That is good to hear. I found the above talk of disabling ACC or not using it in city streets worrisome. That is not the current reality of advanced ACCs on the competition. Hopefully Tesla is a match.
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That is good to hear. I found the above talk of disabling ACC or not using it in city streets worrisome. That is not the current reality of advanced ACCs on the competition. Hopefully Tesla is a match.
Andyw2100
Well-Known Member
I don't understand why you (or others--you're not the first, just the most recent, so the one I chose to quote) would suggest that taking delivery from Tesla would be a factor in this. Sure, those taking delivery from Tesla now --may-- get a complete and thorough explanation of TACC from their delivery specialist, but what about all of us who are just getting firmware updates, and experiencing TACC for the first time that way? Your argument comes dangerously close to suggesting that because we're not being educated in person, by a Tesla employee, we would have an excuse for not being properly informed about how to properly operate our cars. I'm writing to quash that argument.
Not to mention the argument is silly. People buy used cars all the time from private individuals even. The expectation that one would need a trained introduction to the car from Tesla is silly... or are some suggesting Tesla cars are that exceptionally hard to operate?
The "unsupported market" is mostly a red-herring in this case. It might matter jurisdiction-wise if it came to that and Tesla would argue their car can't be driven outside of a certain area (would they really argue that?), and might cause special issues in getting the car repaired (heck, there are *supported* markets in Europe with limited or no service network yet), but mostly it has nothing to do with this. Some people just grasp at that straw because it somehow allows ignoring everything else. Not saying ecarfan is doing that, but you get the point reading the wider thread.
Some of the "you shouldn't have bought a Tesla like that, your fault" arguments in this thread are just silly. Unfortunately that comes with the territory here. The owner is always the first to be blamed or at least suspected, never Tesla, in the minds of some.
Frankly, I'm not blaming Tesla in this case either, but definitely I'm not blaming an enthusiastic Tesla owner in an "unsupported market" as the reason (the owner may well be responsible for the driving, of course but nothing to do with their market area). Instead of silly talk about "unsupported markets" I think we should root for these brave souls who advance and advocate out favorite brand in new territories, where the ownership experience is bound to be a lot harder than in, say, California.
When the very first post asks, "should I plan on suing Tesla?" I think I can see the reasoning for those responses.
I am suggesting that in this case it may have been a contributing factor to the accident, for the reasons I posted. I am not saying it is the primary cause of the accident. Note that I was very clear that the driver was at fault, and that a thorough reading of the owner's manual before driving the car is important. Obviously.
Andyw2100
Well-Known Member
This is what you wrote:
My point is that you (and others) who are pointing to this as a factor in an accident are essentially coming awfully close to making the argument (or helping others who would like to make it) against firmware updates adding features like TACC.
You're saying that not being informed, in person, by a Tesla rep, about a new safety feature, was a contributing factor to an accident when tens of thousands of owners are receiving the same update over the air, and are also not going to be informed about the feature in person, by a Tesla rep. It would be easy for those already leaning that way to then make the argument against allowing any sort of updates that could wind up causing accidents if the feature can't be explained in person by a Tesla rep.
Do you see my point?
Your argument starts things down a slippery slope that personally I don't want Tesla anywhere close to.
I can't. Well, I can because I can see many people identify strongly with Tesla instead of other Tesla owners (hence the defensive attitude), but I can't agree with it. Why should we be the defenders of Tesla? Why not just focus on offering peer support (including, if need be, possibly discussing where legal action might have merits or not)? This is, as I understand it, a Tesla owner's/user's forum after all?
Especially when in this case the OP was quite quick to point out legal action was not their main concern or question and even admitted it would not be a good start - the banter about the lawsuit, unsupported market, spoiled brat still continued for many pages. Some of the stuff thrown at them seems pretty over the top. And this was in response to a non-native English speaker apparently, give the guy(s) some slack. As is often the case on TMC, people with an issue with Tesla get a pretty rude or at least third-degree questioning response instead of peer support. I'd prefer the other way around. I point it out in hopes of changing the behavior, before we alienate great Tesla supporters. Every single one of us can affect that change by offering support and disagreeing vocally with such excesses, before some pile on owners with issues.
I know you responded to this, but for the sake of others here is a quote from the OP mid-way the thread, quite reasonable in my opinion - again, he is a non-native speaker - and I agree with him absolutely this happened in this thread and this has happened on TMC many, many times - this poster was not a troll, but got treated as such by several posters and that's sad. Some people are afraid of hurting Tesla the company's feelings more than they are of hurting a fellow posters.
emir-t said:
In my opinion defenders of the faith are hurting the cause more than they are helping it.
kuttakamina
Member
While I agree with you generally speaking .. in this case I'm with the "community".
When someone starts the discussion with "sue", you can't blame the reaction.
People think it is cool to throw the word "sue" around the place, like it will give more weight to their point of view.
The reality is, people are not sue happy, we are sue scared. Winning a lawsuit is like winning an earthquake, nobody wins.
