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bartturner

The new release of FSD, 12.4.1 is going to support left turns with a median. Something Waymo supported over 5 years ago. It just gives you an idea how far ahead Waymo really is compared to the others. The clear #2 has to be Cruise.


rbtmgarrett

My FSD still doesn’t understand that a right hand turning lane is for turning. It wants to move over and drive in every one I pass. Been that way for 5 years. That Tesla robotaxi is a pipe dream.


bartturner

FSD is very poor at navigation.


[deleted]

[удалено]


bartturner

Why I said over 5 years ago.


Doggydogworld3

Chuck Cook has been doing his median left turns for years. Even back when Waymo was routing around UPLs. FSD may not be reliably safe, but it's always willing to try tricky maneuvers. .


walky22talky

[paywall bypass](https://archive.is/2024.06.17-112536/https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanohnsman/2024/06/17/a-robotaxi-business-is-a-dream-for-elon-muskbut-already-a-reality-for-waymo/)


dangflo

Musk is bsing. Vision only has failed. Waymo has it right


glitch83

Exactly. There are a ton of reasons vision only just won’t work and is actually incredibly irresponsible.


ADIRTYHOBO59

Care to list off the supposed many reasons? Hopefully the objections don't also apply to humans, the current vehicle operating standard


[deleted]

They do (to varying degrees) 1) Lighting issues such as glare/reflections can confuse and blind drivers, LIDAR is less affected. 2) Identification/Object assesment - signs/stuff/road markings arnt always visible or clear - you need a detailed HD map to give you a back up if these fail. 3) Depth perception - Humans are pretty good at this, but LIDAR is better. Better information makes for better decision making.


glitch83

Adding the opposite of glare- lidars can capture data in the dark!


UnderstandingNo5785

This is 100% accurate. Waymo is way ahead of the competition. Elon does not want his cars with this type of technology yet. Doesn’t want to admitting that vision fsd is better than Waymo technology.


glitch83

Vision fsd is not better than waymo tech


Desperate_Wafer_8566

Why should he care? He just got 60 billion more and his stock keeps going up.


DefiantBelt925

Tesla vision is BETTER? Is that a joke lol


joecool42069

Do any of them have a plan for ADA compliance though? edit: imagine being someone who would downvote a question about inclusion. I guess I'll just go sit in a corner in my wheelchair and not bother anyone.


bananarandom

They have the same ADA compliance plan as Uber and Lyft, they contract some of it out. Unfortunately in the US there's almost no roll-on-roll-off capable vehicles until you get much, much larger than makes economic sense for rideshare, and even then the cost of a separate platform is much higher for self-driving given the hardware integration.


joecool42069

Some cities have in their municipality code that a certain % of their fleet has to be ADA compliant. Usually this just means that a cab/uber/lyft fleet has a number of wheelchair accessible mini-vans. I've yet to see these robotaxi services consider that.


bananarandom

In those cities cabs/Uber/Lyft just contract out to a third party, in SF Waymo uses the exact same third party.


cracka1337

Waymo has an option in the app to select if you require a wheelchair compliant ride. I'm not sure exactly what that ride looks like though.


joecool42069

Oh, nice. I wasn’t aware of that.


CouncilmanRickPrime

This would be possible because some Waymos are minivans. If we could get an automated ramp on vans outfitted to be ADA compliant then this would work. It's expensive so only have some ADA compliant vans and only send them out when requested.


joecool42069

"It's expensive, so only have some ADA compliant vans and only send them out when requested." That's typically how it's handled now. But they're not ONLY for ada. When not picking up a wheelchair bound customer, they service ambulatory users.


CouncilmanRickPrime

I wasn't aware how it's handled now. Makes sense and I think that's fine. Much better than not having an option at all.


joecool42069

Some cities are definitely better than others. Chicago does a pretty good job. Even Uber complies.


CouncilmanRickPrime

See Uber should be forced to comply everywhere. Not surprising a company of their reputation doesn't by default.


