Blog WSJ: Ambitious Autopilot Push Angered Tesla Engineers

Tesla engineers are reportedly jumping ship because they don’t believe Autopilot 2.0 hardware can meet the fully self-driving promise that Elon Musk proudly touts.

The Wall Street Journal says Sterling Anderson, previously the Autopilot director, decided to leave Tesla in December in part because he didn’t agree with the claims Musk was making about the vehicle’s potential for full autonomy.

According to the WSJ (paywall):

In a meeting after the announcement, someone asked Autopilot director Sterling Anderson how Tesla could brand the product “Full Self-Driving,” several employees recall. “This was Elon’s decision,” they said he responded. Two months later, Mr. Anderson resigned.

The Autopilot division has lost some 10 employees and four managers recently, according to the report. Satish Jeyachandran, the former director of hardware engineering for Tesla’s Autopilot team, and Berta Rodriguez-Hervas, a former machine learning manager also left the company in June. Anderson was succeeded by Chris Lattner, a former Apple developer, but he left in June after just six months on the job.

Tesla has declined to comment on the report.

 

[AnxietyRanger]

I think the debate comes back to the same old argument:

How much is Tesla allowed to remove existing functionality unilaterally through software updates? Was it OK to do a (hidden no less) removal of a major part of air suspension people paid money for?

The P90DL power limitations were ready to be judged against by a judge, recently, so Tesla returned the power. It would seem Tesla probably are not within their rights to make major removals of features after the fact.

But there are always the borderline questions, of course, the smaller things... As some said, the very low is still gone... what if that was a major thing for someone's purchase decision? I guess Tesla can get away better with removal of very low, but not with removal of the feature completely...

There is some uncharted territory here for sure, no other car has had so much after-the-fact update/change potential...

Anyway, this IMO is the difference of opinion here. Some feel it is OK Tesla makes changes to customer cars for selfish reasons (PR worries about air suspension, warranty costs about drivetrain power etc.), others feel it is not OK.

We also have one judge who said it is not OK, so far. The Volkswagen Dieselgate also suggested that at least in the U.S. power reductions to reach pollution limits were not OK after the fact (hence the buybacks).

My request that the Arizona Attorney General's office investigate Tesla's changes to Ludicrous Mode

 

[MalaikaMike]

I've read more than a few posts of people saying they match. I've also read several posts stating AP2 exceeds AP1 in a couple of areas and not quite up to AP1 capabilities in others. Basically, it appears that people are having different experiences and unhappy people are more vocal than happy ones. I suspect as well that information being posted on the topic has to do with people's bias, comprehension capabilities, interpretation skills etc... and I'm more apt to believe those that post impartially.



Let me correct that for you. SOME people are talking for the above reasons, while others are talking because misery loves company and there's nothing quite like a good ole fashion pile-on.

 

[MalaikaMike]

Just had a Model s 100d for a week now. AP is terrifying! Nearly killed me once and frightened the life out of me another time. Car's great but AP stays off!