think it's down-right irresponsible to allow marketing to dilute the reality of the performance. This isn't like GB vs GiB for storage, which is annoying but understandable, it's a tool that has very serious consequences if what is advertised doesn't match up with reality. Caveat Emptor only covers so much, and when you have non-stop marketing material about autonomous vehicles and auto-pilot being produced about your product (whether internally produced or produced by third parties), there is a responsibility to set out a clear expectation for the product.
  - Gibbon1 9y ago
    There is a case that dates back to the early days of the auto industry. tl;dr: Lady was driving a car and the wheel fell off due to a manufacturing defect. Auto makers said they weren't liable cause Caveat Emptor. Supreme court said a normal person has no way of knowing if the wheel assembly on a car is defective. Auto maker was held liable. Defective or misleadingly advertised auto pilot? The above on steroids.
- dingaling 9y ago
  > Most tech people know that airplane autopilots weren't end-to-end automated for the majority of their existence The Lockheed TriStar flight-control system flew a fully-automated chocks-to-chocks take-off, flight and landing in ... 1973 I think? Anyway the comparison with aircraft autopilots is confusing. The pilots will usually couple the autopilot soon after take-off and from then it follows the commands of the Flight Management System through which the pilots interact; new waypoints, level changes etc. Several test schemes are investigating uploading routings directly from ATC via datalink, with the pilots just having to press a button to accept. There is also a proposal to permit TCAS to command the autopilot to prevent collisions, instead of providing advisory notice to the pilots.
SeeDave 9y ago
I don't mind marketing puffery in the sense of "world's most innovative [X] ever," but I agree with your view that "Full Self-Driving Hardware" is dangerous, and branding the integrated system as AutoPilot™ only amplifies this. And I mean this without any gratuitous negativity about Tesla or Elon... but branding lane-following/collision warning/adaptive-cruise control as "AutoPilot" is far more dangerous and has far more serious real-world consequences than Apple calling their backup application "Time Machine."
- TAForObvReasons 9y ago
  Musk is following the tried and true tradition "Move fast and break things". Only in this case "things" include people's lives :/
  - simion314 9y ago
    It is even worse since they have a good product without the hyped autopilot, when I read about Musk wanting to use only cameras then I was sure Tesla self driving is not safe.
    - naikrovek 9y ago
      Humans drive only with cameras. Vision provides all the information needed to drive a car safely. Maybe the software isn't there, yet, but it will be.
      - simion314 9y ago
        Humans drive with vision + the experience and intuition, so we have an intuition about the laws of physics, we know what the other cars and the pedestrians are, that they have goals and they are similar to us, with imperfect visual information we can interpolate and get a full picture fo the information, an AI would need to be intelligent as a human to be able to drive as good as a human with only 2 cameras. Having radars, maps and other extra input for the self driving car will compensate for the missing intelligence, and a good radar and some deterministic software should prevent hitting static objects. In my country drivers are tested for eye sight, hearing,reflexes before getting the green light for the driving school(so sound is also important) and self driving cars should have mandatory tests to pass after each small update, at least to not allow DIY cars made by students to just test on public roads.
jijojv 9y ago
I'm an average engineer (sometimes 2-3x at best) and was scammed into thinking Autopilot was safer and that Full Self-Driving was just weeks away based on that page - which back in Dec'16 actually said thoses features would begin rolling out end of Dec'16. Hopefully https://www.pacermonitor.com/public/case/21195146/Dean_Sheikh_et_al_v_Tesla,_Inc https://www.pacermonitor.com/public/case/21195146/Dean_Sheik... will come to fruition soon...
rorykoehler 9y ago
I disagree. You can't blame Tesla for consumers lack of reading comprehension and /or ignorance. Same bs as with Facebook doing the news now. Everyone who looked could easily see what was going on but suddenly everyone is outraged.
- rohit2412 9y ago
  Can I blame Tesla for false misleading advertisement? Can I blame Elon musk for misleading and lying with outrageous and clearly false predictions? https://www.reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/83og60/elon_18_months_until_self_driving/dvje4h3/ https://www.reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/83og60/elon_18... Can I blame Tesla for defending Autopilot capabilities with false claims and misleading statistics? https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/04/25/elon-musk-teslas-autopilot-makes-accidents-50pc-less-likely/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/04/25/elon-musk-... https://www.tesla.com/blog/update-last-week%E2%80%99s-accident https://www.tesla.com/blog/update-last-week%E2%80%99s-accide...
