13 ms·

Tesla Admits Current ‘Full Self-Driving Beta’ Will Always Be Level 2

161 points by samizdis 6y ago

gzu 6y ago
@plainsite doing the real dirty work here
reissbaker 6y ago
This is a gotcha headline that is contradicted by one of the quotes from Tesla they list in their own article: Please note that Tesla’s development of true autonomous features (SAE Levels 3+) will follow our iterative process (development, validation, early release, etc.) and any such features will not be released to the general public until we have fully validated them and received any required regulatory permits or approvals. TL;DR: Tesla does not want their upcoming release of FSD Beta to be considered to be above Level 2, and their lawyers are submitting documents to California saying that it shouldn't be considered above Level 2 and thus they shouldn't have to apply for special permits in California to release it. They continue to work on autonomous driving features.
goatherders 6y ago
He's such a good marketer. There is a case to be made that he's participating (often) in fraud to pump up the stock price, but people keep buying it so...whatever.
- jeffbee 6y ago
  Nevermind the pump and dump, which has been right out in the open for years. What about selling people a $10000 option that doesn't work?
  - Sohcahtoa82 6y ago
    I don't think of it that way. It's investing $10,000 in a feature that is currently under development and will go up in price as it improves. It also includes any hardware upgrades that are necessary to keep up with FSD requirements. Tesla fans know that FSD isn't ready. They know that the $10,000 upgrade doesn't actually grant FSD, but the purchase of it indicates that they believe it will in the future. You can call it a $10,000 gamble if you wish, and you can express your belief that it will never happen, but to say "it's a $10,000 option that doesn't work" is only a half-truth, IMO.
- goatherders 6y ago
  3 downvotes? LOL, don't ever change HN.
perardi 6y ago
Musk’s reality distortion field must visibly bend light. He manages to accomplish so much, but also manages to peddle a lot of absolute monorail-level bullshit. https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a35350331/checking-in-on-all-the-promises-elon-musk-and-tesla-have-made/ https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a35350331/checking-in-on-a... (Still hoping for that super-tunnel to take me to O’Hare once flying is back up to full speed.)
- fastball 6y ago
  That article has very TSLAQ-type vibes, and in fact links to two TSLAQ sites at the bottom. None of which are honest about how things have progressed.
  - perardi 6y ago
    I…don’t even know what TSLAQ is, but, where’s that Hyperloop, battery swapping, and robotaxi?
    - fastball 6y ago
      TSLAQ is a coordinated effort by TSLA short-sellers to generate as much bad press about Tesla as possible in order to tank the price and make money on their short positions. Ensuring said bad press is accurate/fair is certainly not the primary goal. Disclaimer: I don't own any TSLA stock.
    - crazypython 6y ago
      > TSLAQ is a loose, international[1] collective of largely anonymous short-sellers,[2] skeptics, and researchers who openly criticize Tesla, Inc. and its CEO, Elon Musk.[3] The group primarily organizes on Twitter, often using the $TSLAQ cashtag,[4] and Reddit[5] to coordinate efforts and share news, opinions, and analysis about the company and its stock. > Tesla Ticker Symbol + "Q" which is the NASDAQ notation for bankruptcy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TSLAQ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TSLAQ
    - nickik 6y ago
      First of all, Musk literally never said he would develop a Hyperloop. He literally said, here is an idea, I'm not gone do it, somebody else might want to try. Why don't people understand this? Tesla had a battery swapping but realized it was a terrible idea and instead built the largest global chairing network in the world instead. Are you seriously gone shit on somebody because they changed strategy with more information and build something that is actually more impressive? Yes, he was wrong about Robotaxi, or at least its delayed. Nobody bats 100%. But if you are actually honest with yourself and start in 2000 and look what he said, compared to what he did. Literally nobody else on the planet predictions are closer to what actually happened in terms of large scale problems.
cogman10 6y ago
Not really surprising if you've been following the beta progress. I doubt Tesla will move past level 2 until they are at a point where Level 4 or 5 is possible. With that said, I have real doubts that they can get their with the current camera suite. IMO, they don't have enough redundancy. Further, I think elon's anti-lidar position is a mistake. Even if they can make it without lidar, I think it will set them behind the rest of the industry. Likely, we will see something where they collect enough training data to hit level 4 + training suite and eventually they'll release cars with new sensor suites. Once that happens, my bet is that's when they'll actually release level 4 capabilities. I highly doubt any current car will ever allow hands off driving.
- perardi 6y ago
  Something I’ve been curious about with computer-vision-only versus LIDAR: snow. Now, I am naïve about the real intricacies of computer vision. But won’t snow be quite nasty for camera-only systems? It’s almost the physical definition of noise, as it’s random and reflective. Is there any research or experience with computer vision and dealing with a snowstorm? Because even human drivers aren’t great in that kind of low-vision scenario. (Why yes, I did grow up in the Midwest.)
  - artursapek 6y ago
    I think the argument is that if a human with two eyeballs can do it, a computer with a bunch of cameras should be able to as well. I can drive in the snow.
    - perardi 6y ago
      That’s…a supposition more than an argument.
      - fastball 6y ago
