What would happen if Tesla renamed AP & FSD?

[Ruffles]

I'm really sick of the media claiming that someone COULD be confused by the name of these features. In my experience, it simple doesn't happen. Self-driving tech is too new to people and their response to experiencing it the first time is to hover their hands 1" from the steering wheel yelling OMG! OMG! THIS IS SO COOL! while paying hyper attention to everything it does. They don't try to hop in the back seat to take a nap because my car has a feature called "Full Self Driving" and Elon said it in a tweet.

That said, what do you think would really happen if Tesla changed the names of the features? Part of me wants him to add a NOT to the name just to be silly about it (kind of like his Not a Flame Thrower). What if they changed it to Tesla Cruise or Tesla Asist or something. How big of an affect would that have?

My thoughts are it wouldn't stop people being critical of them so no benefit there. Haters are going to hate. Would it get any gov agencies off their back like the CA DMV? Marketwise, there would probably be a drop as people would interpret it as Tesla is giving up on the technology and the stock price would take a hit but I don't think it would be too much. I actually don't think it would affect any customers or sales at all. The only possible benefit I can see would be getting regulatory agencies off their back but I don't know if they will actually relent no matter what it's called. I'm curious what the rest of you think. Is changing the name admitting defeat? Would it get rid of noise and help them in the long run?

 

[azred]

I think a renaming was all that was standing in the way of Elon’s promised 2017 coast to coast trip on FSD.

 

[nvx1977]

I'm really sick of the media claiming that someone COULD be confused by the name of these features.

This has been the case for years. The reason it feels like it's ramped up lately is because so many of the old "Tesla is doomed" narratives have been soundly debunked. FSD and its lack of fruition is one of the few things left to criticize Tesla over. Agreed that it's just a bunch of concern-trolling.

 

[FloridaJohn]

I don't think anything bad would happen if it was renamed, just short term confusion.

I have always thought what is standard "Autopilot" today should be called "Co-Pilot" and "FSD" should be then called "AutoPilot." I think that would remove a lot of the confusion today about what they do.

 

[Tam]

...They don't try to hop in the back seat to take a nap because my car has a feature called "Full Self Driving" and Elon said it in a tweet....

Not taking a nap but Param Sharma definitely drove from the back seat and was arrested multiple times but he insisted: "Elon Musk really knows what he's doing"

Tesla owner who “drives” from back seat got arrested, then did it again
Man jailed for leaving driver seat empty says he feels safer in back seat.

Photo: TheDrive.com

 

[Daniel in SD]

Full Self Driving beta is a 100% accurate description. You can sit in the backseat when it's out of beta, not hard to understand at all.
Sure, right now it's bad enough that every sane person will monitor it like a hawk. However once it gets really good, say 1 year between errors, Tesla is going to have to do a much better job of explaining to people that just because it drove 10,000 miles without error doesn't mean it's not going to run over a pedestrian on mile 10,001.

This is a much more accurate description of the issue:
"One of the common misimpressions is that when there is, say, a serious accident on Autopilot, people – or some of the articles – for some reason think that it’s because the driver thought the car was fully autonomous and it wasn’t, and we somehow misled them into thinking it was fully autonomous. It is the opposite.

When there is a serious accident, it’s in fact almost always, maybe always, the case that it is an experienced user and the issue is more one of complacency. They get too used to it. That tends to be more of an issue. It is not a lack of understanding of what Autopilot can do. It’s actually thinking they know more about Autopilot than they do, like quite a significant understanding of it."

 

[Ruffles]

Not taking a nap but Param Sharma definitely drove from the back seat and was arrested multiple times but he insisted: "Elon Musk really knows what he's doing"

Tesla owner who “drives” from back seat got arrested, then did it again
Man jailed for leaving driver seat empty says he feels safer in back seat.

Photo: TheDrive.com

Not the same at all. He purposely knew he shouldn't do that and chose to do so for the clicks. That is willful misuse. The media keeps suggesting people are accidently misled by a confusing name which is why they claim it is dangerous. This is the part that I absolutely don't believe.

 

[qdeathstar]

Well, for starters it would have a different name.

 

[Twiglett]

Full Self Driving beta is a 100% accurate description. You can sit in the backseat when it's out of beta, not hard to understand at all.
Sure, right now it's bad enough that every sane person will monitor it like a hawk. However once it gets really good, say 1 year between errors, Tesla is going to have to do a much better job of explaining to people that just because it drove 10,000 miles without error doesn't mean it's not going to run over a pedestrian on mile 10,001.

This is a much more accurate description of the issue:
"One of the common misimpressions is that when there is, say, a serious accident on Autopilot, people – or some of the articles – for some reason think that it’s because the driver thought the car was fully autonomous and it wasn’t, and we somehow misled them into thinking it was fully autonomous. It is the opposite.

