Yes, you are getting the wrong impression. I use AP daily and I do not experience any of the issues you mention. I used to experience some phantom braking some months ago but not anymore, auto park works perfectly every time, lane centering used to be good but sometimes a bit wobbly especially when the lane widens, now it is essentially perfect and AP has not steered me into stationary objects. In fact, on the roads that I drive daily, AP is good enough to be hands free (of course I still pay attention). There are just a couple roads that AP is not really designed for yet where AP will sometimes freak out and ask me to take over.
NOA has been quite excellent too. On a long trip, it made the drive very convenient. It had some issues on cloverfield ramps and busy traffic but on open highways, it was wonderful.
Now I realize my experience is different from others. But that is my true experience on 2019.24.4.
Based on my personal experience, I am optimistic about FSD. After all, the current AP is not even the latest AP3 NN yet. Once we get the AP3 NN and the new features like "City NOA" and "Traffic Light Detection", I suspect we will have something really good, maybe not quite full autonomous yet but certainly something that with further validation could eventually get there.