  - rorykoehler 9y ago
    I was referring to the text referenced in the parent. There is nothing misleading about it. In fact it's very informative. The statistics around self self driving is a very complex topic. Regardless, thirst for outrage aside, even if sdc's are less safe now it's still worth pushing through as long term they will cost less lives once we get it right.
EngineerBetter 9y ago
One does not buy something as expensive as a Model X without reading all the words on thr configurator page. Said with experience. This is not a whimsical purchasing decision.
- jijojv 9y ago
  Except one really wants to think that all the words on the configurator page are just Tesla's legal team's forced verbiage and really wants to believe Musk and the video at https://www.tesla.com/autopilot https://www.tesla.com/autopilot which starts with the claim that the person is only there for legal reasons...
amasad 9y ago
Add to that that Elon said "self-driving is basically a solved problem" and that they'll be doing a cross country trip soon. I'm honestly puzzled that Musk doesn't seem to be taking this seriously and is joking about it on Twitter (he has an April fool's thing about Tesla being bankrupt). As much as I love Tesla's mission, they seem screwed to me. They just issued a massive recall, their autopolit system is killing people, their financials are terrible, and they haven't lived up to their manufacturing promises. Short sellers that have been talking about its downfall for more than a year are having a field trip now. I know that Elon seems to have this supernatural ability to bounce back, but it's hard to see how Tesla will survive this.
- TAForObvReasons 9y ago
  It's all about the $$. He can keep the stock hype going by buying SpaceX.
- tajen 9y ago
  I suspect little shareholders didn’t “invest” as much as “donate” to Tesla... for the fun of funding a cool guy with a stunt against ICE companies.
- freerobby 9y ago
  I think there is a lot of misunderstanding and missing context in this comment (and many of the recent Tesla threads here on HN). I'll try to add some additional perspective inline: > Add to that that Elon said "self-driving is basically a solved problem" and that they'll be doing a cross country trip soon. He's referring to the approach, and while perhaps a silly statement, Tesla is very clear on their web site that there is more work to do. Immediately after the pull-quotes in the parent comment, Tesla writes in bold letters: "Please note that Self-Driving functionality is dependent upon extensive software validation and regulatory approval, which may vary widely by jurisdiction." Nobody gets to buy Full Self Driving without seeing a litany of disclaimers that it is not ready and that the timetable is unknown (and which are presented front and center, not buried in some lengthy contract). > I'm honestly puzzled that Musk doesn't seem to be taking this seriously I don't think this is right. Safety has been a first order concern in every vehicle Tesla has designed. It's the thing Musk has lead with in every vehicle presentation (even though crowds continue to find it boring). And it's been repeatedly cited by Musk and others at Tesla as a major motivation behind building Autopilot, even before NHTSA confirmed it as a safety improvement. We can debate approaches and results (and hell, even motives if you really want), but it seems clear from both words and actions that Tesla takes safety extremely seriously. I don't see the connection between a short-seller April Fool's joke on Twitter and taking Autopilot safety seriously. > They just issued a massive recall Yes, voluntarily, for a component that Bosch makes (and for which Bosch is paying for replacements) which may be prone to corrode, and that has never caused a known accident or injury. While we debate the seriousness of this, Ford is recalling more cars than Tesla has ever produced because the steering wheels are falling off. This is barely a footnote within the industry, is certainly not an existential threat to Tesla, and IMO it speaks all the more to how seriously they take safety. > their autopolit system is killing people At worst, Autopilot is preventing more crashes than it is causing. Almost certainly saving more lives than it is taking although of course proving a negative is harder. One-off situations and the element of control color how we think about crashes with automated systems, but NHTSA seems to feel that Autopilot is a significant net safety improvement. > their financials are terrible Eh, yes and no. They're operating on a maximization function for growth, which requires a high degree of financial risk-taking. So sure, they're in a tight spot, but it's in line with where they are on a risk/reward spectrum, and while capital may be expensive for them if the market loses confidence, there doesn't appear to be any threat that they won't be able to raise it. > and they haven't lived up to their manufacturing promises. Yeah. This is probably the best, fairest, and most lasting criticism of Tesla. I hope they can turn that around.

