A thread to discuss self-driving cars and other vehicles. No politics, please.
Technology, commercial aspects, legal considerations and marketing are all on-topic.
- Companies (e.g. Tesla Inc.) are only on-topic when discussing their self-driving products and research, not their wider activities. The exception is when those wider activities directly impact (or are impacted by) their other business areas - e.g. if self-driving car development is cut back due to losses in another part of the business.
- Technology that's not directly related to self-driving vehicles is off-topic unless you're discussing how it might be used for them in future.
- If we're talking about individuals here, that should only be because they've said or done something directly relevant to the topic. Specifically, posts about Tesla do not automatically need to mention Elon Musk. And Musk's views, politics and personal life are firmly off-topic unless you can somehow show that they're relevant to self-driving vehicles.
Cadillac plans to release a scaled back, more simple version of similar technology by 2015 - what they call "Super Cruise", which isn't total self-driving, but does let you relax on highways. It positions your car in the exact center of a lane, slows down or speeds up as necessary, and is said to be meant for ideal driving conditions (I'm guessing that means ideal weather, no rain or snow, etc.).
I am looking forward to such tech. If enough people prefer to drive this way, and the technology works reliably, it could result in safer roads with fewer accidents. Another possibility is that, using GPS and maybe the ability to know ahead of time which roads are most clogged, they can find the quickest route from place to place.
On the other hand, hacking could be a real concern, and I hope it doesn't become a serious threat. It's looking like we're living more and more like those sci-fi Everything Is Online worlds depicted in fiction for a long time.
(Mod edited to replace original post)
Edited by Mrph1 on Mar 29th 2024 at 4:19:56 PM
Calling it "Full Self Driving" is a misnomer, and potentially misleading, but that's been the nature of US advertising for over a century, and Tesla hardly stands out in this regard.
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& Yeah, but when I saw it come up again my thought was "wait, they're releasing the finished version before the legal OK for it?" not "oh it's just a different sales model", since I never remembered the previous sales stuff.
Edited by RainehDaze on Apr 15th 2021 at 4:33:02 PM
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Jupiterian Local
Yeah, I really have no idea how you can justify calling it "Full Self-Driving" while simultaneously saying "this is only a Level 2 system so it requires the driver to be attentive and ready to take control at all times". It's just talking out of both sides of your mouth.
But we've had that conversation repeatedly.
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.
Lost in Space
When you buy an in-development product, you are paying for the thing it will become, not the thing it is currently. It's also a known risk that the product may never reach the final intended state. Might as well ban preorders and early access.
Everyone who buys FSD today is an "early access" customer who locks in the price they paid no matter how much it goes up in the future. That's the selling point. It is not advertised as finished or complete and there is no effort or intent to deceive.
Edited by Fighteer on Apr 15th 2021 at 12:08:17 PM
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
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That makes even less sense once you start selling it in subscription form, because you're clearly only paying for the product as it is now: a misnamed product where any news is inherently misleading because the name is still inaccurate.
That is absolute bullshit. No intent to deceive, whilst using the misleading name for years? If they didn't want to be deceptive, they would have used a name that doesn't describe the not yet available goal.
Edited by RainehDaze on Apr 15th 2021 at 5:12:31 PM
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Jupiterian Local
That is, quite frankly, bullshit. You can buy "Tesla Autopilot with Full Self Driving" right now. The "Full Self Driving" package has been released and is being sold as we speak. Anyone buying Tesla Autopilot with Full Self Driving could be forgiven for believing that they're buying a level 5 fully autonomous system right now because "full self-driving" is right there in the name.
Yes, anyone who's done their research will know that that's not the case. But if you have to research the product to understand that it isn't actually what its name says it is, then that's misleading.
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.
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There are two options here: option one, they're keeping the knowingly misleading name and are being deceptive; option two, Tesla either has no marketing department or its marketing is done entirely by naive fools who don't understand people at all. I think the second one is a little unlikely. 
Lost in Space
It says it's Level 2 and describes that on the website, in all materials, in the user manual, on the display before you can activate the product, and during usage. The only thing it doesn't do is release a robot arm to plaster a sign on someone's forehead.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Jupiterian Local
And have a name that accurately describes the product.
Seriously, I don't know why this is the hill you want to die on. Even if it doesn't rise to the level of running afoul of truth-in-advertising regulations, calling your driver assistance system "Autopilot with Full Self-Driving" when it's only level 2 is clearly not accurate. The fact that it says "WARNING: THIS SYSTEM IS A LEVEL 2 ADAS AND REQUIRES DRIVER ATTENTION AT ALL TIMES" in other places doesn't make the name any less misleading.
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.
Lost in Space
Well then, you'd better go off and crusade against every other example of "potentially misleading" branding, since this one has you so excited. If not, then it isn't really about that, but about a specific concern over Tesla. I kind of hoped we'd exhausted that, but apparently not. It's like a broken record around here.