When there is a serious accident, it’s in fact almost always, maybe always, the case that it is an experienced user and the issue is more one of complacency. They get too used to it. That tends to be more of an issue. It is not a lack of understanding of what Autopilot can do. It’s actually thinking they know more about Autopilot than they do, like quite a significant understanding of it."

absolutely this.
People start to attribute superhuman status to what even AP can do, then expect to perform to their own messed up expectations.
Sadly this really means that camera monitoring and other methods will become more prevalent, not less.
Especially when you have a vocal minority bleating about (heaven forbid) having to touch the steering wheel.
Everyone needs FSD beta now so it can scare the crap out of them so they actually start to pay attention
There should be a countdown timer - every <random timer> the AP will simulate a failure that you have to correct.
That should do it

 

[DarkForest]

That said, what do you think would really happen if Tesla changed the names of the features?

The value of my car would go up!

Tesla can rename FSD on future cars, but current owners bought FSD. I don’t know that they could get away with downgrading the name of a feature to be delivered without definitely triggering some false advertising laws.

 

[Ruffles]

The value of my car would go up!

Tesla can rename FSD on future cars, but current owners bought FSD. I don’t know that they could get away with downgrading the name of a feature to be delivered without definitely triggering some false advertising laws.

I don't think the name is tied to the feature set like that. You buy the functionality. If Air conditioning was renamed Cool Breeze, nothing would change.

 

[DarkForest]

I don't think the name is tied to the feature set like that. You buy the functionality. If Air conditioning was renamed Cool Breeze, nothing would change.

If the name wasn’t tied to the feature set, people wouldn’t be complaining about the name not matching the feature set, and we wouldn’t be talking about a name change fixing exactly that problem.

So either it matters, a name change happens for future cars sold, and past cars sold didn’t get what they were supposed to.

Or it doesn’t matter, and the name doesn’t get changed.

Can’t have it both ways.

Whether it should matter is a different topic. It’s whether it does matter (legally).

 

[sleepydoc]

If you bother to read what they say Tesla is absolutely clear about what AP and 'FSD' can do. There are several problems though. First, the name 'FSD' is an absolute misnomer in terms of what the 'FSD package' can do. Up until recently, 'FSD capability' consisted of Autopilot, navigate on autopilot, summon, auto park and auto lane change. It's a nice set of features but most definitely not Capable of Full Self Driving.

The term 'Autopilot' is also problematic - if you talk to a pilot, s/he will tell you that it's a pretty good analogy. To the general public it means 'the car does everything and I don't have to worry about anything,' essentially FSD.

On top of this you add Elon's overpromises and exaggerations and more than a few people being irresponsible with their cars. The end result is a general PR nightmare for Tesla.

 

[Dewg]

It's also partly that some people have lost critical thinking skills, or never had them to begin with. They cannot dissociate a name with a feature/capability/etc. Hence the old jokes about things like Girl Scout Cookies not actually containing girl scouts. A burger called "Heart Attack Special" not actually giving the customer a heart attack when eating it. There are countless product names that are hyperbole, and it's up to the consumer to understand that. Another example that requires research is "meal replacement drinks/shakes". Many of them cannot actually replace a meal (nutritionally), and could be harmful if people skipped eating meals and just drank the drinks/shakes (in an attempt to lose weight, for example).

 

[Dan D.]

It's also partly that some people have lost critical thinking skills, or never had them to begin with. They cannot dissociate a name with a feature/capability/etc. Hence the old jokes about things like Girl Scout Cookies not actually containing girl scouts. A burger called "Heart Attack Special" not actually giving the customer a heart attack when eating it. There are countless product names that are hyperbole, and it's up to the consumer to understand that. Another example that requires research is "meal replacement drinks/shakes". Many of them cannot actually replace a meal (nutritionally), and could be harmful if people skipped eating meals and just drank the drinks/shakes (in an attempt to lose weight, for example).

It's also that some people are never going to read the manual and in general just click through/ignore any warnings. Sometimes they ignore warnings as some kind of affront to their freedom. It has to be known by the manufacturers that a percentage of people do not read the manual.

Now you can say, well ok they have done their due diligence by putting the warnings out there, from then on it's the driver's fault. Perhaps if it's a serious type of product you might say they should go the extra step of at least not downplaying the risk or exaggerating the capabilities of the product, and that extends to the name/marketing of the product.

Let's say I am given a jet-ski to try out on the ocean. I don't know squat about jet-skis. The owner says it's amazing, is fully modern, can drive super fast, is super safe, can dock itself remotely, and has Dolphin Aware Cruise Control - the marketing says you just set the speed and the jet-ski goes at a constant speed and you can relax and enjoy the ride. Ok, so I take it out, and hit a stationary Dolphin. Well, I should have known the DACC doesn't respond to a stationary Dolphin because it's in the manual. Or, they could have called it Limited Dolphin Sensing Cruise Control which kind of implies it can't do everything.

