Author Topic: Is Tesla a good investment?  (Read 378142 times)

bacchi

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1850 on: March 30, 2023, 10:47:02 PM »
Its literally like 1 in trillions use case when it only works in a tiny geographic area under limited \ ideal conditions, relative to normal driving across the entire world.

1 in a trillion? C'mon. There are traffic jams 2x every weekday in Vegas on 15 and 515 and nothing I've read indicates it has to be sunny but, if it does matter, it's freakin' Vegas. It's sunny there a lot.

Quote
I have a Tesla and do not even have FSD just the free auto pilot and it works well on the highway anywhere, although i have to monitor. That seems much more useful to me than a fully autonomous car that drives up to 40 mph on a straight highway in perfect conditions on a tiny geographic area in part of one state,  which is what some companies brag about.

There seems to be some confusion.

MB's self driving is not all-or-none. Level 3 doesn't have to be used; the MB Level 2 can be used instead on any highway, at any speed, under any conditions. 

It should also be noted that, unlike Germany, SAE certification is state by state in the US. Tesla will not move to Level 3 nationally in one fell swoop. They'll have to apply to Nevada and California separately just like MB.

The real downside of MB's Level 3 is the cost. While it's only a ~$5k add on, it requires a $110k car around it.

Paper Chaser

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1851 on: March 31, 2023, 06:50:31 AM »
Here's a rough breakdown of the SAE driving levels for reference:


I'm no lawyer, but it seems to me that there's a big difference in liability between L2 and L3. For Level 2 tech, the car company requires the driver to remain attentive and ready to take over control at any time. So if something happens, they can point the finger at the meat sack in the driver's seat. Going to L3 seems to imply that the meat sack doesn't have to remain attentive, and thus has far less liability should something occur.

lemonlyman

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1852 on: March 31, 2023, 08:11:51 AM »
Premature liability cost, regulatory cost, specific software engineering and staff to manage Level 3 only areas...Tesla's goal is a generalized autonomy solution. Level 3 now in really limited areas and conditions would be a waste of resources. Not sure why Tesla would want to get a limited Level 3 cert.  As a "Level 2" solution, they can update it when they want, test and collect data everywhere in the US, and not assume liability. L3 cert would just burn cash like Waymo and Cruise services. IMO, they'll skip and just go L4 state by state when it's ready.

I use FSD beta. It can drive me everywhere in my town. In the next town. Bordering states...TBF, what Mercedes has done with Drive Pilot is cool, but I'm skeptical it's scalable.

StashingAway

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1853 on: March 31, 2023, 11:40:31 AM »
Premature liability cost, regulatory cost, specific software engineering and staff to manage Level 3 only areas...Tesla's goal is a generalized autonomy solution.

I suspect that's every company's goal, right? Everyone knows what the goal is; it's the same goal as what GM touted was the future of the car at the 1939 World's Fair.

L3 cert would just burn cash like Waymo and Cruise services. IMO, they'll skip and just go L4 state by state when it's ready.

It seems to me that proper engineering is done in steps. Evel Knievel didn't start by jumping the Grand Canyon. You might be right that it's a cash burning waste, but I wouldn't put it past a tech company to have the hubris to think that they can jump in first and fix the holes later. And they might be right to do so, but as we can see with the state of AI and social media, generally these things aren't thought through by the leaders of these companies and are causing a whole host of negative externalities. I don't see Tesla putting in resources to prevent that, just trying to race to be the first.

EchoStache

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1854 on: March 31, 2023, 12:09:06 PM »
Premature liability cost, regulatory cost, specific software engineering and staff to manage Level 3 only areas...Tesla's goal is a generalized autonomy solution. Level 3 now in really limited areas and conditions would be a waste of resources. Not sure why Tesla would want to get a limited Level 3 cert.  As a "Level 2" solution, they can update it when they want, test and collect data everywhere in the US, and not assume liability. L3 cert would just burn cash like Waymo and Cruise services. IMO, they'll skip and just go L4 state by state when it's ready.

I use FSD beta. It can drive me everywhere in my town. In the next town. Bordering states...TBF, what Mercedes has done with Drive Pilot is cool, but I'm skeptical it's scalable.

At the very least, Mercedes L2 Distronic Plus is $2k and, AFAIK, does everything EAP can do, at least on the highway.  I'm not sure if it can do any city driving.  But Mercedes seems to offer the same capability on highways as Tesla does, for 1/3 the cost(compared to EAP).

I think this is a weakness Tesla should address.  No way I'd pay $6k for EAP, but basic AP functionality is too low.  I should be able to at least manually change lanes without losing CC while AP stays engaged and resumes control after the lane change.  As it stands now, I have to really tug the wheel, the car jerks all over the place, lose CC, manually change lanes, manually control speed, pass, lane change, re-engage AP.  This brokenly non-user friendly IMO, especially when competitors are offering the same thing or better for far less money.

Heck, even our Kia allows a lane change without disengaging cruise control.  That's just a broken level of functionality and convenience for a company that is attempting to lead the way in autonomy.
« Last Edit: March 31, 2023, 12:10:52 PM by UltraStache »

lemonlyman

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1855 on: March 31, 2023, 12:53:46 PM »
Premature liability cost, regulatory cost, specific software engineering and staff to manage Level 3 only areas...Tesla's goal is a generalized autonomy solution.

I suspect that's every company's goal, right? Everyone knows what the goal is; it's the same goal as what GM touted was the future of the car at the 1939 World's Fair.

Yes, glib enough comments are usually, technically right.

L3 cert would just burn cash like Waymo and Cruise services. IMO, they'll skip and just go L4 state by state when it's ready.

It seems to me that proper engineering is done in steps. Evel Knievel didn't start by jumping the Grand Canyon. You might be right that it's a cash burning waste, but I wouldn't put it past a tech company to have the hubris to think that they can jump in first and fix the holes later. And they might be right to do so, but as we can see with the state of AI and social media, generally these things aren't thought through by the leaders of these companies and are causing a whole host of negative externalities. I don't see Tesla putting in resources to prevent that, just trying to race to be the first.

FSD Beta versions that have been pushed out the last few years have been engineering steps. FSD hardware versions are engineering steps. FSD Beta already does practical Level 3 functionality. I would argue sectioning off bread and butter roads here and there for a L3 cert would be a liability step and not an engineering one. I'm not sure I've listened to enough AI podcasts to understand your real point here.

lemonlyman

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1856 on: March 31, 2023, 01:11:08 PM »
Premature liability cost, regulatory cost, specific software engineering and staff to manage Level 3 only areas...Tesla's goal is a generalized autonomy solution. Level 3 now in really limited areas and conditions would be a waste of resources. Not sure why Tesla would want to get a limited Level 3 cert.  As a "Level 2" solution, they can update it when they want, test and collect data everywhere in the US, and not assume liability. L3 cert would just burn cash like Waymo and Cruise services. IMO, they'll skip and just go L4 state by state when it's ready.

I use FSD beta. It can drive me everywhere in my town. In the next town. Bordering states...TBF, what Mercedes has done with Drive Pilot is cool, but I'm skeptical it's scalable.

At the very least, Mercedes L2 Distronic Plus is $2k and, AFAIK, does everything EAP can do, at least on the highway.  I'm not sure if it can do any city driving.  But Mercedes seems to offer the same capability on highways as Tesla does, for 1/3 the cost(compared to EAP).

I think this is a weakness Tesla should address.  No way I'd pay $6k for EAP, but basic AP functionality is too low.  I should be able to at least manually change lanes without losing CC while AP stays engaged and resumes control after the lane change.  As it stands now, I have to really tug the wheel, the car jerks all over the place, lose CC, manually change lanes, manually control speed, pass, lane change, re-engage AP.  This brokenly non-user friendly IMO, especially when competitors are offering the same thing or better for far less money.

Heck, even our Kia allows a lane change without disengaging cruise control.  That's just a broken level of functionality and convenience for a company that is attempting to lead the way in autonomy.

That's a product pricing strategy. Obviously the car can do those things. Not sure how your willingness to pay for more ADAS functionality or not is relevant to leading autonomy. You could buy OpenPilot for your Kia to get most FSD Beta-like functionality on highway and city for a fifth of the cost of FSD Beta too. Would doing what you say materially lead to selling more cars, faster? If it did, I'd be for it. This is an investor thread afterall.

EchoStache

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1857 on: March 31, 2023, 01:43:57 PM »
Premature liability cost, regulatory cost, specific software engineering and staff to manage Level 3 only areas...Tesla's goal is a generalized autonomy solution. Level 3 now in really limited areas and conditions would be a waste of resources. Not sure why Tesla would want to get a limited Level 3 cert.  As a "Level 2" solution, they can update it when they want, test and collect data everywhere in the US, and not assume liability. L3 cert would just burn cash like Waymo and Cruise services. IMO, they'll skip and just go L4 state by state when it's ready.

I use FSD beta. It can drive me everywhere in my town. In the next town. Bordering states...TBF, what Mercedes has done with Drive Pilot is cool, but I'm skeptical it's scalable.

At the very least, Mercedes L2 Distronic Plus is $2k and, AFAIK, does everything EAP can do, at least on the highway.  I'm not sure if it can do any city driving.  But Mercedes seems to offer the same capability on highways as Tesla does, for 1/3 the cost(compared to EAP).

I think this is a weakness Tesla should address.  No way I'd pay $6k for EAP, but basic AP functionality is too low.  I should be able to at least manually change lanes without losing CC while AP stays engaged and resumes control after the lane change.  As it stands now, I have to really tug the wheel, the car jerks all over the place, lose CC, manually change lanes, manually control speed, pass, lane change, re-engage AP.  This brokenly non-user friendly IMO, especially when competitors are offering the same thing or better for far less money.

Heck, even our Kia allows a lane change without disengaging cruise control.  That's just a broken level of functionality and convenience for a company that is attempting to lead the way in autonomy.

That's a product pricing strategy. Obviously the car can do those things. Not sure how your willingness to pay for more ADAS functionality or not is relevant to leading autonomy. You could buy OpenPilot for your Kia to get most FSD Beta-like functionality on highway and city for a fifth of the cost of FSD Beta too. Would doing what you say materially lead to selling more cars, faster? If it did, I'd be for it. This is an investor thread afterall.