        How is that not an argument? A human can drive in the snow, and has a sensing package which effectively consists of two cameras. The hard part (when you only have two cameras) is that the processor needs to be exceedingly sophisticated, e.g. a human brain. People like Waymo have decided the best way to decrease the brain requirement is to add more sophisticated sensing that humans are fundamentally incapable of. Tesla's strategy is more to just build a better digital driving brain with machine learning + lots of miles, because arguably all sensing mechanisms have their shortcomings. That being said, they still have a lot more than two cameras in their FSD package – just not LIDAR. They still have radar and other things as well. Only time will tell which approach is better. Probably in the end the best approach will be to combine the two: a brain that is sophisticated enough it can drive with just cameras, but you throw LIDAR and such in their too to go the extra mile.
NickM 6y ago
Article is misleading. Tesla sent a letter to the CA DMV requesting approval for a feature which they referred to as "City Streets" which they say is level 2, and will continue to be level 2 as it is developed. They specifically say in this very document that they will develop higher levels of autonomy in the future, so it's pretty clear that the "final release of City Streets will continue to be level 2" quote is just referring to the particular subset of functionality that they're seeking approval for. From the very same letter, there is also this quote: Please note that Tesla’s development of true autonomous features (SAE Levels 3+) will follow our iterative process (development, validation, early release, etc.) and any such features will not be released to the general public until we have fully validated them and received any required regulatory permits or approvals.
- redis_mlc 6y ago
  > they will develop higher levels of autonomy in the future Any bozo can make claims about the future. And you're a bozo for believing them. Do you believe everything you see in writing?
- ra7 6y ago
  "City Streets" is part of "Full Self Driving" $10,000 package though. They are calling it "Full Self Driving", but a subset of functionality will always be level 2? And the FSD Beta is also level 2 because it only works on city streets? That seems clearly misleading. What's next? "Really, truly full self driving" that's actually level 3+?
  - grumple 6y ago
    These are incremental releases of gradually improving functionality. Their plan is to get to level 3+. People who buy it know what they are getting, and if they don't, it's entirely willful ignorance. I don't even own a Tesla yet I've read plenty about the actual capabilities and the fact that these cars can't truly drive themselves.
    - alkonaut 6y ago
smoldesu 6y ago
As cynical as I'd like to be towards Musk, I'm sending this comment over a Starlink connection that has made me rethink what my future could be. Living in a rural area, I was always under the impression that I'd need to move to the city and get a fiber connection eventually. With Starlink, that's no longer a concern. My latency is rock-solid at <50ms and download speeds are pretty capable as well. Obviously Elon isn't entirely responsible for it, but I'm constantly impressed by his initiative in tech world. If Starlink weren't available, I'd be waiting ~3 years for Amazon to build some sort of equivalent service.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- stanford_labrat 6y ago
  What’re your download and upload speeds like?
  - olyjohn 6y ago
    Mine gets between 50-150mbps, sometimes 200-300 down. Up is between 20-40 from the tests I have done. Exactly as promised. My ping has gone from 40-60ms, and now is regularly around 20. This was just in a matter of months, and also me fucking with it for hours to try to find the best placement. I still have the occasional drop out... I can't make it through a video conference, or wifi call without a freeze up or audio drop. My Starlink app says "No obstructions" but also says "Obstructed for 4 minutes" on a regular basis. Many people seem to echo this. I'm not honestly sure if this is what to expect or not. I generally switch to my 1.5Mbps DSL line for phone calls and video conferences, which lowers the quality a ton, but at least I don't have to ask people to repeat the last 30 seconds. Web surfing and downloading large files is blazing fast, and multiple people sharing the link seems to have no impact on the quality. Video streaming is fantastic. Another downside is that you're behind a CGNAT, so you'll never get a public IP address. Then their router puts you behind another NAT... StarLink is better than nothing for sure. But if Comcast didn't want $25,000 to run 550 feet of cable to my house, I would probably use that instead. I now have to call in an arborist or someone and top some trees that I am guessing are causing temporary obstructions, but I'm not really sure. I have a lot of trees on my property.
noodle 6y ago
Is any of this shocking or contrary to what's already been said in public? You could summarize the whole article like this: Tesla intends on building a great L2 system, releasing it publicly, and then moving on to L3 afterwards.
- kmonsen 6y ago
  I don't think so, and I think level 3 is an error and should never be there. I think most will go from 2->4. L3 is just requiring human concentration that is impossible. That being said I agree with the spirit of your comment.
  - Dylan16807 6y ago
    Level 3 requires that a human be available to take control in a certain amount of time. Whether that's a mistake depends on how long that amount of time it. For example, 10 seconds is perfectly safe. It's fine to completely ignore the road until you hear the beep, because 10 seconds is plenty of time to look around and figure out the situation and take control. I would argue that any system that requires constant human concentration is not actually level 3. Level 2 is the one that's dangerous by design. Edit: Though since the main difference between level 3 and level 4 is the ability to pull over, I wouldn't be surprised if level 3 gets quickly left behind or skipped entirely by many developers.
    - ghaff 6y ago