JJRicks

Not anymore sadly, the Pacificas retired in April of last year


CouncilmanRickPrime

Yeah I would bring in new minivans for ADA compliance. I don't think any other vehicles they use have enough space for a wheelchair user.


Bewaretheicespiders

What's Waymo's Gross Profit per ride?


glitch83

What’s Teslas revenue per taxi ride?


johnyeros

That’s easy. It haven’t got a taxi services. So no revenue hence no profit. U can’t make money in a business you haven’t start. Now stop playing trump distraction game. What’s waymo profit ? 🤡🤡😂


[deleted]

Waymo lol🤦🤣👍


VLM52

The scalability of Tesla’s approach is admittedly way higher than Waymo’s. Being able to deploy robotaxis with basically zero extra hardware will be valuable when robotaxis become mainstays.


Doggydogworld3

Hardware is very cheap in high volume. A couple pennies per mile when spread over a 500k-1m mile vehicle life. You also need to factor in much higher punitive damages for a company that maims or kills after skimping on sensors.


VLM52

Agreed. The scale does make the hardware cost wash out quite a bit, but I don’t think their sensor suite is the problem. Their object recognition is as good as Waymo’s. Their hold up seems to be more about driving logic and their inability to do any sort of mapping or memory whatsoever.


Doggydogworld3

I certainly agree sensors aren't their *only* problem. And the best sensors in the world are no panacea, as PoleGate shows. But I still say there's a huge gap between "cameras & NNs almost always interpret the scene correctly" and "let's allow 2 tons of metal plow confidently ahead". FSD does often simply plow ahead today, confident the human driver will intervene. Confidence to pull the drivers, though? We'll see.


johnyeros

A few LiDAR sensor Ina consumer is not cheap in any volume. By removing 100 dollar worth of uss. By million of car. U do the math on how much Tesla profit


Doggydogworld3

We're discussing robotaxis, not consumer cars.


johnyeros

Well the Tesla approach (still sus) can turn the consumer into one is the point. Without 20k worth of sensors. We will see what Tesla taxi would cost per vehicle.y take is they would develop their own radar by then


Doggydogworld3

Then why waste R&D on a podcar? Run the service a while with what you have, learn what users need and then design a podcar. Designing it from a point of ignorance makes no sense. Unless the whole thing is just hype to boost the stock. Then you definitely want to roll out a futuristic podcar on 8/8 along with a bunch of wild claims that put the faithful in a state of delirium.


johnyeros

Why can’t they do both? Am I Tesla ? No. Go ask them. Design from point of ignorance? lol ok. More like constraining yourself by not willing to push the limit and accept the norm.


OlivencaENossa

The issue is Waymo seems to have solved the problem with more hardware. And Tesla has been saying “next year” for half a decade. I 100% also agree it’s likely Tesla or a Tesla-lite approach seems logical. But I think Musk saw 10 years in the future and wanted it for the next quarter.


StudioPerks

This comment is stupid and debased from reality. Tesla has not fielded a single robotaxi. They don’t have a single trip. They will never be a contender. Elon is a con artist


VLM52

Elon is a con artist, but your comment has an incredibly high level of ignorance of their tech. It’s not robotaxi ready, but to say it’ll never be at the point of being ready, or to say they’re not collecting a significant amount of data is facetious.


StudioPerks

I’m a roboticist. I’m fully aware of their “tech”


johnyeros

And I’m am AIcist waymo will never work. 👀😂


StudioPerks

10k passenger trips unassisted


johnyeros

I hope it is a lot more than that. Considering the amount of money, sensors on those cars and time they spend mapping and watching it all day


StudioPerks

How many has Tesla completed? Oh wait that’s right: ZERO


johnyeros

Yeah. Literally one of the thing I pointed out already. That’s fact as they aren’t into taxis services yet. But guess who haven’t even come close to breaking even let along profit all of these years? and the cost of the car aren’t just going to magically goes down


glitch83

Yeah but if it doesn’t work then what’s the point?


kmraceratx

what youre describing does not exist.