phobius 9y ago

could be a well-meaning tech culture screw up; Most tech people know that airplane autopilots weren't end-to-end automated for the majority of their existence

Barrin92 9y ago
>Most tech people know most tech people also know how "better than human" sounds to the public and the average driver. This isn't well meaning tech culture, it's a PR statement that is misleading and formulated the way it is precisely because it is a sales pitch. It's irresponsible and unethical. It should be called a 'driver assistant' and have a warning label in font size 100 that tells drivers to not treat it as autonomous and infallible.
- rohit2412 9y ago
  I wouldn't even ask for the size 100 font, but Elon musk and Tesla to stop hyping their amazing autonomous capabilities (which are all non existent)
rohit2412 9y ago
I disagree. Look at what Elon musk and Tesla put out in the event of accidents > https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/04/25/elon-musk-teslas-autopilot-makes-accidents-50pc-less-likely/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/04/25/elon-musk-... > https://www.tesla.com/blog/update-last-week%E2%80%99s-accident https://www.tesla.com/blog/update-last-week%E2%80%99s-accide... Elon Musk has been hyping Autopilot for what it cannot be for a long long time > https://www.reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/83og60/elon_18_months_until_self_driving/dvje4h3/ https://www.reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/83og60/elon_18...
csydas 9y ago
As a reasonably self-aware dumb tech person, I would say that this defense would not fly with me any more than "any ____ should know that the product can't actually do that." There's a reason that such consumer protections are in place against claims like this, and especially with something like an auto-pilot, I think it's down-right irresponsible to allow marketing to dilute the reality of the performance. This isn't like GB vs GiB for storage, which is annoying but understandable, it's a tool that has very serious consequences if what is advertised doesn't match up with reality. Caveat Emptor only covers so much, and when you have non-stop marketing material about autonomous vehicles and auto-pilot being produced about your product (whether internally produced or produced by third parties), there is a responsibility to set out a clear expectation for the product.
- Gibbon1 9y ago
  There is a case that dates back to the early days of the auto industry. tl;dr: Lady was driving a car and the wheel fell off due to a manufacturing defect. Auto makers said they weren't liable cause Caveat Emptor. Supreme court said a normal person has no way of knowing if the wheel assembly on a car is defective. Auto maker was held liable. Defective or misleadingly advertised auto pilot? The above on steroids.
dingaling 9y ago
> Most tech people know that airplane autopilots weren't end-to-end automated for the majority of their existence The Lockheed TriStar flight-control system flew a fully-automated chocks-to-chocks take-off, flight and landing in ... 1973 I think? Anyway the comparison with aircraft autopilots is confusing. The pilots will usually couple the autopilot soon after take-off and from then it follows the commands of the Flight Management System through which the pilots interact; new waypoints, level changes etc. Several test schemes are investigating uploading routings directly from ATC via datalink, with the pilots just having to press a button to accept. There is also a proposal to permit TCAS to command the autopilot to prevent collisions, instead of providing advisory notice to the pilots.

SeeDave 9y ago

I don't mind marketing puffery in the sense of "world's most innovative [X] ever," but I agree with your view that "Full Self-Driving Hardware" is dangerous, and branding the integrated system as AutoPilot™ only amplifies this. And I mean this without any gratuitous negativity about Tesla or Elon... but branding lane-following/collision warning/adaptive-cruise control as "AutoPilot" is far more dangerous and has far more serious real-world consequences than Apple calling their backup application "Time Machine."

TAForObvReasons 9y ago
Musk is following the tried and true tradition "Move fast and break things". Only in this case "things" include people's lives :/
- simion314 9y ago
  It is even worse since they have a good product without the hyped autopilot, when I read about Musk wanting to use only cameras then I was sure Tesla self driving is not safe.
  - naikrovek 9y ago
    Humans drive only with cameras. Vision provides all the information needed to drive a car safely. Maybe the software isn't there, yet, but it will be.
    - simion314 9y ago
      Humans drive with vision + the experience and intuition, so we have an intuition about the laws of physics, we know what the other cars and the pedestrians are, that they have goals and they are similar to us, with imperfect visual information we can interpolate and get a full picture fo the information, an AI would need to be intelligent as a human to be able to drive as good as a human with only 2 cameras. Having radars, maps and other extra input for the self driving car will compensate for the missing intelligence, and a good radar and some deterministic software should prevent hitting static objects. In my country drivers are tested for eye sight, hearing,reflexes before getting the green light for the driving school(so sound is also important) and self driving cars should have mandatory tests to pass after each small update, at least to not allow DIY cars made by students to just test on public roads.

jijojv 9y ago

I'm an average engineer (sometimes 2-3x at best) and was scammed into thinking Autopilot was safer and that Full Self-Driving was just weeks away based on that page - which back in Dec'16 actually said thoses features would begin rolling out end of Dec'16. Hopefully https://www.pacermonitor.com/public/case/21195146/Dean_Sheikh_et_al_v_Tesla,_Inc https://www.pacermonitor.com/public/case/21195146/Dean_Sheik... will come to fruition soon...

rorykoehler 9y ago

I disagree. You can't blame Tesla for consumers lack of reading comprehension and /or ignorance. Same bs as with Facebook doing the news now. Everyone who looked could easily see what was going on but suddenly everyone is outraged.

