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Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

arstechnica.com

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Re: Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

#321

Post by xethos »

rich_sasha wrote: post #318
jmb99 wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He finally found a safe spot and successfully pitted the car to a stop. No such thing as a safe spot to PIT someone, ever, let alone while they're asleep at the wheel. This is a great example of why people hate all cops, anyone with two brain cells to rub together would get in front of the car and gradually slow to a stop.

It's a bit grim, but equally what else are you supposed to do? This car will definitely crash into something pretty soon.

I agree with the recommendation that you yourself replied to: move in front of the vehicle, and gradually slow to a stop, with lights and sirens optional but recommended

I am thrown by the question of "What else should have been done" though, after grandparent made an explicit recommendation

Re: Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

#322

Post by closeparen »

grep_name wrote: post #309
Waterluvian wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a 2020 Forester and I've come to describing it as "I no-longer drive on the highway, I manage the car." Sometimes I'll get nervous and take over. But even in stop-and-go traffic, it has behaved perfectly. My only complaint is that there's an over-eager PID loop with lane keeping. If I want to pass a transport truck and want to kind of edge to the left of my lane when doing so, it will keep trying to compensate…

> I have a 2020 Forester and I've come to describing it as "I no-longer drive on the highway, I manage the car." Sometimes I'll get nervous and take over. But even in stop-and-go traffic, it has behaved perfectly. I drive an old beater from 2001, but... I really don't think I understand why people want these in-between not-quite-autopilot features? To me it's like, it would be one thing if you could completely turn y…

I prefer to steer, but radar cruise control takes a lot of the frustration out of minor speed fluctuations in front of me on the highway. I don’t feel as much need to pass all the time.

Re: Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

#323

Post by beAbU »

jmb99 wrote: post #190
burningChrome wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was watching OPLive last week. Every week they have a segment called "Triple Play" where they have law enforcement send them videos of crazy chases and other interesting experiences. This last week they had a guy who had completely passed out in his car and was fast asleep at the wheel. A state trooper pulled up alongside it and could see the guy slumped over his wheel. Apparently the car was essentially weaving back…

> He finally found a safe spot and successfully pitted the car to a stop. No such thing as a safe spot to PIT someone, ever, let alone while they're asleep at the wheel. This is a great example of why people hate all cops, anyone with two brain cells to rub together would get in front of the car and gradually slow to a stop.

Oof, imagine an airbag going off while slumped over the wheel!

Re: Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

#324

Post by tarsinge »

buggy6257 wrote: post #118
Someone1234 wrote: post #96

A new Tesla, without subscription, now has worse Steering Assist than a $22K Toyota Corolla. Back when Autopilot launched, in consumer cars, it was pretty unique. But the market has moved on significantly, and basic Steering Assist/Full-Speed-Range Automatic Cruise Control, are pretty universal features today.

My 5 year old Subaru has been able to lane keep and auto follow to the point that a 2h drive on the freeway is me tapping the wheel every ten seconds to keep it enabled while I watch for idiots. It has been able to do this since I bought it, and I haven’t paid a dime extra. Car cost 30k.

I did a road trip across the US 7 years ago and I barely touched the pedals and the wheel on highway drive, it was a 2018 Subaru Outback.

Re: Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

#325

Post by hdjdndbdj »

grep_name wrote: post #309
Waterluvian wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a 2020 Forester and I've come to describing it as "I no-longer drive on the highway, I manage the car." Sometimes I'll get nervous and take over. But even in stop-and-go traffic, it has behaved perfectly. My only complaint is that there's an over-eager PID loop with lane keeping. If I want to pass a transport truck and want to kind of edge to the left of my lane when doing so, it will keep trying to compensate…

> I have a 2020 Forester and I've come to describing it as "I no-longer drive on the highway, I manage the car." Sometimes I'll get nervous and take over. But even in stop-and-go traffic, it has behaved perfectly. I drive an old beater from 2001, but... I really don't think I understand why people want these in-between not-quite-autopilot features? To me it's like, it would be one thing if you could completely turn y…

The cognitive load is greatly reduced when using these features. Honestly, adaptive cruise control in the city is a godsend. Not having to deal with watching speed . start and stop traffic is also automated for me. Driving on a highway is also great .. You can drive much further without needing a break.

Re: Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

#326

Post by SirMaster »

BeetleB wrote: post #204
wing-_-nuts wrote: post #22

These sort of shenanigans for even basic lanekeeping makes a very strong case for more open source solutions like comma

Comma's days are numbered. Newer cars are encrypting the bus, so that HW like comma can't get the data it needs.

As a company yeah they probably won't survive in the long term. But since the software is open source forks like SunnyPilot should remain updated for existing owners and such. People will likely even make DIY comma hardware devices too if the company stops selling them.

