Cruise control is as far from autonomous driving as a piece of graph paper is from being a computer. Nobody has ever described it as a paradigm shift, and its invention did not prompt unsubstantiated speculation about how driverless taxicabs are literally two years away. And yes, from a safety perspective, Tesla's autopilot is no different from cruise control. Keep your hands on the wheel, your feet on the pedals, and constantly pay attention.
Why are you assuming that other manufacturers are not working towards full autonomy? I strongly doubt that everyone at Ford, GM, VW, Toyota, and Honda is asleep at the wheel... Especially when their luxury vehicles are all incrementally moving towards autonomy.
They certainly have a lot fewer PR pieces about how amazing their autonomous-but-not-really lane assist is.
I'm a huge Tesla fan and am very glad they're pushing things forward... buuuuuut, Audi / VW / Mercedes / Volvo have had adaptive cruise control with auto-braking for over a decade now. The first Audis with Brake Guard were released in 2002. By 2009 you could get ACC on an Audi that cost less than $35k.
The major autos that "had the means to progress vehicles for quite some time and haven't" have literally sold millions of cars with this technology.
We aren't talking about "adaptive cruise control". We're talking about "Full Self-Driving".
Your entire point is predicated on mislabeling Elon's fraudulent service. Yes, every time Elon's "Full Self-Driving" technology gets into a horrific accident and exposes the depths of the lies he peddles, it will become news.
If Tesla labeled the technology "adaptive cruise control", 90% of these stories would go away. No one cares about any other companies cruise control. They only care about "10X Tesla // autonomous taxi // Full Self Driving" future cars getting into accidents.
My perspective is skewed because I'm in Sweden but in real world situations I've seen more good about adaptive cruise control than Tesla autopilot. Tesla autopilot is mostly something I see hyped on HN or reddit.
But in real life, adaptive cruise control is being used all the time, and no good driver that I know trusts it with their life or their insurance.
They do for legal reasons. Are you saying autopilot is no better than adaptive cruise control and lane assist found on many cars - Not the impression they want you to have at https://www.tesla.com/autopilot ...
Tesla is hardly the only company that makes a car with lane following and adaptive cruise control. How do the other manufacturers deal with this issue?
But that is a decade old technology available in even low-end cars, and is not responsible for car crashes because it was never marketed as anything more.
Tesla maliciously advertises as much much more than adaptive cruise control, lane assist, etc, which is disgusting on their part.
"Any car with adaptive cruise control and autosteering is gonna behave identically to a Tesla with autopilot for 99% of the time behind the wheel."
This isn't even close to true. Most LKAS and ADAS systems will only last a few seconds before they require human intervention. It is not at all the same experience.
You do realize that in Europe the same thing that Tesla calls "autopilot" has existed for years in Mercedes, Volvo and some other premium cars, Tesla's autopilot is nothing more at the moment than a line keeping and adaptive cruise control that is used in Europe for at least 3 years now
Have you tried it? I recently got my first car that has adaptive cruise control and “lane-keep assist,” which is essentially what Tesla calls “autopilot,” and it’s really great even with its limitations and flaws. Yes, you need to remain alert, and it doesn’t do everything for you, but it still does some things for you. I’m not sure what’s difficult to understand.
I disagree. Systems from other manufacturers (BMW, Mercedes, Audi/VW) are as capable but they prevent you from using them above certain speeds for safety reasons. Tesla can do little more than lane assist and adaptive cruise control, as recent events have shown.
Based on all the information I've seen, adaptive cruise control with lane keeping is all that Tesla is reliable at as well. The main difference between them and Mercedes is that Tesla is willing to put out tech that is known to be unreliable and let their customers take the fall for it.
You think "Autopilot" is a moat? Every other company has had that stuff for ten years and their systems actually work. Adaptive cruise control ain't new.
And no, I don't think Tesla can improve on build quality. Their cars are fantastically shit. May as well consider Yugo a competitor to Bentley.
Maybe now. But years ago, that's not how it was advertised. As shared by others in this thread:
From Tesla:
"Full Self-Driving Hardware on All Cars"
followed by:
"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."
Self-driving cars doesn't sound like fancy name for cruise control.
That's from Tesla. Who has already faced consequences for lying in marketing.
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