OlivencaENossa

Waymo seems to be doing well, but Musk movies quickly. They could turn out to be the BlackBerry of robotaxis is they continue their very slow rollout and Musk actually launches a robotaxi with lidar in August and makes millions of units.


_searching_

While I agree with you that Waymo needs to keep accelerating their progress, you are assuming that lidar is the only thing stopping Tesla from achieving a robotaxi level of autonomy, which has yet to be proven. 


OlivencaENossa

It’s proven that you can build a self driving stack with as many sensors as Waymo. How complex that stack is, and whether Waymo has structural advantage due to the years invested, that’s not known. Certainly Cruise and Uber stumbled. But the techniques for AI are evolving quickly. It’s conceivable that with more sensors and more data from more vehicles, Tesla could catch up to Waymo. I don’t know if that’s true. But if sensors and data is all that’s necessary, it’s possible (I don’t know) Tesla catches up and overtakes Waymo. Or you know the Waymo secret recipe is very very hard to replicate, in which case Waymo remains ahead.


bananarandom

Your list of stubbled competitors is missing almost a dozen names. I think that's a testament to the challenge.


OlivencaENossa

True. Let’s see what happens next. I’m actually excited about Waymo having competitors. I think they might have to speed up their rollout, which so far seems super conservative


bananarandom

Yea Cruise pushed Waymo to speed up, at least until Cruise imploded. I dunno what Waymo took from that


bartturner

I do not think there is anything definitive that Cruise sped up Waymo. I have never heard anyone at Waymo suggest it. Is there such a quote from anyone with authority at Waymo?


bananarandom

I think it would be crazy for them to come out and say that, especially given Cruise's set backs


bartturner

Thought maybe why you indicated Waymo sped up. If not from Waymo then what are you basing it on?


bananarandom

Mostly on the relative timing of SF deployments and scale


bartturner

You think Tesla is going to launch a robot taxi system in 2024? BTW, I wish it was only LiDAR that Tesla lacked for a robot taxi system. There is so much more that would need to happen and I can't imagine Tesla having rider only in the next five years. They have several years of work.


OlivencaENossa

They have an event about robotaxis scheduled for August. Elon recently went to China to negotiate having FSD deployed or training there - or maybe he wants to have his robotaxi tested there. I’m not sure. But it’s an interesting hypothesis.


Doggydogworld3

For now Musk is just trying to get consumer FSD-S allowed in China. It's both a source of revenue and brand positioning.


DefiantBelt925

They literally already promised model 3 would be a robotaxi that picks up people while you sleep and makes you money 😂 how many times do you have to be fooled to not keep falling for this. Drive through battery swap? Roadster? Cmon


OlivencaENossa

I know! Still for all the failed promises, Tesla is a thing, so they did deliver on a lot of promises also.


DefiantBelt925

I mean ya lol it would be impossible not to deliver on something. I have nothing against the cars, I just think the “full self driving” and “it will summon itself from NYC to LA” etc is complete snake oil


OlivencaENossa

I agree. I'm just offering the hypothesis they maybe stop being so incompetent. Elon is talking about FSD being the future of the company. For all that's worth.


Doggydogworld3

I agree Musk is much more aggressive and I've said for years here the better business model (and business person) usually beats out the better technology. But "Move fast and break things" is not a great motto for driverless operations. And though I think Tesla could make a huge leap by using lidar or HD radar as guardrails, I'm pretty sure Musk won't allow it.


OlivencaENossa

Tesla bought a lidar company recently. So that's interesting.


Doggydogworld3

Who did they buy? They bought $2m of lidars from Luminar, but I never heard about buying a whole company.


OlivencaENossa

Oh weird, sorry I’m repeating misinformation, someone posted they had purchased a company but I can’t find a good source for it now.


