How long until a Autopilot accident is reported and the potential public backlash?

[meltoots]

Sorry about the downer post! But this crossed my mind and wanted to ask the forum.
First let me say, I am like a kid waiting for Christmas with the v7 AP software upgrade.
I literally can't wait.
That said...
I was wondering what the forum's thoughts are this:
1. When do you think we will see an Autopilot accident post?
2. Do we think it will be legit? Or a ICE fake, or click bait by some nefarious website? Or worse, video of an obvious flaw...
3. If there are some apparent legit claims, do you think Tesla could survive the PR nightmare?
Again sorry for the kinda negative post, but I would like to hear some thoughts from ya'll.

 

[notAmeenPerson]

I can see it now. The biggest media firestorm will be someone using this for who knows what while using AP.
(Look at the customer images and reviews)

 

[Luclyluciano]

Driver is responsible for operation of the car. Not TACC or AP. End of thread.

 

[GregTexas]

There is no avoiding the eventuality of an accident involving a Tesla using AP. I don't think you can ignore statistics. I think the occurrences will be rare.

 

[AlanSqB]

I'm going to place my bet for 2h17m after 7.0 release. Will be captured in a vertically oriented video where the words "hey y'all, watch this" can be heard off camera shortly before the screaming begins.

 

[postpast]

I really haven't seen the mass media report on Auto Pilot at all. I don't see much interest in the media unless a "great" video appears.

 

[AWDtsla]

Fortunately, accidents are much less dramatic than car fires.

 

[green1]

Well, several people have already crashed their cars and blamed TACC, and the media hasn't picked it up.
Many other cars on the road today have the same functionality as autopilot, I'm sure a few of them have crashed, and the media hasn't picked it up.

So my guess is that someone will do something stupid and blame Tesla very shortly, but that the media won't bother with it because it's no different than either of the above.

 

[CHG-ON]

Other cars have this tech: Mercedes, BMW, Volvo, Ford, etc. What have they experienced? Nothing that I have read as of yet. Though I can certainly see how the entrenched oil will pick on us because we eschew that ancient fuel. I fully expect some sort of witch hunt and I hope that Tesla has taken that into account. Just yesterday I saw a video review of a Mercedes E350 blow right through the dummy barrier, destroying it. None of this tech is infallible.

 

[supratachophobia]

78hrs

 

[BriansTesla]

This is very worrying to me considering that Google, the company with by far the greatest experience with self driving had this to say:

It's dangerous to require humans to snap to attention and take control at a moments notice so we stopped developing cars that put humans on call

 

[green1]

This is very worrying to me considering that Google, the company with by far the greatest experience with self driving had this to say:

Google, the company with a vested interest in doing it their way, Hardly an independent source.

The alternative is we avoid any driver assistance or autopilot tech for the foreseeable future. Google's version relies on 100% or nothing, and we're at least a decade away from that, we can do 90% now, probably 99% soon, but 100% is a very very very long way away.
I'd rather the increase in safety that driver assistance tech has statistically shown than to be dragged back to the past.

 

[Kbra]

I can see it now. The biggest media firestorm will be someone using this for who knows what while using AP.
(Look at the customer images and reviews)

Using that would make the car unable to turn. I highly doubt the steering wheel free spins while in autopilot. So its basically not logical or possible.

 

[Spidy]

Other cars have this tech: Mercedes, BMW, Volvo, Ford, etc. What have they experienced? Nothing that I have read as of yet. Though I can certainly see how the entrenched oil will pick on us because we eschew that ancient fuel. I fully expect some sort of witch hunt and I hope that Tesla has taken that into account. Just yesterday I saw a video review of a Mercedes E350 blow right through the dummy barrier, destroying it. None of this tech is infallible.

The big difference is that those usually have some kind of nagging forcing you to stay engaged. The real question is what if someone understands Autopilot as actual autonomous driving and then sues Tesla. Or does not know the lane changing features requires you to still check the mirrors.