      10 seconds is not a lot. 10 seconds is: - You're deep into you Netflix movie - +2 seconds. Oh wait, there's an alarm going off. WTF? - +4 seconds. You've acquired some level of visual awareness of the environment but still don't know what's really going on. - etc. You were in a deep sleep? Maybe need a good minute and some indication of why the system has disengaged.
      - Dylan16807 6y ago
        I'm pretty sure I'm not going to get that involved in a Netflix movie in a moving car. Is that a common thing? But even in your scenario, if you hit vague awareness of the environment at 4 seconds, and you know you're taking over to drive... that 6 more seconds is more than enough to reach full environmental awareness. > You were in a deep sleep? You're not supposed to sleep for level 3. And "don't sleep" is not some ridiculous requirement. It doesn't even compare to the "be constantly vigilant" rule of level 2.
babelfish 6y ago
As long as Musk continues to insist that Tesla doesn't need Lidar, their self-driving technology will always be a level lower than Waymo/Cruise/etc
- fastball 6y ago
  Humans don't need LIDAR.
  - sschueller 6y ago
    Humans make mistakes. FSD has to be better than humans.
    - fastball 6y ago
      Tesla has more than just two cameras in their FSD package.
      - tylerhou 6y ago
        It seems like Musk has decided that if humans can drive visually, then cars can. Why did he choose this line? That is, if humans only need two eyes to drive, then why not just only use two cameras? Isn't using more than two cameras (and radar) admitting that cars need more "help" than humans? If using more than two cameras is okay, why not go further and use LIDAR or HD-mappings? I believe that Musk chose this line because he knows that LIDAR (in its current state) is too expensive to sell to consumers. Same with HD-mapping. We know that LIDAR based systems have achieved "better" self-driving than camera based systems. It's still possible that Musk is correct. But at present, it seems to me that Musk's position therefore seems like a mostly ideological stance, and not based on any real data. That's why people doubt Tesla's ability to execute on Level 4/5 self driving. The market will punish ideological purists when they are wrong.
        fastball 6y ago
        Nobody has demonstrated L 4/5, so all positions are ideological ones. You could also argue that because LIDAR is expensive, it's hard to get billions of miles of training from LIDAR-equipped vehicles. This is not the case with Tesla's sensing package, which is racking up the miles as we speak. So sure, expense makes it less appealing from a consumer perspective, but its also possible that the difficulty of deploying LIDAR fleets makes it less likely to achieve FSD in the short term due to less capacity to generate training data. Long-term we'll probably want all our vehicles to have as many sensors as is feasible. But nobody trying to get to FSD today is worried about what it will look like in 100 years – they're all trying to get their first.
tesla_fan_88 6y ago
We all have reasons to be cynical towards Elon, but what yo don’t realize is I'm sending this comment over a Starlink connection that has made me rethink what my future could be. Living in a rural area, I was always under the impression that I'd need to move to the city and get a fiber connection eventually. With Starlink, that's not a concern any longer. My latency is rock-solid at <50ms and download speeds are more than capable as well. Obviously Elon isn't entirely responsible for it, but I'm constantly impressed by his initiative in tech world. If Starlink weren't available, I'd be waiting 3+ years for Apple to build some sort of similar service.
jeffbee 6y ago
The incredible thing about the whole "FSD Beta" phenomenon is how many members of the public are willfully participating in the pump-and-dump. I just can't figure out if they are hypnotized, brainwashed, or just never had any critical thinking skills to begin with. Take for example this well-known youtuber, AI DRIVR. This guy drives around in his Tesla talking about how amazing and mind-blowing it is, but if you mute him and just watch the video with a critical eye you can see that the software simply does not work. It should be outlawed immediately before it kills someone. He recently rampaged through my town of Berkeley, California, breaking five laws per minute (aside from the fact that he has the speed controls set 5 MPH above the limit at all times). Here's his car running a stop sign: https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=219 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=219 Here it runs a red light, which the narrator takes pains to explain away. https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=238 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=238 Here it turns right from the center lane: https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=523 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=523 Here it violates the right-of-way of a car that it incorrectly classified as parked. https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=762 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=762 At numerous points in the video, it signals for a right turn while going straight. https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=806 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=806 Here it signals left while going straight: https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=898 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=898 Absolutely unacceptable. The government should act against this junk.
- snypher 6y ago
  His explanation for the red light is "the front wheels were in the intersection before it turned red". I'm pretty sure it could have stopped on the amber, as required.
mytailorisrich 6y ago
Honda has just unveiled their first certified level 3 car, beating Tesla to it.
- fastball 6y ago
  Level 2 vs 3 is more a regulatory distinction than a technological one. Teslas have a summon feature which is kinda level 4. In summary: the driving autonomy level system kinda sucks.
jack_riminton 6y ago
