
DVD player found in Tesla car in May crash: Florida officials - sndean
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-autopilot-dvd-idUSKCN0ZH5BW
======
kbenson
This highlights Google's stance in driver assistance vs driver replacement.
They specifically noted in their first test cards that they had employees use,
which were modified regular street cars, that the people quickly treated them
as completely autonomous even when they were warned not to. For example,
rooting around in the back-seat looking for a charger to the laptop they had
with them while the car drove itself.

Google decided that if people were going to treat it that way, they needed to
design it that way, and now their autonomous cards don't have steering wheels,
just a big button to tell the car to try to safely pull off the road and stop.
You'll necessarily be a bit more stringent in your tests and capabilities if
you opt for an approach that buts all the responsibility on what you design,
and not the passenger.

I agree with this, so I've been somewhat leery of Tesla's auto-pilot feature.
While sad, I can't say I'm entirely surprised by the accident. Our own nature
makes us very unreliable for regular driving and assisted driving in many of
the same ways. Removing people from the active driving process is ultimately
the better solution, but it takes time to get it right.

------
iamleppert
Tesla needs to take responsibility for negligently releasing a feature they
knew was going to be abused. Its shocking to me how they still have this
feature enabled when it has proven to kill.

I hope they are punished within the full extent of the law. A car is not a web
application that can be pushed updates at the whim of the developer. They've
known about the limitations of the feature, in that its sensors can't even
approximate the complete bounding box of the car, do not have sufficient
resolution and are thus limited by hardware, not software. It's not "beta", it
is alpha quality and should never be in the hands of customers in uncontrolled
situations let alone on the open road.

We are all subjected to risk with this feature, regardless if we have agreed
to it or not. It's not just the owner of the Tesla who is in danger but anyone
else on the road as well.

I personally have witnessed Tesla drivers doing their makeup, eating, and even
sleeping in their car on my commute on 101S and 280S in the morning. Contrast
that to those who drive recklessly, weaving in and out of traffic. For some
reason, these cars seem to attract a certain kind of person who thinks they
are above the law.

At the minimum, Tesla drivers should be required to carry high risk insurance
on their vehicles. Its only a matter of time before it kills or seriously
injures someone other than the driver.

~~~
kbenson
> Tesla needs to take responsibility for negligently releasing a feature they
> knew was going to be abused.

I can release a car without any autonomous features, should I take
responsibility for the people that I know will eventually use it in an
inappropriate manner, such as while intoxicated, sleep deprived, on
medication, or just without paying attention?

> Its shocking to me how they still have this feature enabled when it has
> proven to kill.

Driving cars has proven to kill, even when you follow all the directions
correctly. Some things can't be avoided.

Nothing about this is any different than cruise control. In both cases you are
supposed to still be paying attention and take over in the case of situations
the assist feature can't handle. Cruise control just handles less.

This will be a problem until we make the cars completely autonomous, with
enough safety assurance. Until then, if we don't want to allow assistance
features this advanced, we need to take legal action not against Tesla, but to
create laws that are very explicit in what is and is not allowed.

------
joezydeco
The link points to an older article now, for some reason.

Link moved to here: [http://www.reuters.com/article/tesla-autopilot-dvd-
idUSL1N19...](http://www.reuters.com/article/tesla-autopilot-dvd-
idUSL1N19N19C)