Edited by Fighteer on Apr 15th 2021 at 1:19:20 PM
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
A procrastination in of itself
It’s worth noting that courts in Germany have ruled that Tesla’s use of “Autopilot” and “Full Self Driving” is misleading to consumers. Obviously the US’s laws on false advertising aren’t as strict as Germany’s, but this issue has come up in the past.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran
Lost in Space
Yeah, Germany did that. Kind of ironic since Tesla is building a factory in Germany to produce cars with self-driving capability, but hey.
Look, to prove a case for misleading advertising/branding, it isn't enough to show the potential; you generally have to prove that people are actually being misled.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
For the ethical (as opposed to legal) argument you just have to show the potential, just as to demonstrate that a product is unsafe, you don't have to wait until someone dies. But that's US law for you, we have long protected misleading advertising under the banner of free speech.
Jupiterian Local
I would be if they were as bad as Tesla's. They're not. That's the whole point.
Toyota's branding is "Safety Sense". GM's is "Super Cruise". Honda's is just "Honda Sensing". Ford's is "Co-Pilot360". Nissan's is "ProPILOT Assist".
The worst of those is Ford's, which I'm not wild about, but the clear brand-y styling of mashing numbers and words together helps make it clearer that this is a cool marketing name, not a literal description of its capabilities. Not to mention that Ford's main self-driving feature is called "Blue Cruse", which leaves "Co-Pilot360 with Blue Cruise" compared to "Autopilot with Full Self-Driving". Nissan also includes the potentially-misleading word "pilot", like Autopilot and Co-Pilot360, but also explicitly has the word assist, making it clear that it can't drive for you.
The whole argument is also a transparent dodge, by the way. You've been arguing that it's fine for Tesla to call its system Autopilot with Full Self-Driving, you can't turn around and the complain that Co-Pilot360 with Blue Cruise is unacceptably misleading. And if you want to argue that Co-Pilot360 with Blue Cruise is bad, then Autopilot with Full Self-Driving is also bad and you're essentially conceding the point. It's straight whataboutism.
Edited by NativeJovian on Apr 15th 2021 at 2:29:06 PM
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.
Lost in Space
The question of whether it is deceptive in law is for a court to decide. The question of whether it is deceptive in fact relies on someone actually being deceived. I'm not playing semantics games. I'm peeved that every time I post here, the topic goes to something trivial like branding rather than being about the technology.
Maybe I'll just ignore it from now on and post whatever.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Jupiterian Local
It only turns into an extended conversation every time it comes up because you choose to defend Tesla every time it comes up, instead of saying "yeah, the name's misleading and they should probably change it, but the technology itself is still impressive".
Which isn't to suggest that you shouldn't defend Tesla if you legitimately think that calling a level 2 system "Autopilot with Full Self-Driving" isn't misleading. But you do seem to be the only one posting here who thinks that, so if you're tired of the conversation taking that turn, then you could just... stop turning the conversation in that direction.
That said, if you want to talk about the actual news that you originally posted, I'm not a fan of a subscription model for car features. If I buy a Tesla with a certain feature set, I want to own that car with those features, not own a platform with which Tesla can sell me additional features on a subscription basis. The fact that Teslas phone home to company servers at all is not something I particularly appreciate. Over-the-air updates are nice, but I'd rather deal with the inconvenience of having to stop by a service center for a software update than deal with the security concerns of an outside network connection that can be activated without my knowledge or consent. The fact that Tesla is also leveraging this to enable things like "pay a subscription fee or have your features turned off" only makes it worse. There was a thing last year where Tesla remotely deactivated Autopilot for a car that had already been bought and paid for (though they later turned it back on).
Hard pass on that, thanks. Maybe I'm showing my age, but my car is not something I want using that kind of business model.
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.
Lost in Space
I'll drop a mea culpa and admit that sometimes I do fish for complaints so I can have something to talk about. As for subscriptions, there's a bunch to unpack.
First, it is Tesla's position that Full Self-Driving is a software feature that is a service, not a good, and therefore is not something bought and then permanently owned by the customer. Part of that may be an attempt to get more money out of it, and that's fair - a lot of people complain that Tesla attaches the FSD purchase to the car and not the driver, so if you get a new Tesla you have to pay for FSD again.
The company is not relaxing that stance despite criticism (from people who love Tesla, not just outsiders), but it has said that it will consider adjusting trade-in values based on whether FSD was purchased with the vehicle.
FSD as a subscription, however, has been highly requested by people who can't afford the up-front price. $10,000 is a lot to swallow atop an already expensive car. There's also the "as-needed" aspect. Many people only use Autopilot features when they take long trips, and if they don't do that very often they don't want to feel like they're paying for something they aren't using.
The whole business is weird and while I'm interested in FSD and very much want to buy a Tesla, I am probably going to wait on that upgrade until we get a better sense of how it's going to turn out.
It's hardly the only vehicle service to be subscription-based, though. You pay per month for satellite radio, you can pay per month for service contracts, etc. When you buy a Tesla you own the hardware but that doesn't entitle you to use all its features.
As for the online aspect of the vehicles, that's all on you. If you would prefer to take your car to a dealer for software updates, fine, but nobody objects to their phone communicating back to the server constantly and receiving automatic updates. Your phone travels with you and tracks your location, so you can't even play that objection.