Beta = hands-on until it becomes not Beta They're clearly trying to get as far as possible (data flywheel) until they absolutely have to get authorisation from the regulators. This is just lawyers doing lawyer stuff. Of course Tesla are aiming for complete automation.
theluketaylor 6y ago
I have a 2021 model 3 and autopilot is a really bad driver. Teenager learning to drive with poor habits bad. I went for a 500km+ drive on Sunday to visit new supercharger locations (it's been a long pandemic and I'm pretty bored). It was mostly rural highways without lane separation or limited access. These are some of the most dangerous roads to drive on since there is direct oncoming and cross traffic. Speed limits are 80 km/hr, but the prevailing traffic flows at just under 100 km/hr, so closing speeds are around 200 km/hr. I hardly ever turn on autopilot since it's just bad at driving, but there were long stretches of completely straight roads with multiple minutes passing between oncoming vehicles. Even in that specific circumstances Autopilot made some truly weak decisions about its basic driving style. It attached to the centreline between lanes which limited the gap with oncoming traffic. When I drive myself in the same circumstances I attach to the outside of the lane to maximize the space I can give oncoming cars. With the amount of room autopilot was giving even a small twitch or moment of distraction would be enough for disaster. If the event was timed poorly enough even a computer system would have no chance to react in time to physically manoeuvre the car out of the way. Autopilot makes no accommodation for blind spots. When traffic is flowing at full speed on limited access or other multiple lane highways I adjust my relative position with other vehicles to ensure I'm never spending long periods of time in another driver's blind spot. If we're travelling the same speed I create a gap to ensure a quick lane change won't result in contact. Autopilot will continue along completely oblivious and no taking good defensive driving precautions. There is a youtube channel featuring collision footage from Tesla onboard cameras. Nearly every collision when autopilot is engaged is a situation that never would have occurred in the hands of a skilled driver who anticipates issues and prevents dangerous situations from every occurring. Without knowing the specific collision that's about to happen in the video in most cases I can see a dangerous situation starting to develop I would have reacted to seconds before the collision actually occurs.
- w0m 6y ago
  > Without knowing the specific collision that's about to happen in the video in most cases I can see a dangerous situation starting to develop I would have reacted to seconds before the collision actually occurs. But you tend to know a collision is coming. Most accidents are due to people being comfortable and not being as alert as they should be; your example is the opposite. AP is currently ~good on highway (probably safer than I am in good weather), but Meh elsewise. Hopefully it continues to improve; but it will be awhile still i think; and iffy to ever get there on our current Teslas.
Hypocritelefty 6y ago
Tesla shills here are good at turning fraud in to saving the planet.
Hypocritelefty 6y ago
Tesla shills lol
Hypocritelefty 6y ago
Fraud Karen sells vapurware but Tesla shills in here are oh but he is saving the planet. The fuckers who fall for this shit deserve everybit of it.
tbabb 6y ago
I have [said this before](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19446043 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19446043 ); Tesla is not on track to deliver Level 5 with their current hardware and apparent software strategy. Piloting a car is a very hard problem, but I would say that Tesla is still struggling with the easy parts of it— they should have solved the "never hit any obstacle" problem to superhuman levels; I think that's pretty comfortably solvable with present technology and algorithms. Instead a Tesla feels about as good in that respect as a careful student driver. The harder parts of machine-piloting involve interpreting the world (lane-finding in the absence of striping; distinguishing hard obstacles from ephemeral objects like paper, leaves, weather, reflections, and so on); and participating in a social environment (what driving postures indicate what intents? What do the local humans consider rude or polite? What are they expecting?) (A truly advanced autopilot would seem almost magical to a human— it would be able to back-solve diffuse and specular reflections in the environment, and accurately deduce the presence of oncoming cars around corners that would be totally invisible to a human driver. It could predict accidents several seconds before they begin to play out, and the sudden braking/maneuvering in the absence of any visible threat would seem strange and confusing to the humans inside). Tesla is nowhere near cracking these things; they're still on the ground floor. I still predict that current pre-buyers of so-called "full self-driving" are not going to get what they were promised, and going back on that will probably be bad both for Tesla's reputation and their wallet. If I had to guess, I'd say that if Tesla delivers on Level 5, it will be with a hardware platform that doesn't exist yet, and a software platform that is close to "complete re-write". As it stands, their misleading marketing on self-driving capability is both dangerous and borderline fraudulent. All that being said, I'm long on self-driving as a technology; just short on Tesla's current approach to it. It's a shame because I suspect both Waymo and Cruise are doing significantly better technologically, but I trust in their ability to execute a product significantly less. I'm not sure who will actually crack it.
jaimex2 6y ago
Guess thedrive.com is getting added to my block list. It's pretty obvious they're just cherry picking a sentence out of context for FUD reporting.
kgin 6y ago
Regardless of debates over the utility of "levels", it does seem misleading to name something "full self driving" that is not intended to fully drive itself.

