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Oh, I absolutely agree. Ideally Telsa would dump the old Autopilot stack and put all cars (that have the hardware to support it) on a free version of FSD, nerfe

Oh, I absolutely agree. Ideally Telsa would dump the old Autopilot stack and put all cars (that have the hardware to support it) on a free version of FSD, nerfed so that it's roughly feature-equivalent to Autopilot. That way everyone would get the safety advantages of FSD, including the really important stuff like better driver attention monitoring. Unfortunately, Tesla keeps Autopilot bad because it forces more people to pay for FSD, and in this case they seem to care more about profits than safety.

ben_w 4mo ago
> Unfortunately, Tesla keeps Autopilot bad because it forces more people to pay for FSD, and in this case they seem to care more about profits than safety. Not saying you're wrong, but I think "it forces people to pay for FSD" is a poor decision if true. More likely it creates market confusion (as we see in this thread) about exactly which of the two products that Tesla advertises as things which drive your car for you is the more dangerous one and which is "the good one" (though from their taxis, I think the scare quotes are still justified even then). I'm also not even sure if they do care about profits (or safety), given Musk's made about as much from selling Tesla shares as the company has made in lifetime profit, before getting shareholder approval for a deal to give him more shares. (Conditionally give, yes, but the nature of it all suggests share price is more important than profit or safety, and if you don't care about such things that makes it much easier for them to sell a million robots or whatever).
- JumpCrisscross 4mo ago
  That the reporting is so tortured sort of shows this works. It’s irrelevant in a broad or legal context. But for the narrow audience of his fans, it carries merit.
  - ben_w 4mo ago
    When you say this, do you have in mind that "his fans" are the customers, or the shareholders? I ask because he has made about as much from the latter as Tesla has made from the former.

ben_w 4mo ago

> Unfortunately, Tesla keeps Autopilot bad because it forces more people to pay for FSD, and in this case they seem to care more about profits than safety. Not saying you're wrong, but I think "it forces people to pay for FSD" is a poor decision if true. More likely it creates market confusion (as we see in this thread) about exactly which of the two products that Tesla advertises as things which drive your car for you is the more dangerous one and which is "the good one" (though from their taxis, I think the scare quotes are still justified even then). I'm also not even sure if they do care about profits (or safety), given Musk's made about as much from selling Tesla shares as the company has made in lifetime profit, before getting shareholder approval for a deal to give him more shares. (Conditionally give, yes, but the nature of it all suggests share price is more important than profit or safety, and if you don't care about such things that makes it much easier for them to sell a million robots or whatever).

JumpCrisscross 4mo ago
That the reporting is so tortured sort of shows this works. It’s irrelevant in a broad or legal context. But for the narrow audience of his fans, it carries merit.
- ben_w 4mo ago
  When you say this, do you have in mind that "his fans" are the customers, or the shareholders? I ask because he has made about as much from the latter as Tesla has made from the former.