Interesting combo of very impressive, and also clearly not ready for general availability. It’s doing something noticeably wrong every few minutes. It’s so hard to guess how close this really is, but I’d guess … a few years or so? I’d imagine all those edge cases where it’s stopping too early, stopping too late, getting stuck making certain decisions, etc. will take quite awhile to iron out.
Yes, you are right. Not quite ready for GA just yet, at least not for the insanity of San Francisco driving. I would settle for having to intervene every now and then though. I have a base Tesla Model 3 and just the free "self-steer" mode is very helpful. I definitely miss it when driving one of my kids' cars.
For me, for a “fully self driving” feature to be ready for wide market sales, it needs to be as good or better than a human. A more “drive assist” feature, like current Tesla autopilot, where there has to be a human driver ready to take over at any moment, that’s different, but full self driving, where there doesn’t even need to be a human driver at all, the standards are a lot higher.
Also, by “as good or better than a human”, for me the biggest things are:
- Involved in the same number, or fewer, accidents
- Does not piss off other drivers any more than a human (like stopping way back from stop signs, getting “stuck” on a decision and not making progress, etc.)
In this vid the Tesla was nowhere close to the above standard. Still really impressive, but lots of work to do. Hard to say how close it is - maybe a few quarters away, but could also be a decade or more.
Google/Waymo is closer in terms of safety and pissing off other drivers, but it’s also much more conservative from the rider’s point of view. Like it will do 3 right turns to avoid a tricky left, will take side streets over the highway, etc. Waymo vids seem much safer and more predictable, fewer clear bugs (e.g. all the times the Tesla FSD makes the wrong decision on where to stop at an intersection are bad, “hard dealbreaker” bugs, that Google/Waymo don’t have), but I think it would just get you to your destination too much slower than a human driver, so buyers wouldn’t like it.
Insanity ?
Driving anywhere in the US is an order of magnitude easier than in Europe so if it struggles there, i would like to see how it drives in Paris or Rome
While Rome and Istanbul are really bad, most of Europe is good. Consistent use of traffic circles are a dream (instead of America's infatuation with signalled t-bone collision intersections).