161 points by samizdis 6y ago

gzu 6y ago

@plainsite doing the real dirty work here

This is a gotcha headline that is contradicted by one of the quotes from Tesla they list in their own article: Please note that Tesla’s development of true autonomous features (SAE Levels 3+) will follow our iterative process (development, validation, early release, etc.) and any such features will not be released to the general public until we have fully validated them and received any required regulatory permits or approvals. TL;DR: Tesla does not want their upcoming release of FSD Beta to be considered to be above Level 2, and their lawyers are submitting documents to California saying that it shouldn't be considered above Level 2 and thus they shouldn't have to apply for special permits in California to release it. They continue to work on autonomous driving features.

goatherders 6y ago

He's such a good marketer. There is a case to be made that he's participating (often) in fraud to pump up the stock price, but people keep buying it so...whatever.

jeffbee 6y ago
Nevermind the pump and dump, which has been right out in the open for years. What about selling people a $10000 option that doesn't work?
- Sohcahtoa82 6y ago
  I don't think of it that way. It's investing $10,000 in a feature that is currently under development and will go up in price as it improves. It also includes any hardware upgrades that are necessary to keep up with FSD requirements. Tesla fans know that FSD isn't ready. They know that the $10,000 upgrade doesn't actually grant FSD, but the purchase of it indicates that they believe it will in the future. You can call it a $10,000 gamble if you wish, and you can express your belief that it will never happen, but to say "it's a $10,000 option that doesn't work" is only a half-truth, IMO.
goatherders 6y ago
3 downvotes? LOL, don't ever change HN.

perardi 6y ago

Musk’s reality distortion field must visibly bend light. He manages to accomplish so much, but also manages to peddle a lot of absolute monorail-level bullshit. https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a35350331/checking-in-on-all-the-promises-elon-musk-and-tesla-have-made/ https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a35350331/checking-in-on-a... (Still hoping for that super-tunnel to take me to O’Hare once flying is back up to full speed.)

fastball 6y ago
That article has very TSLAQ-type vibes, and in fact links to two TSLAQ sites at the bottom. None of which are honest about how things have progressed.
- perardi 6y ago
  I…don’t even know what TSLAQ is, but, where’s that Hyperloop, battery swapping, and robotaxi?
  - fastball 6y ago
    TSLAQ is a coordinated effort by TSLA short-sellers to generate as much bad press about Tesla as possible in order to tank the price and make money on their short positions. Ensuring said bad press is accurate/fair is certainly not the primary goal. Disclaimer: I don't own any TSLA stock.
  - crazypython 6y ago
    > TSLAQ is a loose, international[1] collective of largely anonymous short-sellers,[2] skeptics, and researchers who openly criticize Tesla, Inc. and its CEO, Elon Musk.[3] The group primarily organizes on Twitter, often using the $TSLAQ cashtag,[4] and Reddit[5] to coordinate efforts and share news, opinions, and analysis about the company and its stock. > Tesla Ticker Symbol + "Q" which is the NASDAQ notation for bankruptcy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TSLAQ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TSLAQ
  - nickik 6y ago
    First of all, Musk literally never said he would develop a Hyperloop. He literally said, here is an idea, I'm not gone do it, somebody else might want to try. Why don't people understand this? Tesla had a battery swapping but realized it was a terrible idea and instead built the largest global chairing network in the world instead. Are you seriously gone shit on somebody because they changed strategy with more information and build something that is actually more impressive? Yes, he was wrong about Robotaxi, or at least its delayed. Nobody bats 100%. But if you are actually honest with yourself and start in 2000 and look what he said, compared to what he did. Literally nobody else on the planet predictions are closer to what actually happened in terms of large scale problems.

cogman10 6y ago

Not really surprising if you've been following the beta progress. I doubt Tesla will move past level 2 until they are at a point where Level 4 or 5 is possible. With that said, I have real doubts that they can get their with the current camera suite. IMO, they don't have enough redundancy. Further, I think elon's anti-lidar position is a mistake. Even if they can make it without lidar, I think it will set them behind the rest of the industry. Likely, we will see something where they collect enough training data to hit level 4 + training suite and eventually they'll release cars with new sensor suites. Once that happens, my bet is that's when they'll actually release level 4 capabilities. I highly doubt any current car will ever allow hands off driving.