In terms of being applicable to the investor side of things, if Tesla were to charge a small fee to enhance basic auto pilot just a little bit, i.e. $300 or $500 that would drastically improve the user friendliness of AP, I would think that this revenue could be used to increase R&D budget for FSD.  I have to guess that a large % of Tesla owners are not willing to pay $6k-$15k to upgrade basic AP, but maybe many or most would pay a small fee for the ability to manually change lanes without turning AP on and off.  More revenue to invest in autonomy would contribute to.....leading in autonomy.

StashingAway

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1858 on: April 02, 2023, 12:34:26 PM »

That's a product pricing strategy. Obviously the car can do those things Not sure how your willingness to pay for more ADAS functionality or not is relevant to leading autonomy. You could buy OpenPilot for your Kia to get most FSD Beta-like functionality on highway and city for a fifth of the cost of FSD Beta too. Would doing what you say materially lead to selling more cars, faster? If it did, I'd be for it. This is an investor thread afterall.

Obviously the car can also use normal turn signal stocks and volume knobs as well, but that didn't stop Tesla from nixing them for touch buttons. That doesn't mean it's the correct decision, though. And Tesla doesn't know (or seem to care) that people may be buying their cars in spite of this rather than because of it. It's not like they do A/B testing on any of their product decisions. They are basically designing their current cars on the optimism that humans won't need to be driving them in the near future, which makes them worse systems than those companies who make cars that are designed to be primarily driven by humans.

soulpatchmike

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1859 on: April 04, 2023, 09:14:28 AM »
Premature liability cost, regulatory cost, specific software engineering and staff to manage Level 3 only areas...Tesla's goal is a generalized autonomy solution. Level 3 now in really limited areas and conditions would be a waste of resources. Not sure why Tesla would want to get a limited Level 3 cert.  As a "Level 2" solution, they can update it when they want, test and collect data everywhere in the US, and not assume liability. L3 cert would just burn cash like Waymo and Cruise services. IMO, they'll skip and just go L4 state by state when it's ready.

I use FSD beta. It can drive me everywhere in my town. In the next town. Bordering states...TBF, what Mercedes has done with Drive Pilot is cool, but I'm skeptical it's scalable.

At the very least, Mercedes L2 Distronic Plus is $2k and, AFAIK, does everything EAP can do, at least on the highway.  I'm not sure if it can do any city driving.  But Mercedes seems to offer the same capability on highways as Tesla does, for 1/3 the cost(compared to EAP).

I think this is a weakness Tesla should address.  No way I'd pay $6k for EAP, but basic AP functionality is too low.  I should be able to at least manually change lanes without losing CC while AP stays engaged and resumes control after the lane change.  As it stands now, I have to really tug the wheel, the car jerks all over the place, lose CC, manually change lanes, manually control speed, pass, lane change, re-engage AP.  This brokenly non-user friendly IMO, especially when competitors are offering the same thing or better for far less money.

Heck, even our Kia allows a lane change without disengaging cruise control.  That's just a broken level of functionality and convenience for a company that is attempting to lead the way in autonomy.

That's a product pricing strategy. Obviously the car can do those things. Not sure how your willingness to pay for more ADAS functionality or not is relevant to leading autonomy. You could buy OpenPilot for your Kia to get most FSD Beta-like functionality on highway and city for a fifth of the cost of FSD Beta too. Would doing what you say materially lead to selling more cars, faster? If it did, I'd be for it. This is an investor thread afterall.

In terms of being applicable to the investor side of things, if Tesla were to charge a small fee to enhance basic auto pilot just a little bit, i.e. $300 or $500 that would drastically improve the user friendliness of AP, I would think that this revenue could be used to increase R&D budget for FSD.  I have to guess that a large % of Tesla owners are not willing to pay $6k-$15k to upgrade basic AP, but maybe many or most would pay a small fee for the ability to manually change lanes without turning AP on and off.  More revenue to invest in autonomy would contribute to.....leading in autonomy.
If more dollars invested meant a faster result, I think we would have had autonomy done years ago.  I appreciate Tesla's approach to keeping their head down and following their own path, not any perceived competitors' path and not wall streets path but their own path.  They are the kings of being late but also are pretty good at making the impossible possible...eventually...

If they are not leading in autonomy already, who is?  Look up and watch FSD beta videos in any city in America on youtube from 24 months ago, 18 months ago, 12 months ago, 6 months ago, and most recent.  What have Waymo and Cruise done in the past 24 months other than having a handful of cars running in one or 2 urban areas?  How does that scale, every major city in 40 or 50 years?  It still can't drive to the suburbs or even the edge of downtown. 

What does leading in autonomy look like?  Isn't rate of improvement the primary metric?  If the MB level 3 improves at a rate anywhere close to Tesla over the next 24 months I will eat my words.

mistymoney

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1860 on: April 04, 2023, 10:14:32 AM »
Premature liability cost, regulatory cost, specific software engineering and staff to manage Level 3 only areas...Tesla's goal is a generalized autonomy solution. Level 3 now in really limited areas and conditions would be a waste of resources. Not sure why Tesla would want to get a limited Level 3 cert.  As a "Level 2" solution, they can update it when they want, test and collect data everywhere in the US, and not assume liability. L3 cert would just burn cash like Waymo and Cruise services. IMO, they'll skip and just go L4 state by state when it's ready.

I use FSD beta. It can drive me everywhere in my town. In the next town. Bordering states...TBF, what Mercedes has done with Drive Pilot is cool, but I'm skeptical it's scalable.

At the very least, Mercedes L2 Distronic Plus is $2k and, AFAIK, does everything EAP can do, at least on the highway.  I'm not sure if it can do any city driving.  But Mercedes seems to offer the same capability on highways as Tesla does, for 1/3 the cost(compared to EAP).

I think this is a weakness Tesla should address.  No way I'd pay $6k for EAP, but basic AP functionality is too low.  I should be able to at least manually change lanes without losing CC while AP stays engaged and resumes control after the lane change.  As it stands now, I have to really tug the wheel, the car jerks all over the place, lose CC, manually change lanes, manually control speed, pass, lane change, re-engage AP.  This brokenly non-user friendly IMO, especially when competitors are offering the same thing or better for far less money.

Heck, even our Kia allows a lane change without disengaging cruise control.  That's just a broken level of functionality and convenience for a company that is attempting to lead the way in autonomy.

That's a product pricing strategy. Obviously the car can do those things. Not sure how your willingness to pay for more ADAS functionality or not is relevant to leading autonomy. You could buy OpenPilot for your Kia to get most FSD Beta-like functionality on highway and city for a fifth of the cost of FSD Beta too. Would doing what you say materially lead to selling more cars, faster? If it did, I'd be for it. This is an investor thread afterall.

In terms of being applicable to the investor side of things, if Tesla were to charge a small fee to enhance basic auto pilot just a little bit, i.e. $300 or $500 that would drastically improve the user friendliness of AP, I would think that this revenue could be used to increase R&D budget for FSD.  I have to guess that a large % of Tesla owners are not willing to pay $6k-$15k to upgrade basic AP, but maybe many or most would pay a small fee for the ability to manually change lanes without turning AP on and off.  More revenue to invest in autonomy would contribute to.....leading in autonomy.
If more dollars invested meant a faster result, I think we would have had autonomy done years ago.  I appreciate Tesla's approach to keeping their head down and following their own path, not any perceived competitors' path and not wall streets path but their own path.  They are the kings of being late but also are pretty good at making the impossible possible...eventually...

If they are not leading in autonomy already, who is?  Look up and watch FSD beta videos in any city in America on youtube from 24 months ago, 18 months ago, 12 months ago, 6 months ago, and most recent.  What have Waymo and Cruise done in the past 24 months other than having a handful of cars running in one or 2 urban areas?  How does that scale, every major city in 40 or 50 years?  It still can't drive to the suburbs or even the edge of downtown. 

What does leading in autonomy look like?  Isn't rate of improvement the primary metric?  If the MB level 3 improves at a rate anywhere close to Tesla over the next 24 months I will eat my words.

Money is one thing, data another. Tesla has the most data collection going on in the past, now and in the foreseeable future. They could certainly blow it somehow!

But the race is theirs to lose, for sure.

bacchi

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1861 on: April 04, 2023, 11:51:16 AM »
What have Waymo and Cruise done in the past 24 months other than having a handful of cars running in one or 2 urban areas?  How does that scale, every major city in 40 or 50 years?  It still can't drive to the suburbs or even the edge of downtown. 

Cruise has Level 4 driverless cabs running in San Francisco, Phoenix, and Austin. There is no human in the driver's seat.

That certainly seems like it bests Tesla's robotaxi mode, which...doesn't exist at all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLSOf2uVmY4

soulpatchmike

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1862 on: April 04, 2023, 01:13:45 PM »
What have Waymo and Cruise done in the past 24 months other than having a handful of cars running in one or 2 urban areas?  How does that scale, every major city in 40 or 50 years?  It still can't drive to the suburbs or even the edge of downtown. 

Cruise has Level 4 driverless cabs running in San Francisco, Phoenix, and Austin. There is no human in the driver's seat.

That certainly seems like it bests Tesla's robotaxi mode, which...doesn't exist at all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLSOf2uVmY4
Have you ever asked yourself why cruise would go to the same three metro areas that waymo started first?  Its because they are using the same data and their solution is not scalable.  Neither have changed the scope of use case in 24 months and the average person still can't just hail one on the side of the street(wait list).  1 new city in beta every two years will get you driverless cabs in every metro(not suburbs) in 50 years+.  Tesla can drive on every road today with human visual monitoring only with no input in a large percentage of use cases(waaaay larger use case than waymo or cruise) and it grows with every new release.  Just because you have to visually monitor it doesn't mean it isn't solving more autonomy use cases than driverless.  Once the risk of an accident reaches the right threshold, it automatically becomes level 4 for the entire USA with no driver required on any street.  How is a proven(over 2 years) unscalable solution(Waymo/Cruise) to driverless cars equal leading in autonomy?  Driverless in a small geo-fenced area is as impressive as an automated subway system...not very.