When you start with threats, it has the exact opposite effect. If you're gonna sue, then damn well sue. Don't threaten, don't discuss on forums, just consult a lawyer and damned well sue.
While I feel truly sorry for the person's accident and loss, But you don't start a discussion with threats and expect a constructive outcome!
As a contrast where Tesla WAS sued, and the community was WRONG, yet the case was strong is this -
Tesla settles lemon lawsuit, agrees to pay Franklin man $127,000
Instead of approaching the forums full of fanboys, the individual approached a lawyer, the local laws were in his favor.
Tesla was neither on high ground, nor wanted the negative publicity - and the individual got a favorable out of court settlement.
Yet - I am sure - when you account for lawyer fees, the individual probably was in loss.
So why do I overall agree with you about your defenders of faith comment?
Because, one thing fanboys continue to ignore, Tesla has reliability issues.
And the only solution Tesla has to that is good customer service.
Good customer service is like sticking fingers in the dam - you should build a decent dam.
That is plugging the gap, but that is not a long term solution.
For any company, customer service is a cost - future Tesla's will be cheaper if they didn't have to be bothered by the ever increasing inertia of maintaining the current fleet of cars on the road.
No way can Tesla keep up that good customer service as the # of cars increase on the road.
But lets not argue with fanboys, they bite!!
The other community with equally bad fanboys is Apple.
Thank you for a fair post.
I guess my point is, we really should stop reading each other like the devil reads the bible - even amongst native English speakers, but especially when a non-native speaker makes a first comment like that. Clearly there was no malicious intent, it became apparent very fast in the responses from the OP, yet the over-the-top comments continued. Words also have different meanings in different places of the world and there is always the chance of something getting lost in translation - and text is a hard medium even in native language. Giving people at the very least the benefit of the doubt until they clarify themselves, that doesn't seem like too much to ask in my books.
If we as a community weren't so suspicious and so quick to judge, we would be able to offer each other better peer support even in times of trouble.
I think we make a grave mistake if we are so defensive of Tesla that anyone even mentioning legal action gets pummeled. Luckily there are also many voices of reason in this thread, so my comment is aimed at what I view excesses, not everyone of course.
ok...is it just me or am I just a skeptic? Model S owners have posted numerous pics of their cars involved in accidents, and in all cases the other cars were damaged beyond repair. The picture of the OPs Model S and the non-existent damage to the rear of the Ford Focus that he ostensibly hit does not compute.
islandbayy
Active Member
I was trying to stay out of this discussion, but you hit the nail on the head! This was my very first thought, what the heck did Ford put in that Focus to survive a model S hit!
Please. People posted often they were sorry to hear about the accident but that doesn't take the fault away from the driver. No one said he jumped in the back seat but the feature requires you to actively be paying attention. He thought incorrectly the car would stop for him and reacted too slowly. Pretty simple.
I'm a little conflicted about this topic.
While Tesla warns against using TACC in certain scenarios, and it seems to be the forum consensus that OP used TACC in an inappropriate situation, Tesla muddied the waters by putting so much emphasis on Autopilot which doesn't even exist yet. I think Tesla is inadvertently creating expectations in the minds of customers with all of the Autopilot talk. Judging by the posts at TM Forums, many owners don't even know that Autopilot is not yet released. Lots of owners think it's already there.
While I'm not trying to defend those who don't read manuals or make assumptions, it doesn't seem unreasonable at all for someone to believe that TACC will slow down and/or stop when coming up on a stationary vehicle or other object. Clearly the TACC doesn't work in this manner, and as owners we should be familiar with the limitations of our car's safety systems. However, I wouldn't necessarily be so quick to put this on the driver given the claims that Tesla and Musk have been making and the sorts of articles that are being written. For some, this can be a legitimate point of confusion.
I have no horse in this race - I have a pre-Autopilot car - but it seems there are far too many "grey areas" with this new technology when compared to the plain old standard cruise control. With that older technology, there is only one expectation: the car will maintain it's speed until it is disengaged or it crashes into something. That expectation informs the driver's behavior. Pretty simple. My fear is that TACC, and eventually Autopilot when it is released, are creating greater expectations than the technology can satisfy. There are nuances to this new technology that did not exist with the previous, much simpler cruise control.
It seems like there may be a number of caveats to this technology and scenarios that this technology cannot handle. Should we expect the average driver to understand all of the "fine print" and exclusions? We live in a world where we expect our products and technologies to "just work". That means a lot of different things to different people, and that's a little frightening to me. I would hazard to guess that many who use TACC probably didn't read the release notes.
Imagine if a situation like this escalated into a jury trial. Do you think the jury will side with Tesla, who will cite a number of exclusions in the manual, or with a driver who expected the car would stop itself based upon its other behaviors? Think about how an average person would look at this. Using disclaimers as a defense is not a position of strength, especially when lives are at stake.