perardi 6y ago
Something I’ve been curious about with computer-vision-only versus LIDAR: snow. Now, I am naïve about the real intricacies of computer vision. But won’t snow be quite nasty for camera-only systems? It’s almost the physical definition of noise, as it’s random and reflective. Is there any research or experience with computer vision and dealing with a snowstorm? Because even human drivers aren’t great in that kind of low-vision scenario. (Why yes, I did grow up in the Midwest.)
- artursapek 6y ago
  I think the argument is that if a human with two eyeballs can do it, a computer with a bunch of cameras should be able to as well. I can drive in the snow.
  - perardi 6y ago
    That’s…a supposition more than an argument.
    - fastball 6y ago
      How is that not an argument? A human can drive in the snow, and has a sensing package which effectively consists of two cameras. The hard part (when you only have two cameras) is that the processor needs to be exceedingly sophisticated, e.g. a human brain. People like Waymo have decided the best way to decrease the brain requirement is to add more sophisticated sensing that humans are fundamentally incapable of. Tesla's strategy is more to just build a better digital driving brain with machine learning + lots of miles, because arguably all sensing mechanisms have their shortcomings. That being said, they still have a lot more than two cameras in their FSD package – just not LIDAR. They still have radar and other things as well. Only time will tell which approach is better. Probably in the end the best approach will be to combine the two: a brain that is sophisticated enough it can drive with just cameras, but you throw LIDAR and such in their too to go the extra mile.

NickM 6y ago

Article is misleading. Tesla sent a letter to the CA DMV requesting approval for a feature which they referred to as "City Streets" which they say is level 2, and will continue to be level 2 as it is developed. They specifically say in this very document that they will develop higher levels of autonomy in the future, so it's pretty clear that the "final release of City Streets will continue to be level 2" quote is just referring to the particular subset of functionality that they're seeking approval for. From the very same letter, there is also this quote: Please note that Tesla’s development of true autonomous features (SAE Levels 3+) will follow our iterative process (development, validation, early release, etc.) and any such features will not be released to the general public until we have fully validated them and received any required regulatory permits or approvals.

redis_mlc 6y ago
> they will develop higher levels of autonomy in the future Any bozo can make claims about the future. And you're a bozo for believing them. Do you believe everything you see in writing?
ra7 6y ago
"City Streets" is part of "Full Self Driving" $10,000 package though. They are calling it "Full Self Driving", but a subset of functionality will always be level 2? And the FSD Beta is also level 2 because it only works on city streets? That seems clearly misleading. What's next? "Really, truly full self driving" that's actually level 3+?
- grumple 6y ago
  These are incremental releases of gradually improving functionality. Their plan is to get to level 3+. People who buy it know what they are getting, and if they don't, it's entirely willful ignorance. I don't even own a Tesla yet I've read plenty about the actual capabilities and the fact that these cars can't truly drive themselves.
  - alkonaut 6y ago

smoldesu 6y ago

As cynical as I'd like to be towards Musk, I'm sending this comment over a Starlink connection that has made me rethink what my future could be. Living in a rural area, I was always under the impression that I'd need to move to the city and get a fiber connection eventually. With Starlink, that's no longer a concern. My latency is rock-solid at <50ms and download speeds are pretty capable as well. Obviously Elon isn't entirely responsible for it, but I'm constantly impressed by his initiative in tech world. If Starlink weren't available, I'd be waiting ~3 years for Amazon to build some sort of equivalent service.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
stanford_labrat 6y ago
What’re your download and upload speeds like?
- olyjohn 6y ago
  Mine gets between 50-150mbps, sometimes 200-300 down. Up is between 20-40 from the tests I have done. Exactly as promised. My ping has gone from 40-60ms, and now is regularly around 20. This was just in a matter of months, and also me fucking with it for hours to try to find the best placement. I still have the occasional drop out... I can't make it through a video conference, or wifi call without a freeze up or audio drop. My Starlink app says "No obstructions" but also says "Obstructed for 4 minutes" on a regular basis. Many people seem to echo this. I'm not honestly sure if this is what to expect or not. I generally switch to my 1.5Mbps DSL line for phone calls and video conferences, which lowers the quality a ton, but at least I don't have to ask people to repeat the last 30 seconds. Web surfing and downloading large files is blazing fast, and multiple people sharing the link seems to have no impact on the quality. Video streaming is fantastic. Another downside is that you're behind a CGNAT, so you'll never get a public IP address. Then their router puts you behind another NAT... StarLink is better than nothing for sure. But if Comcast didn't want $25,000 to run 550 feet of cable to my house, I would probably use that instead. I now have to call in an arborist or someone and top some trees that I am guessing are causing temporary obstructions, but I'm not really sure. I have a lot of trees on my property.

noodle 6y ago

Is any of this shocking or contrary to what's already been said in public? You could summarize the whole article like this: Tesla intends on building a great L2 system, releasing it publicly, and then moving on to L3 afterwards.