Locally geo-fenced driverless cars are akin to a physical keyboard on the smartphone...eventually people will understand they are not very useful and not necessary.

bacchi

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1863 on: April 04, 2023, 01:48:41 PM »
Once the risk of an accident reaches the right threshold, it automatically becomes level 4 for the entire USA with no driver required on any street.

So Tesla isn't ready to certify its FSD for Level 3 or Level 4 because it's not reliable enough under certain conditions?

Viking Thor

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1864 on: April 05, 2023, 05:30:16 PM »
What have Waymo and Cruise done in the past 24 months other than having a handful of cars running in one or 2 urban areas?  How does that scale, every major city in 40 or 50 years?  It still can't drive to the suburbs or even the edge of downtown. 

Cruise has Level 4 driverless cabs running in San Francisco, Phoenix, and Austin. There is no human in the driver's seat.

That certainly seems like it bests Tesla's robotaxi mode, which...doesn't exist at all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLSOf2uVmY4

Cruise operates under extremely limited conditions. For example only within a subset of San Francisco (not even the whole city), from 10pm to 5am. More broadly for Cruise employees.

They have cherry picked the easiest roads in the city and just drive on those and spent years mapping and honing the driving to a small area, which the taxi can’t leave. And even then the usage is limited to a time when pedestrians and other traffic are less numerous.

Every other so called autonomous leader has a similar model where they pick a really narrow/ easy use case and hone the car’s abilities to do that.

Tesla lets you drive anywhere under any conditions, which is infinitely harder than narrow use cases. And the system is being trained and optimized with data from millions of Teslas on the road.

Not sure how soon a robotaxi for broadly available general use across the US is coming, but I would bet Tesla would be the first to do it.


FINate

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1865 on: April 05, 2023, 08:09:27 PM »
What have Waymo and Cruise done in the past 24 months other than having a handful of cars running in one or 2 urban areas?  How does that scale, every major city in 40 or 50 years?  It still can't drive to the suburbs or even the edge of downtown. 

Cruise has Level 4 driverless cabs running in San Francisco, Phoenix, and Austin. There is no human in the driver's seat.

That certainly seems like it bests Tesla's robotaxi mode, which...doesn't exist at all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLSOf2uVmY4

Cruise operates under extremely limited conditions. For example only within a subset of San Francisco (not even the whole city), from 10pm to 5am. More broadly for Cruise employees.

They have cherry picked the easiest roads in the city and just drive on those and spent years mapping and honing the driving to a small area, which the taxi can’t leave. And even then the usage is limited to a time when pedestrians and other traffic are less numerous.

Every other so called autonomous leader has a similar model where they pick a really narrow/ easy use case and hone the car’s abilities to do that.

Tesla lets you drive anywhere under any conditions, which is infinitely harder than narrow use cases. And the system is being trained and optimized with data from millions of Teslas on the road.

Not sure how soon a robotaxi for broadly available general use across the US is coming, but I would bet Tesla would be the first to do it.

Future commentators will view Tesla's attempt to skip over Levels 3-4 as a mistake.

In tech it's always best to start with a usable minimum viable product and build out from there. Focus on the 80% use case and don't over complicate the design trying to implement the long-tail of features. So limiting the problem space to known streets/areas is actually really smart. They can incrementally add to the coverage area over time. At some point the vast majority of rides will be within service parameters. For a robotaxi service this is Good Enough... 95% of folks will opt for the cheaper driverless option, and the 5% of edge cases can fall back on human drivers.

Similarly, it's also wise to mitigate risks outside one's control. Car companies don't control the condition of roads, so limiting routes to places that are expected to work is a good thing. Again, this range can be increased as the technology advances.

All the autonomous car companies are slurping up tons of data. Quantity of data is less important than quality, so it's not clear to me who has the advantage here.

Viking Thor

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1866 on: April 05, 2023, 09:45:37 PM »
Time will tell but I’m pretty confident Tesla is in the lead. 10 years to master a few limited geographic areas at night does not seem to be on the right track.

From what I’ve heard from people in San Francisco it’s basically a few main streets that Waymo and Cruise use primarily. Maybe if they did this over 6 months that would be impressive but we are talking many years and still at tiny scale.

Tesla has millions of cars everywhere feeding data to improve their performance compared to a tiny scale (hundreds of cars under limited conditions/area) for Waymo/cruise.

Also Tesla is already a viable use case more so than Cruise and Waymo in that they sell FSD at scale as a successful commercial product and contribute to profits versus money losing small scale pilots.

FINate

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1867 on: April 05, 2023, 10:18:10 PM »
Tesla has millions of cars everywhere feeding data to improve their performance compared to a tiny scale (hundreds of cars under limited conditions/area) for Waymo/cruise.

This is magical thinking. Cracking the self-driving nut isn't simply a brute force problem... 10x more data won't move things along 10x faster. Even industry insiders have admitted that Level 5 is a lot more difficult than anticipated. Everyone got excited about the initial progress, but it turns out the early phase stuff was the easy part, and even then some of what we saw was fake.

Also Tesla is already a viable use case more so than Cruise and Waymo in that they sell FSD at scale as a successful commercial product and contribute to profits versus money losing small scale pilots.

Just because Telsa calls/called it Full Self Driving doesn't mean it's actually self driving or anywhere near Level 5. Tesla FSD Beta is Level 2 (note the quote: "Tesla has so far only delivered FSD Beta, which is still a level 2 driver assist system as per the automaker’s own admission.") and always requires a human behind the wheel. In other words, Tesla has commercialized Level 2 at scale, which is on par with other advanced driver assistance systems from other companies. Whereas Waymo and Cruise have actual Level 4 vehicles on the road... like cars without human operators. There's no way around it, Tesla is behind the leaders at this point.
« Last Edit: April 05, 2023, 10:20:21 PM by FINate »

GuitarStv

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1868 on: April 06, 2023, 07:19:16 AM »
Tesla has millions of cars everywhere feeding data to improve their performance compared to a tiny scale (hundreds of cars under limited conditions/area) for Waymo/cruise.

This is magical thinking. Cracking the self-driving nut isn't simply a brute force problem... 10x more data won't move things along 10x faster. Even industry insiders have admitted that Level 5 is a lot more difficult than anticipated. Everyone got excited about the initial progress, but it turns out the early phase stuff was the easy part, and even then some of what we saw was fake.

Also Tesla is already a viable use case more so than Cruise and Waymo in that they sell FSD at scale as a successful commercial product and contribute to profits versus money losing small scale pilots.

Just because Telsa calls/called it Full Self Driving doesn't mean it's actually self driving or anywhere near Level 5. Tesla FSD Beta is Level 2 (note the quote: "Tesla has so far only delivered FSD Beta, which is still a level 2 driver assist system as per the automaker’s own admission.") and always requires a human behind the wheel. In other words, Tesla has commercialized Level 2 at scale, which is on par with other advanced driver assistance systems from other companies. Whereas Waymo and Cruise have actual Level 4 vehicles on the road... like cars without human operators. There's no way around it, Tesla is behind the leaders at this point.

I think that this is a very valid and important point.  Tesla has a (pretty long by this point) history of intentionally lying about their technological progress to investors in order to mislead them.  Because of that, for non-fanboys it's difficult to take any of the company's comments at face value.

FINate

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1869 on: April 06, 2023, 08:33:14 AM »
From what I’ve heard from people in San Francisco it’s basically a few main streets that Waymo and Cruise use primarily. Maybe if they did this over 6 months that would be impressive but we are talking many years and still at tiny scale.

Further commenting on the above, I think this reveals two important things:

First, Waymo (essentially Google) has incredibly deep and broad technical talent and essentially bottomless pockets. I was an engineer at Google for 10 years and the folks there are brilliant. I dealt with intense Imposture Syndrome while working there. Big data, data mining, machine learning, artificial intelligence, large complex systems at scale... these are core competencies for Google. That Waymo, after many years and billions of dollars invested, is still limited to a small subset of city streets shows how difficult this is. And I should add, the problem isn't just (or even primarily) technical in nature. Navigating the legal and regulatory environment is a major part of getting to fully autonomous. FSD keeps killing people, which doesn't bode well for Tesla.

Second, that Cruise, a subsidiary of GM, is essentially on par with Waymo shows that the big automakers are not the hopeless lumbering dinosaurs that some have made them out to be. They have deep pockets and can attract the right talent through direct hiring, acquisitions, or partnerships. A similar story is playing out in the battery space.
« Last Edit: April 06, 2023, 09:25:06 AM by FINate »

StashingAway

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1870 on: April 06, 2023, 10:12:53 AM »
Have you ever asked yourself why cruise would go to the same three metro areas that waymo started first?  Its because they are using the same data and their solution is not scalable.  Neither have changed the scope of use case in 24 months and the average person still can't just hail one on the side of the street(wait list).  1 new city in beta every two years will get you driverless cabs in every metro(not suburbs) in 50 years+.  Tesla can drive on every road today with human visual monitoring only with no input in a large percentage of use cases(waaaay larger use case than waymo or cruise) and it grows with every new release.  Just because you have to visually monitor it doesn't mean it isn't solving more autonomy use cases than driverless.  Once the risk of an accident reaches the right threshold, it automatically becomes level 4 for the entire USA with no driver required on any street.  How is a proven(over 2 years) unscalable solution(Waymo/Cruise) to driverless cars equal leading in autonomy?  Driverless in a small geo-fenced area is as impressive as an automated subway system...not very.

Locally geo-fenced driverless cars are akin to a physical keyboard on the smartphone...eventually people will understand they are not very useful and not necessary.

Yes, once that happens... which is when, exactly?

 AI is proving to not flesh out in the way that the optimists say. ChatCPT answers questions confidently incorrectly in unpredictable ways. It has no sense of the actual world... no real representation of objects and posession... it just produces word output based on millions of datasets of input, but it has no idea of what it's actually doing. Humans can now beat AI at GO again after taking advantage of AI's blind spot in the game, a blind spot that cannot be overcome through more data input.

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2022/11/new-go-playing-trick-defeats-world-class-go-ai-but-loses-to-human-amateurs/

This idea that we just need a bit more data and a bit more use case scenarios to round out the capabilities of AI appears to have some serious issues in that we don't really know how the computer is reading objects. The computers can get confused by very mundane things. Mind you, they're way better than humans when they get it right (and this is the argument that proponents use... as long is it is several factors safer than humans it should be used).