rohit2412 9y ago
Can I blame Tesla for false misleading advertisement? Can I blame Elon musk for misleading and lying with outrageous and clearly false predictions? https://www.reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/83og60/elon_18_months_until_self_driving/dvje4h3/ https://www.reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/83og60/elon_18... Can I blame Tesla for defending Autopilot capabilities with false claims and misleading statistics? https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/04/25/elon-musk-teslas-autopilot-makes-accidents-50pc-less-likely/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/04/25/elon-musk-... https://www.tesla.com/blog/update-last-week%E2%80%99s-accident https://www.tesla.com/blog/update-last-week%E2%80%99s-accide...
- rorykoehler 9y ago
  I was referring to the text referenced in the parent. There is nothing misleading about it. In fact it's very informative. The statistics around self self driving is a very complex topic. Regardless, thirst for outrage aside, even if sdc's are less safe now it's still worth pushing through as long term they will cost less lives once we get it right.

EngineerBetter 9y ago

One does not buy something as expensive as a Model X without reading all the words on thr configurator page. Said with experience. This is not a whimsical purchasing decision.

jijojv 9y ago
Except one really wants to think that all the words on the configurator page are just Tesla's legal team's forced verbiage and really wants to believe Musk and the video at https://www.tesla.com/autopilot https://www.tesla.com/autopilot which starts with the claim that the person is only there for legal reasons...

amasad 9y ago

Add to that that Elon said "self-driving is basically a solved problem" and that they'll be doing a cross country trip soon. I'm honestly puzzled that Musk doesn't seem to be taking this seriously and is joking about it on Twitter (he has an April fool's thing about Tesla being bankrupt). As much as I love Tesla's mission, they seem screwed to me. They just issued a massive recall, their autopolit system is killing people, their financials are terrible, and they haven't lived up to their manufacturing promises. Short sellers that have been talking about its downfall for more than a year are having a field trip now. I know that Elon seems to have this supernatural ability to bounce back, but it's hard to see how Tesla will survive this.

TAForObvReasons 9y ago
It's all about the $$. He can keep the stock hype going by buying SpaceX.
tajen 9y ago
I suspect little shareholders didn’t “invest” as much as “donate” to Tesla... for the fun of funding a cool guy with a stunt against ICE companies.
freerobby 9y ago
I think there is a lot of misunderstanding and missing context in this comment (and many of the recent Tesla threads here on HN). I'll try to add some additional perspective inline: > Add to that that Elon said "self-driving is basically a solved problem" and that they'll be doing a cross country trip soon. He's referring to the approach, and while perhaps a silly statement, Tesla is very clear on their web site that there is more work to do. Immediately after the pull-quotes in the parent comment, Tesla writes in bold letters: "Please note that Self-Driving functionality is dependent upon extensive software validation and regulatory approval, which may vary widely by jurisdiction." Nobody gets to buy Full Self Driving without seeing a litany of disclaimers that it is not ready and that the timetable is unknown (and which are presented front and center, not buried in some lengthy contract). > I'm honestly puzzled that Musk doesn't seem to be taking this seriously I don't think this is right. Safety has been a first order concern in every vehicle Tesla has designed. It's the thing Musk has lead with in every vehicle presentation (even though crowds continue to find it boring). And it's been repeatedly cited by Musk and others at Tesla as a major motivation behind building Autopilot, even before NHTSA confirmed it as a safety improvement. We can debate approaches and results (and hell, even motives if you really want), but it seems clear from both words and actions that Tesla takes safety extremely seriously. I don't see the connection between a short-seller April Fool's joke on Twitter and taking Autopilot safety seriously. > They just issued a massive recall Yes, voluntarily, for a component that Bosch makes (and for which Bosch is paying for replacements) which may be prone to corrode, and that has never caused a known accident or injury. While we debate the seriousness of this, Ford is recalling more cars than Tesla has ever produced because the steering wheels are falling off. This is barely a footnote within the industry, is certainly not an existential threat to Tesla, and IMO it speaks all the more to how seriously they take safety. > their autopolit system is killing people At worst, Autopilot is preventing more crashes than it is causing. Almost certainly saving more lives than it is taking although of course proving a negative is harder. One-off situations and the element of control color how we think about crashes with automated systems, but NHTSA seems to feel that Autopilot is a significant net safety improvement. > their financials are terrible Eh, yes and no. They're operating on a maximization function for growth, which requires a high degree of financial risk-taking. So sure, they're in a tight spot, but it's in line with where they are on a risk/reward spectrum, and while capital may be expensive for them if the market loses confidence, there doesn't appear to be any threat that they won't be able to raise it. > and they haven't lived up to their manufacturing promises. Yeah. This is probably the best, fairest, and most lasting criticism of Tesla. I hope they can turn that around.