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Tesla hires Andrej Karpathy

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Re: Tesla hires Andrej Karpathy

#221

Post by Shivetya »

_ph_ wrote: post #133
Animats wrote: post #117

What this really reflects is that Tesla has painted itself into a corner. They've shipped vehicles with a weak sensor suite that's claimed to be sufficient to support self-driving, leaving the software for later. Tesla, unlike everybody else who's serious, doesn't have a LIDAR. Now, it's "later", their software demos are about where Google was in 2010, and Tesla has a big problem. This is a really hard problem to do…

As far as I know, no car manufacturer ships cars equipped with LIDAR. Nor do they seem to have a camera setup as extensive as Tesla. So I fail to see how Tesla has painted itself into a corner. The worst case is, that they are not reaching full autonomy with the current hardware setup. It certainly would be a big marketing blunder if they don't, but if necessary they can add LIDAR to the production, if they choose to…

Chevrolet Bolt self driving test fleet comes this way. The difference is that Tesla has been talking loudly to get people to not see the short comings other companies are actively compensating for.

so what if they can add it to future production, their talk promises or implies they have all they need. yet cursory review of random youtube videos will show you how limited their system still is.

this may be another "war" they lead the charge on but falter in securing the win. you can play the car marketing game at times similar to the technology market but in the area of safety there is no compromise. instead of acting like a tech company pushing a new tablet they should have acted like SpaceX

Re: Tesla hires Andrej Karpathy

#222

Post by [deleted] »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #109
pscsbs wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The top of the range you're quoting is for a typical Staff Software Engineer at Google/Facebook/Microsoft. "Top ML experts" garner much, much higher comp packages.

These are representative of salary numbers for new hires. Agreed though on total comp for top ML experts who have been around for a while - or the highest end.

[deleted]

Re: Tesla hires Andrej Karpathy

#224

Post by arkh »

Matthias247 wrote: post #168
_ph_ wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I know, no car manufacturer ships cars equipped with LIDAR. Nor do they seem to have a camera setup as extensive as Tesla. So I fail to see how Tesla has painted itself into a corner. The worst case is, that they are not reaching full autonomy with the current hardware setup. It certainly would be a big marketing blunder if they don't, but if necessary they can add LIDAR to the production, if they choose to…

Shipping hardware that isn't needed is not how automotive engineering works today. Most automotive projects look like: You want to release a new car model in year X (with is typically around now() + 3-5 years). Then you start a development project exactly for that car, which involves creating roadmaps for the car, creating the architecture, sourcing the components, packaging everything together and testing everything…

>where there might be only a minimal reuse from the last one

Not from what I saw from some constructors. Lot of software and parts are reused for multiples models.

Re: Tesla hires Andrej Karpathy

#226

Post by cm2187 »

jacquesm wrote: post #205
cm2187 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually in the dark you often drive as a leap of faith in the state of the road. I.e. with very little visibility on what can come from the side of the road (no light) or after a turn. We shouldn't. But we do.

Yes, but it will cause you to slow down. Or at least, it should. As soon as you have less than your stopping distance of space in front of the car you are going too fast.

Again we probably should but we don't always.

In fact even in daylight you drive a lot as a leap of faith. When the traffic light is green for you at a crossing and you see a car arriving on the side, you assume that you have the priority, that the car will stop and you go ahead without adjusting your speed to the coming car. This is a leap of faith in the fact that all other cars will follow the rules.

Re: Tesla hires Andrej Karpathy

#227

Post by mrfusion »

veidr wrote: post #201
bpicolo wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Laundry bot would definitely make money, tons of it. Robo maid is like numero uno on things people have historically wished robots would do in the future

Yep, I paid around $2000 for a nice Hitachi drum-type washer-dryer machine last year. I would certainly, without any hesitation whatsoever, have been willing to pay $5000 or even a bit more for one that, instead of just washing and drying all our clothes, took a pile of dirty clothes as input and output a few stacks of washed, dried, folded, and sorted clothes. Anybody with children would want this; those who also ha…

It would be simpler to invent wrinkle free clothes and convince your wife clothes don't need to be sorted.

Re: Tesla hires Andrej Karpathy

#228

Post by notheguyouthink »

jacquesm wrote: post #204
Matthias247 wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Prediction: 2020 will be the year the big players have self-driving. I think that depends on what you mean with self-driving. My prediction is that in 2020 we will have slightly better driver assistance systems. Maybe a lane assist system which won't kill me if I don't babysit it on a road with construction ongoing and multiple lane markings or if corners get too tight. Maybe some limited self-driving, e.g. only av…

> Maybe a lane assist system which won't kill me if I don't babysit it on a road with construction ongoing and multiple lane markings or if corners get too tight. Or if someone else makes a mistake. That's another scenario that can have very unpredictable and immediate consequences ranging from 'nothing' to 'two car accident with fatalities'. Even in relatively placid (when it comes to driving) NL I see this kind of…

Yup, these are the reasons I'm not interested in those "hands-free but still assisted" autodriving deals. I'd love cruise control assist and lane assist in my car, but that's about all I want until I can be 100% sure cars can handle the situations by themselves.

Re: Tesla hires Andrej Karpathy

#229

Post by randomdata »

kornish wrote: post #86
rockinghigh wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. Chris is very smart but this is unlikely to be a good fit.

I disagree (that it was inevitable...obviously it ended up not being a good fit, ha). This comment from the original announcement has an insightful point of view on how much sense it could make to have someone concerned with correctness and reliability heading the AI/Autonomous Driving team. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13370144

The most insightful part seems to be:

"Naively one might have expected some machine learning expert to take over the reins at Tesla."

Here we are.

Re: Tesla hires Andrej Karpathy

#230

Post by ryandrake »

fragmede wrote: post #179
ryandrake wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe I'm seeing the past through rose-colored glasses, but it seems there was once a time in Silicon Valley when you could make it big as a pure technologist and not have to always be marketing and selling yourself. Maybe I'm just fooling myself.

As a pure technologist you'll never be Steve Jobs, at best, if you're exceedingly lucky, you might manage to be Steve Wozniak. However, Steve Wozniak's fortune and minor celebrity status owes a great deal to Steve Jobs, whos success in marketing and selling himself was so great that it earned the name Reality Distortion Field. If "make it big" just means a giant pile of money, there are plenty of millionaire pure tec…

I'm not after recognition or household name recognition--quite the opposite. I'm just a normal, unremarkable technologist who's getting old and wondering whether I should have spend the last 20 years blogging and self-promoting rather than quietly polishing my skills. It feels very uncomfortable that "Becoming a tech celebrity" has emerged as a legitimate path to advancing in one's career.

EDIT: Not saying these celebrities don't also earn their keep through their skills. It's just disappointing how much of a factor self-promotion is.

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