Viking Thor

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1871 on: April 06, 2023, 01:04:26 PM »
Tesla has millions of cars everywhere feeding data to improve their performance compared to a tiny scale (hundreds of cars under limited conditions/area) for Waymo/cruise.

This is magical thinking. Cracking the self-driving nut isn't simply a brute force problem... 10x more data won't move things along 10x faster. Even industry insiders have admitted that Level 5 is a lot more difficult than anticipated. Everyone got excited about the initial progress, but it turns out the early phase stuff was the easy part, and even then some of what we saw was fake.

Also Tesla is already a viable use case more so than Cruise and Waymo in that they sell FSD at scale as a successful commercial product and contribute to profits versus money losing small scale pilots.

Just because Telsa calls/called it Full Self Driving doesn't mean it's actually self driving or anywhere near Level 5. Tesla FSD Beta is Level 2 (note the quote: "Tesla has so far only delivered FSD Beta, which is still a level 2 driver assist system as per the automaker’s own admission.") and always requires a human behind the wheel. In other words, Tesla has commercialized Level 2 at scale, which is on par with other advanced driver assistance systems from other companies. Whereas Waymo and Cruise have actual Level 4 vehicles on the road... like cars without human operators. There's no way around it, Tesla is behind the leaders at this point.

Completely disagree; in my view Tesla is way ahead.

They have many millions of miles self driven with no intervention, and the level of intervention declining consistently. This being done under all types of conditions anywhere in the world, and can be done for entire end to end trips.

This includes highly complex maneuvers like difficult left hand turns through busy traffic.

They are teaching the car to do anything/ anywhere globally that an human could drive and using AI to continuously improve it, with use case from millions of cars identifying any optimization needed.

No other company in the world has a self driving sw that works anywhere remotely as broadly. The other car companies (GM, Ford, etc) have sw that works in very limited situations, like certain mapped highways only and even then limited (eg not on sharp curves).

Cruise/waymo are driving easy trips under limited conditions in small mapped areas autonomously. In areas cherry picked for being easy to drive and then carefully mapped and honed according to the local geography. It’s like a step up from a self driven train/streetcar.

We’ll have to agree to disagree on this as your logic is not compelling to me and it appears mine is not compelling to you.

FINate

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1872 on: April 06, 2023, 04:22:48 PM »
Tesla has millions of cars everywhere feeding data to improve their performance compared to a tiny scale (hundreds of cars under limited conditions/area) for Waymo/cruise.

This is magical thinking. Cracking the self-driving nut isn't simply a brute force problem... 10x more data won't move things along 10x faster. Even industry insiders have admitted that Level 5 is a lot more difficult than anticipated. Everyone got excited about the initial progress, but it turns out the early phase stuff was the easy part, and even then some of what we saw was fake.

Also Tesla is already a viable use case more so than Cruise and Waymo in that they sell FSD at scale as a successful commercial product and contribute to profits versus money losing small scale pilots.

Just because Telsa calls/called it Full Self Driving doesn't mean it's actually self driving or anywhere near Level 5. Tesla FSD Beta is Level 2 (note the quote: "Tesla has so far only delivered FSD Beta, which is still a level 2 driver assist system as per the automaker’s own admission.") and always requires a human behind the wheel. In other words, Tesla has commercialized Level 2 at scale, which is on par with other advanced driver assistance systems from other companies. Whereas Waymo and Cruise have actual Level 4 vehicles on the road... like cars without human operators. There's no way around it, Tesla is behind the leaders at this point.

Completely disagree; in my view Tesla is way ahead.

They have many millions of miles self driven with no intervention, and the level of intervention declining consistently. This being done under all types of conditions anywhere in the world, and can be done for entire end to end trips.

This includes highly complex maneuvers like difficult left hand turns through busy traffic.

They are teaching the car to do anything/ anywhere globally that an human could drive and using AI to continuously improve it, with use case from millions of cars identifying any optimization needed.

No other company in the world has a self driving sw that works anywhere remotely as broadly. The other car companies (GM, Ford, etc) have sw that works in very limited situations, like certain mapped highways only and even then limited (eg not on sharp curves).

Cruise/waymo are driving easy trips under limited conditions in small mapped areas autonomously. In areas cherry picked for being easy to drive and then carefully mapped and honed according to the local geography. It’s like a step up from a self driven train/streetcar.

We’ll have to agree to disagree on this as your logic is not compelling to me and it appears mine is not compelling to you.

Yes, we're in disagreement. It's your money, do as you please. I'm not trying to convince you of anything, just pointing out a different perspective for others that may be reading this thread.

As the saying goes, the proof is in the eating of the pudding. Tesla FSD is Level 2, Cruise and Waymo are Level 4 with regulatory oversight that includes providing data for public scrutiny. Are investors really to believe that Tesla is secretly far ahead in this race yet is keeping it quiet while they release modest incremental updates? This is inconsistent with what we've seen from Musk and his well established pattern of over-promising and under-delivering.

One has to wonder how many true believers forked over a lump sum of $15k for FSD on the expectation that their cars would soon pay for themselves as robotaxies. I feel for them since they're unlikely to see Level 5 autonomy within the lifespan of the vehicle. https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/12/business/tesla-fsd-autopilot-lawsuit/index.html

TomTX

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1873 on: April 06, 2023, 04:50:30 PM »
As the saying goes, the proof is in the eating of the pudding. Tesla FSD is Level 2, Cruise and Waymo are Level 4 with regulatory oversight that includes providing data for public scrutiny.
The (rather enormous) problem with your position is that the "level 4" for Cruise and Waymo has insanely tight geographic controls and they don't seem to be on a trajectory for generalizing from those extremely limited areas.

EchoStache

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1874 on: April 06, 2023, 05:04:40 PM »
Tesla has millions of cars everywhere feeding data to improve their performance compared to a tiny scale (hundreds of cars under limited conditions/area) for Waymo/cruise.

This is magical thinking. Cracking the self-driving nut isn't simply a brute force problem... 10x more data won't move things along 10x faster. Even industry insiders have admitted that Level 5 is a lot more difficult than anticipated. Everyone got excited about the initial progress, but it turns out the early phase stuff was the easy part, and even then some of what we saw was fake.

Also Tesla is already a viable use case more so than Cruise and Waymo in that they sell FSD at scale as a successful commercial product and contribute to profits versus money losing small scale pilots.

Just because Telsa calls/called it Full Self Driving doesn't mean it's actually self driving or anywhere near Level 5. Tesla FSD Beta is Level 2 (note the quote: "Tesla has so far only delivered FSD Beta, which is still a level 2 driver assist system as per the automaker’s own admission.") and always requires a human behind the wheel. In other words, Tesla has commercialized Level 2 at scale, which is on par with other advanced driver assistance systems from other companies. Whereas Waymo and Cruise have actual Level 4 vehicles on the road... like cars without human operators. There's no way around it, Tesla is behind the leaders at this point.

Completely disagree; in my view Tesla is way ahead.

They have many millions of miles self driven with no intervention, and the level of intervention declining consistently. This being done under all types of conditions anywhere in the world, and can be done for entire end to end trips.

This includes highly complex maneuvers like difficult left hand turns through busy traffic.

They are teaching the car to do anything/ anywhere globally that an human could drive and using AI to continuously improve it, with use case from millions of cars identifying any optimization needed.

No other company in the world has a self driving sw that works anywhere remotely as broadly. The other car companies (GM, Ford, etc) have sw that works in very limited situations, like certain mapped highways only and even then limited (eg not on sharp curves).

Cruise/waymo are driving easy trips under limited conditions in small mapped areas autonomously. In areas cherry picked for being easy to drive and then carefully mapped and honed according to the local geography. It’s like a step up from a self driven train/streetcar.

We’ll have to agree to disagree on this as your logic is not compelling to me and it appears mine is not compelling to you.

Yes, we're in disagreement. It's your money, do as you please. I'm not trying to convince you of anything, just pointing out a different perspective for others that may be reading this thread.

As the saying goes, the proof is in the eating of the pudding. Tesla FSD is Level 2, Cruise and Waymo are Level 4 with regulatory oversight that includes providing data for public scrutiny. Are investors really to believe that Tesla is secretly far ahead in this race yet is keeping it quiet while they release modest incremental updates? This is inconsistent with what we've seen from Musk and his well established pattern of over-promising and under-delivering.

One has to wonder how many true believers forked over a lump sum of $15k for FSD on the expectation that their cars would soon pay for themselves as robotaxies. I feel for them since they're unlikely to see Level 5 autonomy within the lifespan of the vehicle. https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/12/business/tesla-fsd-autopilot-lawsuit/index.html

  You say Waymo is level 4 and therefore ahead of Tesla.  Here is what you seem to be unwilling to acknowledge.

Waymo's operating area:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/ovcmX3vyUpWGlqym945vUFsUPFTH7O5FGyYs38yWGCW57Aoi-Cu2TZfOuv4bLYZLCyVHLR_5fNZ6qkdHNXNSYk8P2NQFgtDby2wze_M=rw-w2880-e365
Tesla operating area:
https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nationsonline.org%2Foneworld%2Fmap%2Fusa_map.htm&psig=AOvVaw2iIRkWkE1nC_fpSPtoMV6q&ust=1680908404438000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CBAQjRxqFwoTCNDx3_Stlv4CFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE

Your position seems to be that level 4 capability but only in .0001% of circumstances is better than being somewhat close to level 4 anywhere under any conditions.  Maybe you are correct, but some people seem to disagree with you.  At least acknowledge that those are two completely different things.  It would be similar to saying cell phone company A has the absolute best coverage in the world and is the leader in that industry, but they only cover ten blocks in the entire USA.  Company B provides 95% coverage in the entire country.  Which company is truly ahead?

It seems you are either being disingenuous or aren't well educated on the difference between Tesla's FSD capability compared to Waymo.

If I'm one of the 95%+(99%?) who don't live in the tiny little zone Waymo operates in and I want a car that will *mostly* drive itself to anywhere I want to go, should I give Tesla a try, or Waymo?  For most people in most situations, Tesla is almost full FSD capable. For almost all  people in almost all situations, Waymo provides nothing at all.