So if you use a smartphone, there is no basis to object to a car getting the same treatment unless you draw an arbitrary distinction for some reason. And you do consent to getting software updates; the car prompts you for it. Like an iPhone, however, it won't wait forever, and you can have updates disabled if you fail to install them after a certain length of time.
The experience of owning a Tesla is intentionally similar to the experience of owning a smartphone, except that the car itself is a durable good intended to last for decades and be supported by software updates and purchases.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Figure of Hourai
I'm not a fan of cars that come with some feature or other already in place, which is then disabled until further payments are made. Not when it's BMW disabling a lighting assistant or this. Nor when it's computer hardware, which is part of why everyone hates trial bloatware stuck on a new purchase.
My phone is theoretically able to perform many of its non-phone functions without actually having a connection to anything, depending on what's already installed on it, and needing to access untrusted networks constantly is something any sane and remotely tech-aware person seeks to minimise. It can also, conversely, act as a phone without an internet connection.
Plus, a security flaw in my phone is not potentially fatal.
Edited by RainehDaze on Apr 15th 2021 at 9:06:57 AM
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Lost in Space
Your Tesla is perfectly capable of driving around and functioning as a car without being connected to any service.
If you're concerned about software flaws in cars, we could go through history and see how many of those there've been. It's quite a lot. But this is why over-the-air updates are so great. Your Tesla can be patched of software flaws very quickly and without a trip to the dealer. It's also worth noting that core driving systems are completely independent at a software level from FSD and from media functions.
Ask Volkswagen ID.3 owners how the software experience went for them.
Edited by Fighteer on Apr 15th 2021 at 4:10:44 AM
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Figure of Hourai
"Core driving functions are completely separate at a software level from the thing that can drive the car and control its every action" is not a particularly reassuring statement.
Also, who said anything about software flaws? I said security flaws. These are overlapping but they are not the same.
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Lost in Space
Not sure how you read that into my post. Tesla vehicles have three core software systems, each running more or less independently:
- The powertrain and battery systems that control steering, braking, acceleration, battery usage, charging, all the low-level stuff that constitutes actually driving the car. Any time you engage with the physical controls other than the infotainment system, you're at this level.
- The FSD system that runs on dedicated hardware. It processes inputs from all of the car's sensors and delivers outputs in the form of driving instructions. It is always operating but unless you specifically engage it, it's merely "shadowing" the driver and checking what it would have done against what you actually do.
- Tesla collects this data to improve FSD, although not continually. Rather, engineers may query the entire fleet for samples of specific situations to assist in training the ML software. It also automatically uploads logs, engineering data, and video when you are in a crash.
- The media/infotainment system that operates the car's main screen. This is where you set your driving options, control various features, view maps and visualizations, play music or games, etc.
The car can be driven without the FSD or MCU systems. It'll be tricky to operate if the screen isn't on, something that was an issue for early software revisions, but seems to be fairly rare these days. The core driving systems are walled off at a software level as well, so that a problem with the MCU won't suddenly make your car brake or steer into a wall.
As risks go, the worry that a hacker will render your car inoperable or unsafe is pretty low. They'd have to intervene in the software update process and trick it into downloading their software rather than Tesla's. I'd call that fairly low-probability. I suppose there could be exploitable web browser vulnerabilities, but at worst they could mess up your MCU; they would be unable to touch the core driving or FSD systems.
Edited by Fighteer on Apr 15th 2021 at 4:41:06 AM
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Figure of Hourai
I fail to see why "the actual car controls are separate from FSD" is supposed to be in any way reassuring. FSD can control the former, and the fact it's NOT locked down and can be updated at any point is concerning.
Places where hackers having any way to potentially compromise functional systems is undesirable: cars, planes, hospital equipment. It being a supposedly low risk is never a good thing when the existence of said risk is a matter of designer choice.
And if they can get at browser functions, unless the systems are physically disconnected then there's a risk of escalating from that to proper control. It's happened on computers enough times.
Edited by RainehDaze on Apr 15th 2021 at 9:42:23 AM
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Lost in Space
The FSD system cannot control the car without being engaged by the driver, and it is updated separately from the MCU. A compromised media system cannot alter the FSD software or the core driving software.
You're surrounded by software every minute of the day, and all of it carries risks even if those are marginal. What if a hacker messes with medical equipment, or traffic lights, or the power grid? These are risks we accept as a trade-off for living in a technological society. You might as well go live in a cave.
Edited by Fighteer on Apr 15th 2021 at 4:43:04 AM
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Figure of Hourai
Are these hardware lockouts or software? Because if it's only guaranteed by software, then no, that's just how it's supposed to work and the risk is still there.
Oh here we go again, I said something bad about Tesla so time to ignore the substance of the complaint (unnecessary security holes) and go on about how software is everywhere. Not the point, unless they're updating the traffic lights via constantly open wireless channels in which case someone needs to be fired.
It's a strawman and you know it.
Edited by RainehDaze on Apr 15th 2021 at 9:47:43 AM
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Selling subscriptions to a service that people can already purchase and have for years. It is a different sales model, not a new feature.
Edited by Fighteer on Apr 15th 2021 at 10:44:35 AM
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"