kmonsen 6y ago
I don't think so, and I think level 3 is an error and should never be there. I think most will go from 2->4. L3 is just requiring human concentration that is impossible. That being said I agree with the spirit of your comment.
- Dylan16807 6y ago
  Level 3 requires that a human be available to take control in a certain amount of time. Whether that's a mistake depends on how long that amount of time it. For example, 10 seconds is perfectly safe. It's fine to completely ignore the road until you hear the beep, because 10 seconds is plenty of time to look around and figure out the situation and take control. I would argue that any system that requires constant human concentration is not actually level 3. Level 2 is the one that's dangerous by design. Edit: Though since the main difference between level 3 and level 4 is the ability to pull over, I wouldn't be surprised if level 3 gets quickly left behind or skipped entirely by many developers.
  - ghaff 6y ago
    10 seconds is not a lot. 10 seconds is: - You're deep into you Netflix movie - +2 seconds. Oh wait, there's an alarm going off. WTF? - +4 seconds. You've acquired some level of visual awareness of the environment but still don't know what's really going on. - etc. You were in a deep sleep? Maybe need a good minute and some indication of why the system has disengaged.
    - Dylan16807 6y ago
      I'm pretty sure I'm not going to get that involved in a Netflix movie in a moving car. Is that a common thing? But even in your scenario, if you hit vague awareness of the environment at 4 seconds, and you know you're taking over to drive... that 6 more seconds is more than enough to reach full environmental awareness. > You were in a deep sleep? You're not supposed to sleep for level 3. And "don't sleep" is not some ridiculous requirement. It doesn't even compare to the "be constantly vigilant" rule of level 2.

babelfish 6y ago

As long as Musk continues to insist that Tesla doesn't need Lidar, their self-driving technology will always be a level lower than Waymo/Cruise/etc

fastball 6y ago
Humans don't need LIDAR.
- sschueller 6y ago
  Humans make mistakes. FSD has to be better than humans.
  - fastball 6y ago
    Tesla has more than just two cameras in their FSD package.
    - tylerhou 6y ago
      It seems like Musk has decided that if humans can drive visually, then cars can. Why did he choose this line? That is, if humans only need two eyes to drive, then why not just only use two cameras? Isn't using more than two cameras (and radar) admitting that cars need more "help" than humans? If using more than two cameras is okay, why not go further and use LIDAR or HD-mappings? I believe that Musk chose this line because he knows that LIDAR (in its current state) is too expensive to sell to consumers. Same with HD-mapping. We know that LIDAR based systems have achieved "better" self-driving than camera based systems. It's still possible that Musk is correct. But at present, it seems to me that Musk's position therefore seems like a mostly ideological stance, and not based on any real data. That's why people doubt Tesla's ability to execute on Level 4/5 self driving. The market will punish ideological purists when they are wrong.
      - fastball 6y ago
        Nobody has demonstrated L 4/5, so all positions are ideological ones. You could also argue that because LIDAR is expensive, it's hard to get billions of miles of training from LIDAR-equipped vehicles. This is not the case with Tesla's sensing package, which is racking up the miles as we speak. So sure, expense makes it less appealing from a consumer perspective, but its also possible that the difficulty of deploying LIDAR fleets makes it less likely to achieve FSD in the short term due to less capacity to generate training data. Long-term we'll probably want all our vehicles to have as many sensors as is feasible. But nobody trying to get to FSD today is worried about what it will look like in 100 years – they're all trying to get their first.

tesla_fan_88 6y ago

We all have reasons to be cynical towards Elon, but what yo don’t realize is I'm sending this comment over a Starlink connection that has made me rethink what my future could be. Living in a rural area, I was always under the impression that I'd need to move to the city and get a fiber connection eventually. With Starlink, that's not a concern any longer. My latency is rock-solid at <50ms and download speeds are more than capable as well. Obviously Elon isn't entirely responsible for it, but I'm constantly impressed by his initiative in tech world. If Starlink weren't available, I'd be waiting 3+ years for Apple to build some sort of similar service.

jeffbee 6y ago

The incredible thing about the whole "FSD Beta" phenomenon is how many members of the public are willfully participating in the pump-and-dump. I just can't figure out if they are hypnotized, brainwashed, or just never had any critical thinking skills to begin with. Take for example this well-known youtuber, AI DRIVR. This guy drives around in his Tesla talking about how amazing and mind-blowing it is, but if you mute him and just watch the video with a critical eye you can see that the software simply does not work. It should be outlawed immediately before it kills someone. He recently rampaged through my town of Berkeley, California, breaking five laws per minute (aside from the fact that he has the speed controls set 5 MPH above the limit at all times). Here's his car running a stop sign: https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=219 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=219 Here it runs a red light, which the narrator takes pains to explain away. https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=238 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=238 Here it turns right from the center lane: https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=523 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=523 Here it violates the right-of-way of a car that it incorrectly classified as parked. https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=762 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=762 At numerous points in the video, it signals for a right turn while going straight. https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=806 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=806 Here it signals left while going straight: https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=898 https://youtu.be/SNT5MzjAAms?t=898 Absolutely unacceptable. The government should act against this junk.

snypher 6y ago
His explanation for the red light is "the front wheels were in the intersection before it turned red". I'm pretty sure it could have stopped on the amber, as required.

mytailorisrich 6y ago

Honda has just unveiled their first certified level 3 car, beating Tesla to it.

fastball 6y ago
Level 2 vs 3 is more a regulatory distinction than a technological one. Teslas have a summon feature which is kinda level 4. In summary: the driving autonomy level system kinda sucks.