Which approach is right?  I personally don't know, but I also would never make a ridiculous claim that the above scenario shows Waymo as ahead.

To me, it seems like neither company is anywhere close i.e. years or a decade away from offering L4 everywhere.
« Last Edit: April 06, 2023, 05:27:56 PM by UltraStache »

StashingAway

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1875 on: April 06, 2023, 06:03:34 PM »

If I'm one of the 95%+(99%?) who don't live in the tiny little zone Waymo operates in and I want a car that will *mostly* drive itself to anywhere I want to go, should I give Tesla a try, or Waymo?  For most people in most situations, Tesla is almost full FSD capable. For almost all  people in almost all situations, Waymo provides nothing at all.

That's very true, but we aren't exactly talking about what current capabilities are as far as utility for customers. We are talking about what current development patterns will lead to the promise of full self driving. So... is a company with level 2 everywhere ahead of a company with level 4 in an extremely limited area? If you are to believe that more data in --> better performance than sure, Tesla is ahead. But more data in doesn't seem to pan out when talking about ai capabilities (see my reference to humans being able to beat AI at GO again because of the limitation of how AI can interpret the input, with no solution in sight)

FINate

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1876 on: April 07, 2023, 09:35:43 AM »
You say Waymo is level 4 and therefore ahead of Tesla.  Here is what you seem to be unwilling to acknowledge.

Waymo's operating area:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/ovcmX3vyUpWGlqym945vUFsUPFTH7O5FGyYs38yWGCW57Aoi-Cu2TZfOuv4bLYZLCyVHLR_5fNZ6qkdHNXNSYk8P2NQFgtDby2wze_M=rw-w2880-e365
Tesla operating area:
https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nationsonline.org%2Foneworld%2Fmap%2Fusa_map.htm&psig=AOvVaw2iIRkWkE1nC_fpSPtoMV6q&ust=1680908404438000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CBAQjRxqFwoTCNDx3_Stlv4CFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE

Your position seems to be that level 4 capability but only in .0001% of circumstances is better than being somewhat close to level 4 anywhere under any conditions.  Maybe you are correct, but some people seem to disagree with you.  At least acknowledge that those are two completely different things.  It would be similar to saying cell phone company A has the absolute best coverage in the world and is the leader in that industry, but they only cover ten blocks in the entire USA.  Company B provides 95% coverage in the entire country.  Which company is truly ahead?

It seems you are either being disingenuous or aren't well educated on the difference between Tesla's FSD capability compared to Waymo.

If I'm one of the 95%+(99%?) who don't live in the tiny little zone Waymo operates in and I want a car that will *mostly* drive itself to anywhere I want to go, should I give Tesla a try, or Waymo?  For most people in most situations, Tesla is almost full FSD capable. For almost all  people in almost all situations, Waymo provides nothing at all.

Which approach is right?  I personally don't know, but I also would never make a ridiculous claim that the above scenario shows Waymo as ahead.

To me, it seems like neither company is anywhere close i.e. years or a decade away from offering L4 everywhere.

I fully acknowledge that Waymo and Cruise have a *very* limited operating area, never said otherwise. IMO this is a Good Thing. It's not as if the streets of San Francisco are easy or otherwise unrealistic. Solve driving in SF and then extend to Oakland, San Jose, pretty much any US city. Build trust with regulators along the way. Highway driving is the easy part.

But if you want to talk quantity, then let's make an apples-to-apples comparison of Level 2 systems. Even here, Tesla has fallen behind the pack:

https://electrek.co/2023/01/25/ford-gm-consumer-reports-driver-assistance-rankings-tesla/
https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/car-safety/active-driving-assistance-systems-review-a2103632203/

Que the Tesla fanbois who will now tell us Consumer Reports is biased, bwahahaha! Now from what I can tell this is Autopilot (not FSD), but again, if quantity of data were the key factor in producing quality then improvements should be making it into both FSD and Autopilot. Instead, competitors are besting Tesla.

Naming it Full Self Driving (when it clearly was nowhere near this), along with Musk promising Level 5 with software updates, was a stroke of marketing genius. Showmanship at it's best, which is where Musk really shines. It's fascinating that some people have bought this hook, line and sinker when it's clearly not true. At this point Tesla isn't in the game until they put Level 4 or Level 5 vehicles on public roads.
« Last Edit: April 07, 2023, 09:47:09 AM by FINate »

bacchi

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1877 on: April 07, 2023, 10:07:08 AM »
Naming it Full Self Driving (when it clearly was nowhere near this), along with Musk promising Level 5 with software updates, was a stroke of marketing genius. Showmanship at it's best, which is where Musk really shines.

Starting this year, California has banned the use of the term "full self driving" for cars that aren't.

lemonlyman

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1878 on: April 07, 2023, 01:10:44 PM »

I fully acknowledge that Waymo and Cruise have a *very* limited operating area, never said otherwise. IMO this is a Good Thing. It's not as if the streets of San Francisco are easy or otherwise unrealistic. Solve driving in SF and then extend to Oakland, San Jose, pretty much any US city. Build trust with regulators along the way. Highway driving is the easy part.

But if you want to talk quantity, then let's make an apples-to-apples comparison of Level 2 systems. Even here, Tesla has fallen behind the pack:

https://electrek.co/2023/01/25/ford-gm-consumer-reports-driver-assistance-rankings-tesla/
https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/car-safety/active-driving-assistance-systems-review-a2103632203/

Que the Tesla fanbois who will now tell us Consumer Reports is biased, bwahahaha! Now from what I can tell this is Autopilot (not FSD), but again, if quantity of data were the key factor in producing quality then improvements should be making it into both FSD and Autopilot. Instead, competitors are besting Tesla.

Naming it Full Self Driving (when it clearly was nowhere near this), along with Musk promising Level 5 with software updates, was a stroke of marketing genius. Showmanship at it's best, which is where Musk really shines. It's fascinating that some people have bought this hook, line and sinker when it's clearly not true. At this point Tesla isn't in the game until they put Level 4 or Level 5 vehicles on public roads.

"Let's do apples-to-apples..." You claim a direct comparison report with Basic Autopilot (completely different legacy software product) and other L2 systems means FSD Beta is also behind other Level 2 systems? Consumer reports doesn't make that claim. You did. I wasn't aware Ford BlueCruise could recognize a stop light. When did Super Cruise start making left hand turns in intersections? FSD Beta gets updates regularly (because data) including a unified road stack for city and highway just in the past few weeks. From release notes, "- Improved recall for close-by cut-in cases by 15%, particularly for large trucks and high-yaw rate scenarios, through an additional 30k auto-labeled clips mined from the fleet."

Autopilot is cruise control with lane keep and follow distance features. But apples-to-apples I guess they're functionally the same on L2 because former Google engineer with no biases told me so.

StashingAway

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1879 on: April 08, 2023, 10:06:55 AM »
FSD Beta gets updates regularly (because data) including a unified road stack for city and highway just in the past few weeks.

I still don't think that 99% of the marketing on AI are addressing the potential problems with deep learning based systems or communicating those hurdles to the public. It's becoming like nanotechnology or the cloud where companies are relying on the misunderstanding of it to oversell their products. And it works. Just need more data (magic) and problems are solved!

Issues with AI learing https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?p=AONE&u=googlescholar&id=GALE|A637731669&v=2.1&it=r&asid=9366b827

As was mentioned before, it wouldn't be out of the norm for Elon to oversell the capabilities or timeframe of his tech. I do recognized that he has fundamentally changed the trajectory of vehicles for the world- an amazing feat! And even more impressive was to capitalize on the need for space travel development when NASA had been chained by politics. It's all amazing stuff.

But I still want to point out: this still doesn't solve the problem that cars are at their base level an inefficient and expensive system to build our civilization around. For someone (Elon) who proports to be about First Principles thinking, he hit a road block on cars and didn't take any further steps back in the simplification process to analyze human movement, efficient cities and the like. He's just someone who loves cars and wanted to make better ones (he was ecstatic to buy an McClaren F1 after selling PayPal, a true enthusiasts supercar). And he did make better ones. But that's like making a better gun... to what end are we trying to reach?
« Last Edit: April 08, 2023, 10:10:27 AM by StashingAway »

mistymoney

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1880 on: April 08, 2023, 11:48:53 AM »
FSD Beta gets updates regularly (because data) including a unified road stack for city and highway just in the past few weeks.

I still don't think that 99% of the marketing on AI are addressing the potential problems with deep learning based systems or communicating those hurdles to the public. It's becoming like nanotechnology or the cloud where companies are relying on the misunderstanding of it to oversell their products. And it works. Just need more data (magic) and problems are solved!

Issues with AI learing https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?p=AONE&u=googlescholar&id=GALE|A637731669&v=2.1&it=r&asid=9366b827

As was mentioned before, it wouldn't be out of the norm for Elon to oversell the capabilities or timeframe of his tech. I do recognized that he has fundamentally changed the trajectory of vehicles for the world- an amazing feat! And even more impressive was to capitalize on the need for space travel development when NASA had been chained by politics. It's all amazing stuff.

But I still want to point out: this still doesn't solve the problem that cars are at their base level an inefficient and expensive system to build our civilization around. For someone (Elon) who proports to be about First Principles thinking, he hit a road block on cars and didn't take any further steps back in the simplification process to analyze human movement, efficient cities and the like. He's just someone who loves cars and wanted to make better ones (he was ecstatic to buy an McClaren F1 after selling PayPal, a true enthusiasts supercar). And he did make better ones. But that's like making a better gun... to what end are we trying to reach?

Where are you going with this? None of us is invested in musk's soul! Which I fear may be doomed because he is an asshat for sure!

We invested in a company that has created it's own markets and may or may not grow into a powerhouse lasting decades or more. Musk didn't invent telsa, he bought his phony "founder" status, and I hope telsa will continue to do well long after elon is gone........deposed, retired to mars, whathaveyou. That said - he has some very magical visionary capabilities that tesla has greatly benefitted from.

