I agree completely with
@green1 on this issue, and I applaud him for holding out on updating for so long.
First, Tesla was quite careless with the autopilot restrictions. They should never have released a version that did not impose speed restrictions if they were ever going to do so in the future. It's left a pretty bad taste in my mouth knowing that the details of a paid feature can be altered for the worse at Tesla's whim.
As far as updates go, I think the process Tesla has implemented only has a couple of redeeming qualities: It exists, and the user can choose whether or not to install the update and when. Unfortunately, the lack of any transparency whatsoever regarding the update process kind of makes it less appealing. Before installing, the user doesn't even know what version the software will be updated to, let alone what's changed in that new version. This is an absolutely absurd practice. No one who cares at all about security of their devices should ever install something on their device without first at least knowing what it was and having a minimal understanding of what it will change. This is an entirely unacceptable practice on Tesla's part, and it's one that I doubt will change because so many people will just happily hit that update button without a care in the world. Even then, after updating for over an hour at times, the user still wont even have a clue what's actually been changed. I have no issue with people choosing to trust Tesla to put whatever into updates... but I'm not one of those people.
Personally, due to the neutering of autopilot in 7.1, I held out on 7.0 for a while and gave the word to my service center that they were no longer allowed to update my firmware under any circumstances without my express permission... a directive which they did abide by. Eventually, as many here are aware, I finally was able to hack out the restrictions on my own car. (No, please do not waste your time asking me to do this on other vehicles. I will not.) I do my updates now after going through them to see what changes are being made first. I don't expect this solution to last forever, either, so at some point I may start rejecting updates again.
For example, not far from my home there is a 2 lane undivided 55 MPH road which always has minimal traffic. However, 75% of the time the car interprets the speed limit at 5 MPH, even though the 55 MPH sign is clearly visible shortly after turning on to the road. It takes several miles of driving before the car catches the correct limit. In the mean time, the autopilot restrictions would normally make autopilot useless. This is just one example. The speed limit recognition leaves much to be desired. As another example, there is a highway nearby that is 2-lanes in some areas, 4 lanes in others, sometimes divided, sometimes not. Speed limit varies between 45 MPH and 65 MPH. Flow of traffic is generally around 8-12 MPH over the speed limit. Autopilot with the 5 MPH restriction makes it unusable on this road, which I occasionally travel ~40+ miles on. In my opinion, if I were to utilize restricted autopilot on this road I would be creating an unsafe situation for myself and for other drivers as the drivers behind me get frustrated and make dangerous passing maneuvers to get around me... a situation what wouldn't exist in v7.0.
I'm not against safety restrictions on autopilot. I do have an issue with the speed restriction for quite a few reasons, though. It gets it wrong quite a bit of the time, making the feature more of a crap shoot than a useful feature. I also have an issue with the broad lock down in general with no way the human who's supposed to be babysitting autopilot to actually override it in this instance. Nope, they assume the computer knows best here, when clearly it doesn't. Maybe out in California where Tesla personally tests these things it works great. But most places I've been it would be more of a hindrance. I suppose my biggest issue is that this particular restriction just makes so little sense. Definitely a knee jerk reaction to some early incidents where people were doing stupid things at higher speeds than reasonable. When driving with the flow of traffic at a reasonable speed there's no real difference in autopilot's performance be it at 60 or 65 MPH in a 55 MPH zone. It works as expected and has the same issues at +5 MPH as it does at +10 MPH. So really, Tesla, at a minimum put in a damn user override for this. You want people to use autopilot and increase overall safety? Let people actually use it.
Anyway,
@green1, it seems that Tesla isn't going to change their position on these issues. They've no reason too. The responses from many people in this very thread provide proof they have no real incentive to change anything because still, right or wrong, people will simply defend Tesla's actions to the death.... which is pretty sad. I promise, regardless of what many want to believe, Tesla is fallible, just like every other company.... perhaps even more so at times.