 

[Dewg]

Oh, I'm all for renaming the product. I think Tesla Driver Assistance (Autopilot) and Tesla Advanced Driver Assistance (FSD) are excellent names. However, it's still not going to stop the people you mentioned (that don't read manuals, disclaimers, warnings) from jet-skiing over the dolphin. You can't fix stupid.

 

[JHCCAZ]

Full Self Driving beta is a 100% accurate description. You can sit in the backseat when it's out of beta, not hard to understand at all.

I don't think so - FSD beta is a development version of Autosteer on City Streets. It's a supervised aka L2 driving feature, not just because it's in beta today, but because that's what it is.

A future FSD feature set might become unsupervised aka L4. I certainly hope so and I think that's the ultimate goal, but that isn't Autosteer on City Streets.

This is affirmed by Tesla in those much-discussed emails with California DMV. Some people accused Tesla of lying when they told those regulators they were working on an L2 product. I don't think they were lying, I do think that's what City Streets is, and still will be upon "wide Beta" release or an unlikely "no longer Beta" designation. There's no question that all of this will be critically important in the march towards L4 but I agree with Tesla that they shouldn't have to classify it as an L4 feature development.

Regarding the naming, yes I think that in retrospect Tesla and Elon went too far in their naming. But an alternative historical timeline, with better product names, would hardly be free of noisy Tesla detractors.

 

[Daniel in SD]

I don't think so - FSD beta is a development version of Autosteer on City Streets. It's a supervised aka L2 driving feature, not just because it's in beta today, but because that's what it is.

A future FSD feature set might become unsupervised aka L4. I certainly hope so and I think that's the ultimate goal, but that isn't Autosteer on City Streets.

This is affirmed by Tesla in those much-discussed emails with California DMV. Some people accused Tesla of lying when they told those regulators they were working on an L2 product. I don't think they were lying, I do think that's what City Streets is, and still will be upon "wide Beta" release or an unlikely "no longer Beta" designation. There's no question that all of this will be critically important in the march towards L4 but I agree with Tesla that they shouldn't have to classify it as an L4 feature development.

Regarding the naming, yes I think that in retrospect Tesla and Elon went too far in their naming. But an alternative historical timeline, with better product names, would hardly be free of noisy Tesla detractors.

Yes but my opinion is affirmed by my own eyes and the person in charge of the program. Arguing that FSD beta is not the beta of FSD seems absurd to me. If that is somehow the case then Tesla should definitely change the name and change the system to be an actual driver assist (for example eliminate maneuvers where there is no plausible way it makes them safer, Chucks ULT for example).

https://twitter.com/x/status/1450868052040507392

 

[JHCCAZ]

I don't think so - FSD beta is a development version of Autosteer on City Streets. It's a supervised aka L2 driving feature, not just because it's in beta today, but because that's what it is.

A future FSD feature set might become unsupervised aka L4. I certainly hope so and I think that's the ultimate goal, but that isn't Autosteer on City Streets.

This is affirmed by Tesla in those much-discussed emails with California DMV. Some people accused Tesla of lying when they told those regulators they were working on an L2 product. I don't think they were lying, I do think that's what City Streets is, and still will be upon "wide Beta" release or an unlikely "no longer Beta" designation. There's no question that all of this will be critically important in the march towards L4 but I agree with Tesla that they shouldn't have to classify it as an L4 feature development.

Regarding the naming, yes I think that in retrospect Tesla and Elon went too far in their naming. But an alternative historical timeline, with better product names, would hardly be free of noisy Tesla detractors.

I completely agree that the names are flawed. Not only for the obvious reason that they suggest an overpromise, but also because of the inconsistency that you are bringing up there: FSD is a package of features, some more complete than others some admittedly not done, some being a little more than a joke, and most if not all still designated beta.

So when Elon said "The day FSD goes to wide release" did he mean the entire package, including some future L4 Robotaxi feature capability? Or did he mean FSD beta going to wide release beta (to all paying customers) instead of restricted safety score beta?

In the context of his ultra value-increase argument, I would say he would have to mean the former Robotaxi type thing.

This ambiguity is par for the course for Elon. I'd like to say that it's due to an extremely clever mastery of english, keeping us on our toes with deliberately vague and mysterious references that all hold together. But no, I just think he's not himself very careful, not very articulate as a public speaker and overall not a superb communicator.

City Streets, even if it got hugely better, is simply not designed as a Robotaxi. It not only requires a "safety driver" for safety intervention: it actually requires a human operator just to initiate, reengage after non-safety disengagements and just generally operate the car. Additional infrastructure would be required for very many aspects, including to transport customers, recharge the car, interact with law enforcement or parking lot attendants and so on.

I stand by what I said, it's not absurd but I will agree that Elon's tweets can't be used to settle the argument.

 

[_Redshift_]

No matter what Tesla calls it, it is a non self driving alpha. Doesn’t even do proper AEB, for heavens sake.