That aside, comparing EVs to a "better gun" is ridiculous. EVs are a huge positive step for the environment over ICE. Unless your "better gun" can be set to stun instead of kill, then maybe.

Tesla is on the tip of the iceburg for transforming transportation. That tesla is so profitable at this point is what is really impressive right now - and that tesla has been able to make itself profitable while developing the tech that can then be used in dozens if not hundreds of ways in the next decade or two is what is going to make any other things have a chance.

That they went all in for the semi this early shows that they are targeting CO2 sequencially. Why else veer into the semi at this stage?

Quote
Medium and heavy trucks are the second- largest polluters, accounting for 22 percent of transportation emissions. Although this was half the emissions of passenger cars, there are considerably fewer trucks on the road, showing just how polluting global road freight is.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1185535/transport-carbon-dioxide-emissions-breakdown/#:~:text=Medium%20and%20heavy%20trucks%20are,polluting%20global%20road%20freight%20is.








StashingAway

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1881 on: April 08, 2023, 12:52:53 PM »

That aside, comparing EVs to a "better gun" is ridiculous. EVs are a huge positive step for the environment over ICE. Unless your "better gun" can be set to stun instead of kill, then maybe.

Tesla is on the tip of the iceburg for transforming transportation.


I respectfully but vehemently disagree with the bolded statement, and it's what I've been saying this whole time. They're just making cars. Electric cars- sure. Maybe even self driving ones some day. Cars are poor daily transportation. Cars have ruined our cities. Cars are bad for your health, even if they have no emissions. Car tires are ruining our groundwater. Cars are un-mustachian (I'm throwing that in there as to why I feel compelled to defend this line of view on this forum)

Your stun analogy is a perfect continuation of mine. Yes, a stun gun (Taser) is "better" than a gun- aka less lethal. But what would be even better is for our police force to actively de-escalate situations in a way that needs neither as frequently. It would be better for us to design society with institutions for mental health that remove the danger of individuals from the public, rather than making them live on the streets. Much harder and less romantic and easy to measure, but better in the long run. In the narrow view of "gun vs Taser", I would prefer to be shot with a Taser.  Just like I would prefer to drive an EV over an ICE. But if one uses First Principles thinking (like Elon promotes), then I'm going to say, why do we need the Gun/Car in the first place? How about we just design our cities so I can do most things on foot? Why presume that a car is needed for normal American life?

Because then I don't need cheap Tesla insurance. I don't need a two car garage or an EV charger or to replace my tires that hold 2 tons of sheet metal. I don't need to exercise after sitting in a passenger seat for hours every week because I can walk or bike. I could do those things if I want to, but I can be a super environmentally conscious citizen without even thinking about it because it's just the standard procedure. That's why I think Tesla is a distraction. In the 90's, plastic bags were touted to be the solution to avoiding killing all of the trees needed to make paper bags. The environmentalists were happy, paving the way with good intentions. I see Tesla in a similar way. Great intentions by the investors and owners. But possibly misguided, sold on the marketing hype. And why wouldn't they be? The hype is incredibly strong, with an incredible story. Lone American manufacturer saves the world and atones for the sins of the Big Three that got us here in the first place. Ridding us of dealers and, also, they are linked with sending us into space and putting solar power in the hands of the people. Beating China at their own game. I get it. I'm just not sold on it, and the longer I go, the more it smells of bs to me.


Edit: I don't want to make your personal decision to own a Tesla or Tesla Stock the point of the conversation here. We are all subject to outside forces and tendencies. I am frustrated with how public conversation goes, and am sure that I don't know everything.
« Last Edit: April 08, 2023, 12:59:26 PM by StashingAway »

mistymoney

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1882 on: April 08, 2023, 02:56:05 PM »

That aside, comparing EVs to a "better gun" is ridiculous. EVs are a huge positive step for the environment over ICE. Unless your "better gun" can be set to stun instead of kill, then maybe.

Tesla is on the tip of the iceburg for transforming transportation.


I respectfully but vehemently disagree with the bolded statement, and it's what I've been saying this whole time. They're just making cars. Electric cars- sure. Maybe even self driving ones some day. Cars are poor daily transportation. Cars have ruined our cities. Cars are bad for your health, even if they have no emissions. Car tires are ruining our groundwater. Cars are un-mustachian (I'm throwing that in there as to why I feel compelled to defend this line of view on this forum)

Your stun analogy is a perfect continuation of mine. Yes, a stun gun (Taser) is "better" than a gun- aka less lethal. But what would be even better is for our police force to actively de-escalate situations in a way that needs neither as frequently. It would be better for us to design society with institutions for mental health that remove the danger of individuals from the public, rather than making them live on the streets. Much harder and less romantic and easy to measure, but better in the long run. In the narrow view of "gun vs Taser", I would prefer to be shot with a Taser.  Just like I would prefer to drive an EV over an ICE. But if one uses First Principles thinking (like Elon promotes), then I'm going to say, why do we need the Gun/Car in the first place? How about we just design our cities so I can do most things on foot? Why presume that a car is needed for normal American life?

Because then I don't need cheap Tesla insurance. I don't need a two car garage or an EV charger or to replace my tires that hold 2 tons of sheet metal. I don't need to exercise after sitting in a passenger seat for hours every week because I can walk or bike. I could do those things if I want to, but I can be a super environmentally conscious citizen without even thinking about it because it's just the standard procedure. That's why I think Tesla is a distraction. In the 90's, plastic bags were touted to be the solution to avoiding killing all of the trees needed to make paper bags. The environmentalists were happy, paving the way with good intentions. I see Tesla in a similar way. Great intentions by the investors and owners. But possibly misguided, sold on the marketing hype. And why wouldn't they be? The hype is incredibly strong, with an incredible story. Lone American manufacturer saves the world and atones for the sins of the Big Three that got us here in the first place. Ridding us of dealers and, also, they are linked with sending us into space and putting solar power in the hands of the people. Beating China at their own game. I get it. I'm just not sold on it, and the longer I go, the more it smells of bs to me.


Edit: I don't want to make your personal decision to own a Tesla or Tesla Stock the point of the conversation here. We are all subject to outside forces and tendencies. I am frustrated with how public conversation goes, and am sure that I don't know everything.

If you are frustrated with public conversation, being a fan of a particular company and products seems the least concerning thing about public converstion! Women's bodily autonomy, civil right, school shootings......these are all much more pressing than if tesla is living up to its hype.

meanwhile.....

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-01/the-carbon-footprint-of-mcdonald-s-menu-very-big#xj4y7vzkg



EchoStache

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1883 on: April 09, 2023, 10:30:20 AM »
I saw this and felt like it is a great video for those wondering/debating about the capabilities/strategies of Waymo vs FSD.

This video is a ~15 minute drive in Waymo's geofenced area comparing the capability on the exact same route at the exact same time.  Heavy advantage for Waymo here as it is within their small geofenced area.  What Tesla does in this video, it can do anywhere in the USA.

For anyone open minded who wants to honestly compare and contrast the two, I thought this was very informative!

https://youtu.be/2Pj92FZePpg


« Last Edit: April 09, 2023, 10:50:41 AM by UltraStache »

mistymoney

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1884 on: April 09, 2023, 01:11:13 PM »
I saw this and felt like it is a great video for those wondering/debating about the capabilities/strategies of Waymo vs FSD.

This video is a ~15 minute drive in Waymo's geofenced area comparing the capability on the exact same route at the exact same time.  Heavy advantage for Waymo here as it is within their small geofenced area.  What Tesla does in this video, it can do anywhere in the USA.

For anyone open minded who wants to honestly compare and contrast the two, I thought this was very informative!

https://youtu.be/2Pj92FZePpg

Pretty interesting!

One thing that hasn't been addressed here is the equipement on top of the waymo and cruise cars vs totally builtin with tesla. Not sure what future plans are for that - is cruise part of/partnered with an auto manufacturer?

Is waymo/cruise only going for the taxi piece? not for car owners?

also found this of interest!

IDRV - iShares Self-Driving EV and Tech ETF

StashingAway

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1885 on: April 09, 2023, 04:53:34 PM »

If you are frustrated with public conversation, being a fan of a particular company and products seems the least concerning thing about public converstion! Women's bodily autonomy, civil right, school shootings......these are all much more pressing than if tesla is living up to its hype.


Maybe, maybe not. Hear me out. The mental health in this country is declining- especially in young people. One possible reason for that is kids don't really play outside anymore. They certainly don't normally just wander around neighborhoods like they used to in most of the country. Parents don't like their kids playing in the streets... largely because it feels dangerous (pedestrian deaths have gone up!). There's also nowhere to go. Living in a suburban neighborhood of the 21st century... there's no hangouts anymore. It's just houses. Fewer public parks, town squares and the like. Modern cities are designed around cars, and kids don't have cars. They just revert to social media.

There's also a lot less intermixing of social circles. In ye olden times, in walkable cities, people all used to have to at least pass by different folks. Currently we hide behind 15" touch screens in our 2 ton EVs, driving to and from isolated social bubbles, most people rarely interact with the "other" anymore, except in the abstract social media and 24 hour news cycle. This has been so normalized by current generations in North America that we don't even think that it can be different! But back to the point... intermixing of different social classes helps people empathize with others better. Can't really happen in cars. And that kills public conversation, or at least makes us less likely to take our social media news filter with a grain of salt.

All of this is to say that I think that having a country designed around cars is a really big problem. It's not just some fringe passion; It changes how we live as a culture. I think that putting our weight and effort behind companies like Tesla is well intentioned but possibly disastrous because we're missing the big picture. If we head down this path in 50 years we may look back and realized that we made a huge mistake. And I think that's a real possibility.

Misty... we've knocked heads a few times on this forum... and you've been quite positive and respectful in all instances. And I really appreciate that... but, it doesn't appear that we get across any points to each other. Well, I feel that I am not given the benefit of good faith conversation... What am I missing in convincing you that I've spent a lot of time thinking about this subject and have some quite interesting things to discuss? It seems that there should be somewhere that we can agree on but I'm not sure where it is? I'm genuinely concerned for the human event and our environment and think that there are some powerful tools that are missing from the conversation.

mistymoney

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1886 on: April 09, 2023, 07:38:30 PM »

If you are frustrated with public conversation, being a fan of a particular company and products seems the least concerning thing about public converstion! Women's bodily autonomy, civil right, school shootings......these are all much more pressing than if tesla is living up to its hype.