While Tesla warns against using TACC in certain scenarios, and it seems to be the forum consensus that OP used TACC in an inappropriate situation, Tesla muddied the waters by putting so much emphasis on Autopilot which doesn't even exist yet. I think Tesla is inadvertently creating expectations in the minds of customers with all of the Autopilot talk. Judging by the posts at TM Forums, many owners don't even know that Autopilot is not yet released. Lots of owners think it's already there.
While I'm not trying to defend those who don't read manuals or make assumptions, it doesn't seem unreasonable at all for someone to believe that TACC will slow down and/or stop when coming up on a stationary vehicle or other object. Clearly the TACC doesn't work in this manner, and as owners we should be familiar with the limitations of our car's safety systems. However, I wouldn't necessarily be so quick to put this on the driver given the claims that Tesla and Musk have been making and the sorts of articles that are being written. For some, this can be a legitimate point of confusion.
I have no horse in this race - I have a pre-Autopilot car - but it seems there are far too many "grey areas" with this new technology when compared to the plain old standard cruise control. With that older technology, there is only one expectation: the car will maintain it's speed until it is disengaged or it crashes into something. That expectation informs the driver's behavior. Pretty simple. My fear is that TACC, and eventually Autopilot when it is released, are creating greater expectations than the technology can satisfy. There are nuances to this new technology that did not exist with the previous, much simpler cruise control.
It seems like there may be a number of caveats to this technology and scenarios that this technology cannot handle. Should we expect the average driver to understand all of the "fine print" and exclusions? We live in a world where we expect our products and technologies to "just work". That means a lot of different things to different people, and that's a little frightening to me. I would hazard to guess that many who use TACC probably didn't read the release notes.
Imagine if a situation like this escalated into a jury trial. Do you think the jury will side with Tesla, who will cite a number of exclusions in the manual, or with a driver who expected the car would stop itself based upon its other behaviors? Think about how an average person would look at this. Using disclaimers as a defense is not a position of strength, especially when lives are at stake.
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stopcrazypp
Well-Known Member
Couple things at play here. Low post count and the first post in a thread with only the "sue" part in bold (something he chose to emphasize himself) raises alarm bells. This forum is no stranger to people posting who claim to be owners but turn out not to be (and in this case the person posting was not the owner, although at least a friend posting on the owner's behalf). So paranoid levels are quite high here. But even given that, at the start of the thread there was not a lot of doubt about his identity, only a lot of talk about suing (which you can't logically blame people for focusing on, given the OP decided to highlight that).
And in general, unless it pertains to an issue others have experience themselves, it's harder for people to have sympathy. A lot of people here have the reasonable position that it's the owner's responsibility to stay alert even with ACC activated (something they adhere to themselves), a position supported by manuals of not only the Tesla, but pretty much all manufacturers. In the end the OP agreed to this too, so I don't really see the issue here of being "defensive" in this thread. Sure, we may suggest ways for the technology to improve (and it should), but that is a separate issue from the owner's responsibility.
JohnSnowNW
Active Member
If someone ignores instruction, and instead uses a product as though it is what Tesla discusses as a future ability, then I don't really understand how you could say Tesla is doing anything inappropriately.
Specifically in this instance, the OP/Driver was clearly ignorant of the abilities of TACC. I realize that not everyone would be reasonable enough to read the literature on a feature that if used improperly could be harmful, but that's not the fault of Tesla. Especially in an instance where they weren't given the opportunity to inform the OP/Driver at delivery.
Agreed.
Well, I think the jury would find the driver to have the ultimate responsibility.
but I do think most Americans would feel that the driver's expectation that the car would stop was not completely unreasonable.
and of course owners think that autopilot is here: the website details autopilot's features in the present tense, not the future tense. Sure there's a sentence about how "features are progressively added over time with software updates", but if autopilot isn't released, why not explicitly say that? The line about the current software "adding automatic emergency braking and blind spot warning" says very little about what has not been added (nearly everything described by "autopilot").
To me, the key thing is to have consumer expectations match what's being delivered. You can't always do that, but I think this is a situation where Tesla is unnecessarily setting expectations of their car's traffic awareness higher than the car's actual abilities.
Andyw2100
Well-Known Member
I think this is a great point.
I had been reading the forums quite a bit before placing the order for my P85D, but to be honest, if I'm remembering the chronology correctly, it was actually after ordering that I realized my P85D wouldn't have the autopilot (lane-keeping) functionality at delivery. (If it wasn't after ordering, it was at least late in the process. I remember being surprised that I had not realized it before, and annoyed at myself for having missed it.) So it doesn't surprise me at all that there are others out there who aren't reading the forums and aren't making an extra effort to educate themselves about their cars that would still be confused about these features.
No thanks, nanny state.
This I can agree with.
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I don't see why you think it's reasonable to reach the underlined conclusion given the bolded admission.
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This needs to be in an FAQ somewhere on the forum before Gen3 comes out.
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This is a great argument for keeping every technology product out of the hands of the consumer. No thanks, nanny state.
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I want this of almost every technology. I expect this of none of them. I guess I'm in the minority.
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