Although even if the devices stop getting updates, that makes them on par with most built in car software and lane assist stuff which never gets updated in the car's life anyway.

Re: Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

#327

Post by nxtfari »

BeetleB wrote: post #186
nxtfari wrote: post #18

My guess is Tesla is desperately in need of Q1 revenue and they want people to scarcity buy FSD lifetime @ $8K. Otherwise the strategy doesn’t make any sense. They’re saying FSD and basic Autopilot will go behind subscription and that subscription prices are expected to go up. Basically laying out that they’re planning to lock you into a subscription and then price gouge. It’s so transparent that I think the point is…

> Otherwise the strategy doesn’t make any sense. The price is high, but it's not unique to Tesla. Ford has Blue Cruise, which is about $500/year. People can, however, opt for openpilot/comma ( https://comma.ai/openpilot ), which random Youtubers tested and say it's about as good as Tesla's FSD, but has a simple one time fee of $1K But whether you want to trust open source is up to you.

I’m a fan of what Comma is working on, but to say it’s about as good as FSD (!!) would be a big misunderstanding of both products. Comma is L2 assist: basically in a lane it will keep the lane, and if a car stops ahead it will stop. It’s equivalent to Tesla standard Autopilot, but FSD is an L3 bordering on L4 system. It navigates traffic lights, intersections, indicating, merging, etc none of which Comma can do. Still good product though.

Re: Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

#328

Post by lern_too_spel »

Mawr wrote: post #276
ajross wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well... yeah, but the Tesla will do that on an empty road, then approach a slow car from behind and make a lane change decision to pass, then take your next exit and continue on through city streets, through all sorts of traffic conditions, to your destination. And it will monitor your attention with eye tracking instead of making you mess with the wheel. It's absolutely true that the rest of the industry is rolling…

> and frankly at parity with Waymo in the autonomy space. Waymos have been driving around autonomously for years; meanwhile Tesla taxis have a human in the car ready to activate a kill switch at all times. Therefore, your statement is objectively false. EDIT: Oops, this isn't quite correct anymore — as of two days ago, in a geofenced area of Austin, Tesla has moved the safety person to a follower car: https://xcancel…

It's a stunt. If they believed it worked, they wouldn't need somebody dedicated to monitoring it for the entire time it's on the road. Having nobody in the car looks cool, but there is nothing different about the car's self driving capability, and the economics are even worse than having the safety driver in the car.

Re: Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

#329

Post by flowerthoughts »

grep_name wrote: post #309
Waterluvian wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a 2020 Forester and I've come to describing it as "I no-longer drive on the highway, I manage the car." Sometimes I'll get nervous and take over. But even in stop-and-go traffic, it has behaved perfectly. My only complaint is that there's an over-eager PID loop with lane keeping. If I want to pass a transport truck and want to kind of edge to the left of my lane when doing so, it will keep trying to compensate…

> I have a 2020 Forester and I've come to describing it as "I no-longer drive on the highway, I manage the car." Sometimes I'll get nervous and take over. But even in stop-and-go traffic, it has behaved perfectly. I drive an old beater from 2001, but... I really don't think I understand why people want these in-between not-quite-autopilot features? To me it's like, it would be one thing if you could completely turn y…

As a technologist, I like lane-keep assist because it feels fundamentally more right that my car by default follows the road than keeps going with the turn radius I had previously input.

Cruise control with minimum distance helps me keep a sound distance even as other cars keep packing up and reducing distances on a busy highway. My previous car (Mercedes) was great at detecting if a new car coming in front of me was accelerating, if so it didn't adjust the distance as aggressively. Much better behavior than my current Kia.

Auto-break features are sweet as they react really fast. If that can avoid deploying an airbag in my face, I'm all for it.

I agree it's a lot like managing, with six buttons just to do the above, but from a bottom-up approach, each feature has value in its own right.

> For me, if I'm already driving somewhere, and have to pay enough attention to know if an emergency is about to happen, I might as well just do the driving.

Where do you draw the line? Would you prefer not having a steering and brake servo? Would you prefer sticking out your arms instead of having flashing lights? Would you prefer feeling every bump in the road to having suspension?

To me these systems just feel like natural evolution of the car concept, something that's been going on for 120 years. What Tesla failed at was putting their heads in the clouds and hoping something awesome would eventually pop out the other end. While the established car makers did incremental improvements.

Re: Tesla kills Autopilot, locks lane-keeping behind $99/month fee

#330

Post by dingaling »

Someone1234 wrote: post #96

A new Tesla, without subscription, now has worse Steering Assist than a $22K Toyota Corolla. Back when Autopilot launched, in consumer cars, it was pretty unique. But the market has moved on significantly, and basic Steering Assist/Full-Speed-Range Automatic Cruise Control, are pretty universal features today.

Steering Assistance, please

Let's not slaughter the language for the sake of a few letters.

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