Misty... we've knocked heads a few times on this forum... and you've been quite positive and respectful in all instances. And I really appreciate that... but, it doesn't appear that we get across any points to each other. Well, I feel that I am not given the benefit of good faith conversation... What am I missing in convincing you that I've spent a lot of time thinking about this subject and have some quite interesting things to discuss? It seems that there should be somewhere that we can agree on but I'm not sure where it is? I'm genuinely concerned for the human event and our environment and think that there are some powerful tools that are missing from the conversation.

Thanks for the opportunity to address this directly.

IMO what tesla may accomplish as a profit driven organization is not the same the things as addressing the car culture you call out. Those are things that need to come from a community and/or government perspective. So it seems unfair and/or disengenious to pivot to that in a discussion about tesla.

I do think tesla is just getting started, and in ways that may address these concerns - such as reconfiguring public transportation making it more timely, reliable, 24 hours, and maybe on demand. (or may not! who knows! but autonomous bus routes seem easy peasy after FSD is done....but maybe they only want to do taxi? who knows!) But it would still be up to communities to adopt and purchase whatever offerings there are. And I don't see how tesla would ever get to there - offering buses/minivans to the public - without being here first - with cars and a profit center.

And it's really nice to think about everyone being healthy and active in nice places and walking and biking everywhere. That is the fantasy of young healthy people. Some people are old, sick, disabled, indisposed, injured, having a super crampy period. And they need to go to doctors' offices, and pharmacies, and food stores when they don't want to and don't feel up to it. And sometimes it is brutally cold out, or brutally hot out, or snowing or sleeting or raining or hailing and people still need to get to work or get fired. And some areas are dangerous - from crime, or industrial areas where foot traffic is unexpected and not safe, and these may occur between where a body lives and where they need to go to work, shop, or visit family and friends.

Right now, people still need and want cars for a lot of different reasons. Tesla is offering a better alternative to ICE. I don't know where tesla and public transit may be in 10 years. But I don't see holding tesla accountable for this. And then Ford And GM given a total pass!

Paper Chaser

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1887 on: April 10, 2023, 05:06:39 AM »
I saw this and felt like it is a great video for those wondering/debating about the capabilities/strategies of Waymo vs FSD.

This video is a ~15 minute drive in Waymo's geofenced area comparing the capability on the exact same route at the exact same time.  Heavy advantage for Waymo here as it is within their small geofenced area.  What Tesla does in this video, it can do anywhere in the USA.

For anyone open minded who wants to honestly compare and contrast the two, I thought this was very informative!

https://youtu.be/2Pj92FZePpg

Pretty interesting!

One thing that hasn't been addressed here is the equipement on top of the waymo and cruise cars vs totally builtin with tesla. Not sure what future plans are for that - is cruise part of/partnered with an auto manufacturer?

Is waymo/cruise only going for the taxi piece? not for car owners?

Since 2016 Cruise has been a subsidiary of GM:

https://news.gm.com/newsroom.detail.html/Pages/news/us/en/2022/mar/0318-cruise.html

A lot of the tech from Cruise goes into GM's Super Cruise suite of driving aids for their consumer vehicles (which by most accounts is a very capable competitor to Tesla's Auto Pilot but is limited to being used only in mapped areas). Or perhaps that's a two way street, with SuperCruise enabled vehicles providing data to help Cruise and vice versa?

Anyway, the stuff that they add on top of the vehicle is lidar, etc which should increase the ability for the vehicle to "see" it's surroundings without visual input (foggy, snowy weather, etc). I believe Tesla has elected to avoid using lidar, relying on cameras completely which has raised concerns from many industry people. The tech can be incorporated more smoothly when it's included in the vehicle's design from the beginning such as the Cruise Origin driverless taxi:

https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/21/21075977/cruise-driverless-car-gm-no-steering-wheel-pedals-ev-exclusive-first-look

« Last Edit: April 10, 2023, 05:12:28 AM by Paper Chaser »

mistymoney

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1888 on: April 10, 2023, 08:49:51 AM »
I saw this and felt like it is a great video for those wondering/debating about the capabilities/strategies of Waymo vs FSD.

This video is a ~15 minute drive in Waymo's geofenced area comparing the capability on the exact same route at the exact same time.  Heavy advantage for Waymo here as it is within their small geofenced area.  What Tesla does in this video, it can do anywhere in the USA.

For anyone open minded who wants to honestly compare and contrast the two, I thought this was very informative!

https://youtu.be/2Pj92FZePpg

Pretty interesting!

One thing that hasn't been addressed here is the equipement on top of the waymo and cruise cars vs totally builtin with tesla. Not sure what future plans are for that - is cruise part of/partnered with an auto manufacturer?

Is waymo/cruise only going for the taxi piece? not for car owners?

Since 2016 Cruise has been a subsidiary of GM:

https://news.gm.com/newsroom.detail.html/Pages/news/us/en/2022/mar/0318-cruise.html

A lot of the tech from Cruise goes into GM's Super Cruise suite of driving aids for their consumer vehicles (which by most accounts is a very capable competitor to Tesla's Auto Pilot but is limited to being used only in mapped areas). Or perhaps that's a two way street, with SuperCruise enabled vehicles providing data to help Cruise and vice versa?

Anyway, the stuff that they add on top of the vehicle is lidar, etc which should increase the ability for the vehicle to "see" it's surroundings without visual input (foggy, snowy weather, etc). I believe Tesla has elected to avoid using lidar, relying on cameras completely which has raised concerns from many industry people. The tech can be incorporated more smoothly when it's included in the vehicle's design from the beginning such as the Cruise Origin driverless taxi:

https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/21/21075977/cruise-driverless-car-gm-no-steering-wheel-pedals-ev-exclusive-first-look



thanks!

StashingAway

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1889 on: April 10, 2023, 10:08:04 AM »
Right now, people still need and want cars for a lot of different reasons. Tesla is offering a better alternative to ICE. I don't know where tesla and public transit may be in 10 years. But I don't see holding tesla accountable for this. And then Ford And GM given a total pass!

Thanks for the response.

I don't hold Tesla accountable, and I do think that Ford, GM, etc are *significantly* worse, in that the automotive industry has cause these problems in the first place. They are quite directly the cause of our urban sprawl through lobbying and lying to the public. But, I group Tesla in with them. Not as bad as them, but more of the same. They're perpetuating our needs for cars- we still need huge swaths of tar oil slicks just to move around.

And... well, to your point about old, sick, elderly, disabled, etc... how do you think they handle that in areas that are pedestrian friendly? The elderly can sit on their patio and watch people and interact with neighbors, rather than be stuck in a ranch house in the suburbs with no visitors or social life without driving somewhere. Not to mention, if you walk around on foot all your life rather than sit in a car, you will be much more mobile well into your later decades than someone who sits all the time. Overall, the quality of life is just better.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uhx-26GfCBU

I totally agree that this should be a community thing as well! So why am I even in a Tesla investor's thread talking about this? You should invest in things that you believe in. And as a collective society, we put our $ where our priorities are. I think that Tesla, compared to GM, is quite a good company to own part of, or at least could be argued that. I think Tesla, compared to all of the other options for making our lives better, is more likely to be a poor investment. And by investment here, I'm not strictly talking returns, I'm talking about where we put our effort, time and money as a society. The availability of EVs has now led to national legislature and goals (Inflation Recovery Act) that are putting a lot of money and backing into EVs. That's almost certainly credited to Tesla. What if Tesla, as a concept, had been a company that invented a better rail system, or was a city who developed old school zoning with no car based limitations (street setbacks, parking, stroads, etc.). What if those concepts were developed over the last decade and worked into the IRA instead? I have no idea if that's an even reasonable though, maybe a pipe dream... but I think the people who support Tesla would be receptive to it in general.

mistymoney

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1890 on: April 10, 2023, 11:46:02 AM »
Right now, people still need and want cars for a lot of different reasons. Tesla is offering a better alternative to ICE. I don't know where tesla and public transit may be in 10 years. But I don't see holding tesla accountable for this. And then Ford And GM given a total pass!


And... well, to your point about old, sick, elderly, disabled, etc... how do you think they handle that in areas that are pedestrian friendly? The elderly can sit on their patio and watch people and interact with neighbors, rather than be stuck in a ranch house in the suburbs with no visitors or social life without driving somewhere. Not to mention, if you walk around on foot all your life rather than sit in a car, you will be much more mobile well into your later decades than someone who sits all the time. Overall, the quality of life is just better.



You're being extreme short sighted here.

I live in a very walkable city, I have always lived in a walkable city, so I can't comment on suburban living having never lived in one. My city it not some modern utopian walkable parkways all over. I live in an area where most buildings were built before WWII. It's still a hardship to live without a car, and I've done it at several points in my life in different neighborhoods.

Maybe you haven't had this experience in your life but even super active, healthy 80 year olds are still aging - and they don't just fall over dead at 89 before things take a turn. They get to 90, then 95, maybe even older, and it keeps getting harder and harder for them while they need more doctor appts and testing visits than before.

And I don't find al this pie in the sky urban planning to be at all pertinent to a discussion about tesla. Especially in the US. If we've learned anything, it's that the US is filled to the brim with selfish assholes who aren't going to inconvience themselves one iota.

Making an EV that was attractive, fun, with great performance that people would buy on it's own merits regardless of if they were thinking EV over ICE was a genious move.





StashingAway

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1891 on: April 11, 2023, 05:50:45 AM »
you haven't had this experience in your life but even super active, healthy 80 year olds are still aging - and they don't just fall over dead at 89 before things take a turn. They get to 90, then 95, maybe even older, and it keeps getting harder and harder for them while they need more doctor appts and testing visits than before.

Ok, so we can carve out that cars are needed for some instances such as semi-mobile elderly in their last decade, disabled, moving things like mattresses. But 99% of car trips are done by healthy people that can walk.

And I don't find al this pie in the sky urban planning to be at all pertinent to a discussion about tesla.

It seems relevent to me for the reasons I've stated above

If we've learned anything, it's that the US is filled to the brim with selfish assholes who aren't going to inconvience themselves one iota.