 

[Matias]

I can see it now. The biggest media firestorm will be someone using this for who knows what while using AP.
(Look at the customer images and reviews)

I prefer this

http://www.amazon.com/Zone-Tech-Lap...u166efrL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR159,160_

 

[schonelucht]

Driver is responsible for operation of the car. Not TACC or AP. End of thread.

Why? This strikes me as something that is very specific to each jurisdiction. Is Tesla able to refuse liability everywhere?

Volvo has indicated that they will take full responsibility for all accidents with their auto driving functionality. A more interesting question to me he is how long will Tesla be able to refuse claims either because the market place or legislation forces their hand.

 

[aronth5]

Driver is responsible for operation of the car. Not TACC or AP. End of thread.

Why? This strikes me as something that is very specific to each jurisdiction. Is Tesla able to refuse liability everywhere?

Volvo has indicated that they will take full responsibility for all accidents with their auto driving functionality. A more interesting question to me he is how long will Tesla be able to refuse claims either because the market place or legislation forces their hand.

Luclyluciano you may want to consider this article.
Volvo: We will be responsible for accidents caused by our driverless cars
"Speaking to the BBC, Samuelsson said: "Volvo wants to remove the uncertainty of who would be responsible in the event of a crash. At the moment it could be the manufacturer of the technology, the driver, a maker of a component in a car."
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/volvo-we-will-be-responsible-accidents-caused-by-our-driverless-cars-1523260

 

[sandpiper]

This is very worrying to me considering that Google, the company with by far the greatest experience with self driving had this to say:

It's going to be interesting for sure. I'm sure that Tesla has all sorts of monitoring software in the vehicle that will measure and record everything that's happening during the autopilot/driver interaction. And if our behavior demands it, they'll modify the software to be more aggressive about nagging the driver.

But, no matter what, the law of big numbers definitely dictates that at some point, somebody will doze off on a late night drive and something bad will happen. The idea that the vehicle would be capable of smoothly pulling over in all circumstances seems overly optimistic.

I know I plan on doing some experimenting around what happens when I don't take over as commanded. I want to know the limits of the software and to what degree I can trust it. I suspect that, at least for the foreseeable future, the software is going to demand a fair bit of driver attention; perhaps even more than with manual steering.

 

[wdolson]

I suspect people will be very wary of driverless cars for some time to come. It's likely that driverless cars will be safer overall than human driven cars, but most people just aren't comfortable with computers taking over and running the show. Commercial airliners have been able to fly themselves for almost two decades now. For the most part pilots program the auto pilot then sit back and watch it fly the plane. Most airliner crashes in the last two decades have been due to either pilot error or deliberate action by humans. The computers can handle most situations faster and better than humans can, but regulations all over the world still require two pilots and a large number of passengers would not fly in a plane without a pilot.

Humans do have the ability to improvise more than computers do. A computer can only handle situations it's been programmed to handle. If done right, that covers 99.9% of all situations, but the people are there for the 0.1% the software designers didn't think of.

Google's self driving cars may be legalized in some jurisdictions, but there will be many where they won't be legal for some time to come. Most car companies, Tesla included are sort of back dooring auto driving cars by offering it as a type of driver assist. This is probably the wisest approach to get it legal in all jurisdictions. The things the driver assist features are doing are legal in most if not all jurisdictions and law makers would have to take action to ban them.

Google's approach may be illegal in a lot of jurisdictions and does open up some gray areas in the law. One that has the lawyers wondering is if a car with no driver controls causes an accident, who's at fault? The person in the driverless car couldn't have stopped it if they wanted to. Volvo is trying to get ahead of that. They are probably pretty confident of their software to make that guarantee. It will likely fall back on the manufacturer anyway.

When a car with a driver and driver assist causes an accident, you can still blame the driver for not taking control or not using the driver assist features properly.

Then Elon Musk is concerned about the AI apocalypse with AIs deciding humans shouldn't be here. Personally I'm not too worried about that scenario coming about, but it has been a common theme in Science Fiction for over 50 years.

 

[GregTexas]

Volvo is trying to get ahead of that. They are probably pretty confident of their software to make that guarantee.

Their guarantee doesn't kick in until 2020. I think Tesla will always stay ahead of Volvo in AP technology.