jack_riminton 6y ago

Beta = hands-on until it becomes not Beta They're clearly trying to get as far as possible (data flywheel) until they absolutely have to get authorisation from the regulators. This is just lawyers doing lawyer stuff. Of course Tesla are aiming for complete automation.

theluketaylor 6y ago

I have a 2021 model 3 and autopilot is a really bad driver. Teenager learning to drive with poor habits bad. I went for a 500km+ drive on Sunday to visit new supercharger locations (it's been a long pandemic and I'm pretty bored). It was mostly rural highways without lane separation or limited access. These are some of the most dangerous roads to drive on since there is direct oncoming and cross traffic. Speed limits are 80 km/hr, but the prevailing traffic flows at just under 100 km/hr, so closing speeds are around 200 km/hr. I hardly ever turn on autopilot since it's just bad at driving, but there were long stretches of completely straight roads with multiple minutes passing between oncoming vehicles. Even in that specific circumstances Autopilot made some truly weak decisions about its basic driving style. It attached to the centreline between lanes which limited the gap with oncoming traffic. When I drive myself in the same circumstances I attach to the outside of the lane to maximize the space I can give oncoming cars. With the amount of room autopilot was giving even a small twitch or moment of distraction would be enough for disaster. If the event was timed poorly enough even a computer system would have no chance to react in time to physically manoeuvre the car out of the way. Autopilot makes no accommodation for blind spots. When traffic is flowing at full speed on limited access or other multiple lane highways I adjust my relative position with other vehicles to ensure I'm never spending long periods of time in another driver's blind spot. If we're travelling the same speed I create a gap to ensure a quick lane change won't result in contact. Autopilot will continue along completely oblivious and no taking good defensive driving precautions. There is a youtube channel featuring collision footage from Tesla onboard cameras. Nearly every collision when autopilot is engaged is a situation that never would have occurred in the hands of a skilled driver who anticipates issues and prevents dangerous situations from every occurring. Without knowing the specific collision that's about to happen in the video in most cases I can see a dangerous situation starting to develop I would have reacted to seconds before the collision actually occurs.

w0m 6y ago
> Without knowing the specific collision that's about to happen in the video in most cases I can see a dangerous situation starting to develop I would have reacted to seconds before the collision actually occurs. But you tend to know a collision is coming. Most accidents are due to people being comfortable and not being as alert as they should be; your example is the opposite. AP is currently ~good on highway (probably safer than I am in good weather), but Meh elsewise. Hopefully it continues to improve; but it will be awhile still i think; and iffy to ever get there on our current Teslas.

Hypocritelefty 6y ago

Tesla shills here are good at turning fraud in to saving the planet.

Hypocritelefty 6y ago

Tesla shills lol

Hypocritelefty 6y ago

Fraud Karen sells vapurware but Tesla shills in here are oh but he is saving the planet. The fuckers who fall for this shit deserve everybit of it.

tbabb 6y ago

I have [said this before](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19446043 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19446043 ); Tesla is not on track to deliver Level 5 with their current hardware and apparent software strategy. Piloting a car is a very hard problem, but I would say that Tesla is still struggling with the easy parts of it— they should have solved the "never hit any obstacle" problem to superhuman levels; I think that's pretty comfortably solvable with present technology and algorithms. Instead a Tesla feels about as good in that respect as a careful student driver. The harder parts of machine-piloting involve interpreting the world (lane-finding in the absence of striping; distinguishing hard obstacles from ephemeral objects like paper, leaves, weather, reflections, and so on); and participating in a social environment (what driving postures indicate what intents? What do the local humans consider rude or polite? What are they expecting?) (A truly advanced autopilot would seem almost magical to a human— it would be able to back-solve diffuse and specular reflections in the environment, and accurately deduce the presence of oncoming cars around corners that would be totally invisible to a human driver. It could predict accidents several seconds before they begin to play out, and the sudden braking/maneuvering in the absence of any visible threat would seem strange and confusing to the humans inside). Tesla is nowhere near cracking these things; they're still on the ground floor. I still predict that current pre-buyers of so-called "full self-driving" are not going to get what they were promised, and going back on that will probably be bad both for Tesla's reputation and their wallet. If I had to guess, I'd say that if Tesla delivers on Level 5, it will be with a hardware platform that doesn't exist yet, and a software platform that is close to "complete re-write". As it stands, their misleading marketing on self-driving capability is both dangerous and borderline fraudulent. All that being said, I'm long on self-driving as a technology; just short on Tesla's current approach to it. It's a shame because I suspect both Waymo and Cruise are doing significantly better technologically, but I trust in their ability to execute a product significantly less. I'm not sure who will actually crack it.

jaimex2 6y ago

Guess thedrive.com is getting added to my block list. It's pretty obvious they're just cherry picking a sentence out of context for FUD reporting.

kgin 6y ago

Regardless of debates over the utility of "levels", it does seem misleading to name something "full self driving" that is not intended to fully drive itself.