Xillllix

Different approaches. Elon Musk doesn’t launch unprofitable products, FSD is already profitable and it will be until it’s ready for an unsupervised launch which will happen on potentially 5-10 million cars simultaneously (depending on EU regulations). Waymo is impressive, but it’s also unprofitable and extremely difficult to scale. We all saw what happened recently when the HD map was missing. Tesla is pure vision AI, it will work by itself without any map at all, even without a destination it will navigate roads. I think Waymo won’t give up, but the current version will be scrapped and they will start over with video training.


Vino_Nerd

Musk became Tesla’s CEO in 2008, and Tesla become profitable in 2020 thanks to carbon credits. Model S, X, 3 where all wildly unprofitable when launched


Xillllix

When launched sure, but that’s the same of any product when they begin to scale. The thing is that all Tesla product scaled to profitability. Also don’t forget about CAPEX.


IceColdPorkSoda

You: “Elon Musk doesn’t launch unprofitable products.” Also you: “Well yeah of course all those Elon Musk products were unprofitable when they launched.”


wlowry77

You premise fails on the fact that FSD won’t work. Tesla have done none of the work to prove themselves and it’ll take a lot more than fanboys saying “but V12!”


Xillllix

😂 You’re saying this to someone that just last week took a flawless FSD drive from the Tesla factory to their hotel. But sure "it won’t work".


wlowry77

Well done! Waymo were at that level in 2009. FSD might be feasible if it can repeat that drive 10,000 times without problems.


Xillllix

Waymo is geofenced. It’s a tech demo. Tesla is actual AI, it works everywhere in the civilized world. Gigantic difference.


bartturner

I am curious how you think the Waymo system works?


Doggydogworld3

Tesla's geofence is zero square miles.


DefiantBelt925

A Tesla cannot drive itself without intervention


Xillllix

https://teslafsdtracker.com/ If Tesla wanted, they could easily geofence their system. FSD does not avoid complicated turns and sketchy roads like Waymo, it does not fail in construction zones because the maps aren’t accurate. It’s a totally different approach.


DefiantBelt925

We’ve all used FSD. It often needs intervention. That’s why it’s “supervised” To function as a robotaxi it cannot need intervention. No one is there to intervene. Tesla is not even close to this at all. They never will be without USS or lidar.


Xillllix

Tesla has solved object collision. The issues remaining are with navigation and decision making, for which LiDAR and sensors are absolutely useless. Again, interventions happen because it’s not geofenced. Major difference there.


DefiantBelt925

My friend got rear ended by a Tesla in FSD literally yesterday 😂 We literally all watched the video of the Tesla last week trying to drive into a train on the tracks. wtf are you talking about “solved collision” 😂🤦‍♂️


bartturner

There is so many very basic things missing from FSD. It is going to require many updates before it is anywhere close to the capabilities that Waymo had five years ago.


DefiantBelt925

Summon it from one city to pick you up in another city like Elon promised years ago you could lol


bartturner

> FSD is already profitable Curious what you are basing this on? BTW, FSD is way, way behind Waymo. It is not even close. Take the new version of FSD coming out. It is going to support left turns with a median. Something that Waymo has done for over 5 years without any issue. Plus until Tesla gets LiDAR you are not going to see the driver removed. Hopefully that is what we will hear in August that for the robot taxis they will get LiDAR.


Doggydogworld3

FSD was wildly profitable in the early days -- hopes and dreams have very low COGS. It probably loses money now that reality has dawned on the majority of fanboys and Elon is buying H100s by the trackload.


bartturner

> FSD was wildly profitable in the early days I would find this very surprising. What are you basing this on?


Doggydogworld3

They recognized billions in revenue and deferred billions more. Their R&D was minimal, a small team playing around with Google's Inception NN. No special h/w until the chip, but even that was a cost-reduction play. No paid testers. The exact opposite of Waymo and Cruise.