Making an EV that was attractive, fun, with great performance that people would buy on it's own merits regardless of if they were thinking EV over ICE was a genious move.

Those same arguments were used by people 20 years ago about why EVs would not ever work in the US... but here we are! The were too slow, didn't have any range, weren't "tough" enough for Americans, what about charging on long trips, etc." and slowly but surely those concerns are being put to rest for the majority of the population.

Let me propose that right now you've got the same tone about walkable cities as the dissenters had about EVs. "It can't work, it's a pipe dream, Americans resist change, what about this specific scenario, etc." What I am saying is that there is the same potential for our culture to embrace more pedestrian mobility in the same way we've begun to embrace EVs. Just because we don't see the path there (like we didn't see the path 20 years ago until the cards fell in the right place and Tesla led the charge), doesn't mean that path isn't there. We need an Elon for walkable cities- some genius to market them as fun and profitable so that people would live there on their own merit. With potentially much bigger payback than EVs could ever give us.
« Last Edit: April 11, 2023, 05:53:40 AM by StashingAway »

mistymoney

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1892 on: April 11, 2023, 09:39:39 AM »
you haven't had this experience in your life but even super active, healthy 80 year olds are still aging - and they don't just fall over dead at 89 before things take a turn. They get to 90, then 95, maybe even older, and it keeps getting harder and harder for them while they need more doctor appts and testing visits than before.

Ok, so we can carve out that cars are needed for some instances such as semi-mobile elderly in their last decade, disabled, moving things like mattresses. But 99% of car trips are done by healthy people that can walk.

And I don't find al this pie in the sky urban planning to be at all pertinent to a discussion about tesla.

It seems relevent to me for the reasons I've stated above

If we've learned anything, it's that the US is filled to the brim with selfish assholes who aren't going to inconvience themselves one iota.

Making an EV that was attractive, fun, with great performance that people would buy on it's own merits regardless of if they were thinking EV over ICE was a genious move.

Those same arguments were used by people 20 years ago about why EVs would not ever work in the US... but here we are! The were too slow, didn't have any range, weren't "tough" enough for Americans, what about charging on long trips, etc." and slowly but surely those concerns are being put to rest for the majority of the population.

Let me propose that right now you've got the same tone about walkable cities as the dissenters had about EVs. "It can't work, it's a pipe dream, Americans resist change, what about this specific scenario, etc." What I am saying is that there is the same potential for our culture to embrace more pedestrian mobility in the same way we've begun to embrace EVs. Just because we don't see the path there (like we didn't see the path 20 years ago until the cards fell in the right place and Tesla led the charge), doesn't mean that path isn't there. We need an Elon for walkable cities- some genius to market them as fun and profitable so that people would live there on their own merit. With potentially much bigger payback than EVs could ever give us.

I really think you should start your own thread about walkable cities. This thread is about tesla as an investment, and repeatedly veering into this line of discourse is just kind of odd.

What attractive investment opportunities exist for walkable cities? Or could potentially exist? If nothing, then could be a general discussion if it is just about urban planning aspect?

And IMO investing in telsa is better than investing in mcdonald's, walmart, philipp morris, exxon, boeing, conoco phillips, et al. You know, the sp500? So unless you have echewed investing in all these kinds of companies, I'm not sure what you are trying to preach here.

mistymoney

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1893 on: April 11, 2023, 11:33:02 AM »
Meanwhile!

Quote
Someone with a lot of money to spend has taken a bullish stance on Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA).

And retail traders should know.

We noticed this today when the big position showed up on publicly available options history that we track here at Benzinga.

Whether this is an institution or just a wealthy individual, we don't know. But when something this big happens with TSLA, it often means somebody knows something is about to happen.

was waiting for some funds to settle yesterday to pick up 2 more shares....but then tsla shot up like 6%....up more today, maybe due to this?  Now I don't have enough to buy two shares! Wondering if I should just get one, or wait a few days see if this shakes out? In my super junior "timing the market" with my $350 odd ><D


EchoStache

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1894 on: April 11, 2023, 12:32:26 PM »
Meanwhile!

Quote
Someone with a lot of money to spend has taken a bullish stance on Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA).

And retail traders should know.

We noticed this today when the big position showed up on publicly available options history that we track here at Benzinga.

Whether this is an institution or just a wealthy individual, we don't know. But when something this big happens with TSLA, it often means somebody knows something is about to happen.

was waiting for some funds to settle yesterday to pick up 2 more shares....but then tsla shot up like 6%....up more today, maybe due to this?  Now I don't have enough to buy two shares! Wondering if I should just get one, or wait a few days see if this shakes out? In my super junior "timing the market" with my $350 odd ><D

I think Tesla has tremendous long term potential as a company/stock.  At some point in the somewhat near future as their sales continue to explode and revenue continues to explode with solar, batteries, FSD, etc etc, their stock is likely to climb.  In the meantime, the stock seems to be heavily manipulated and volatile on a day to day basis.

My point is that, since buying a single stock like Tesla is just kind of having fun with a small % of our/your money, then I don't see the harm in having fun with "timing" things and trying to buy on a little dip here and there.  IF its something you enjoy doing and don't see it as a headache.  You could always put in a limit order to buy at XYZ price which matches your available funds.

mistymoney

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1895 on: April 11, 2023, 01:19:56 PM »
Meanwhile!

Quote
Someone with a lot of money to spend has taken a bullish stance on Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA).

And retail traders should know.

We noticed this today when the big position showed up on publicly available options history that we track here at Benzinga.

Whether this is an institution or just a wealthy individual, we don't know. But when something this big happens with TSLA, it often means somebody knows something is about to happen.

was waiting for some funds to settle yesterday to pick up 2 more shares....but then tsla shot up like 6%....up more today, maybe due to this?  Now I don't have enough to buy two shares! Wondering if I should just get one, or wait a few days see if this shakes out? In my super junior "timing the market" with my $350 odd ><D

I think Tesla has tremendous long term potential as a company/stock.  At some point in the somewhat near future as their sales continue to explode and revenue continues to explode with solar, batteries, FSD, etc etc, their stock is likely to climb.  In the meantime, the stock seems to be heavily manipulated and volatile on a day to day basis.

My point is that, since buying a single stock like Tesla is just kind of having fun with a small % of our/your money, then I don't see the harm in having fun with "timing" things and trying to buy on a little dip here and there.  IF its something you enjoy doing and don't see it as a headache.  You could always put in a limit order to buy at XYZ price which matches your available funds.

Interesting thoughts, thanks for this POV! I think I do have some fun trying to bargain shop. :) And I have learned more about stocks in general.

So fun and educational! Worth the cost of admission.

StashingAway

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1896 on: April 11, 2023, 03:02:05 PM »

I really think you should start your own thread about walkable cities. This thread is about tesla as an investment, and repeatedly veering into this line of discourse is just kind of odd.

What attractive investment opportunities exist for walkable cities? Or could potentially exist? If nothing, then could be a general discussion if it is just about urban planning aspect?

And IMO investing in telsa is better than investing in mcdonald's, walmart, philipp morris, exxon, boeing, conoco phillips, et al. You know, the sp500? So unless you have echewed investing in all these kinds of companies, I'm not sure what you are trying to preach here.

Fair enough. My one (very minor) reply is that I am interested in communicating with people involved in EVs, not with those already interested in walkable cities. But I understand how this is bothersome in here to many. If I started such a thread, what are the chances that most people in this thread would participate in it?

..I need some way to block this thread so it doesn't keep popping up in my feed, lol. I will stop hounding for now. Tesla is in my VTSAX so I'll just ride with that.

ChpBstrd

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1897 on: April 11, 2023, 03:50:43 PM »

I really think you should start your own thread about walkable cities. This thread is about tesla as an investment, and repeatedly veering into this line of discourse is just kind of odd.

What attractive investment opportunities exist for walkable cities? Or could potentially exist? If nothing, then could be a general discussion if it is just about urban planning aspect?

And IMO investing in telsa is better than investing in mcdonald's, walmart, philipp morris, exxon, boeing, conoco phillips, et al. You know, the sp500? So unless you have echewed investing in all these kinds of companies, I'm not sure what you are trying to preach here.

Fair enough. My one (very minor) reply is that I am interested in communicating with people involved in EVs, not with those already interested in walkable cities. But I understand how this is bothersome in here to many. If I started such a thread, what are the chances that most people in this thread would participate in it?

..I need some way to block this thread so it doesn't keep popping up in my feed, lol. I will stop hounding for now. Tesla is in my VTSAX so I'll just ride with that.

My 2 cents is that a transition to EVs would allow people to maintain their current commuting/suburban lifestyles while moving somewhat in the direction of environmental responsibility. In theory at least! It's a small, incremental change that doesn't solve 90% of the problems cars cause, but we can at least imagine it happening.

The walkable cities change would require lots of people to cooperate (impossible?) to buy large tracts of existing property, tear it to the ground, and redevelop it. Then it would require many times more people to want to live in walkable places instead of suburbs and exurbs. A whole massive cultural shift is required just to get the concept off the ground. Additionally, the walkable cities could be perceived as "ghettos" - as they were in the 20th century - if issues such as crime, vandalism, litter, homelessness, public transit, and mental illness are not addressed in addition to changing out the infrastructure. Arguably, our failure to address these underlying issues is what led to sprawl in the first place! Finally, the impetus for walkable cities is decreasing as the work-from-home trend continues, and as same-day deliveries from online shopping platforms expand. Bottom line: a shift to walkable cities is a tall order!

FINate

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1898 on: April 11, 2023, 04:18:40 PM »
I saw this and felt like it is a great video for those wondering/debating about the capabilities/strategies of Waymo vs FSD.

This video is a ~15 minute drive in Waymo's geofenced area comparing the capability on the exact same route at the exact same time.  Heavy advantage for Waymo here as it is within their small geofenced area.  What Tesla does in this video, it can do anywhere in the USA.

For anyone open minded who wants to honestly compare and contrast the two, I thought this was very informative!

https://youtu.be/2Pj92FZePpg

Interesting video. Both systems did well, but FSD still required manual intervention (at stoplight and parking at destination). Waymo got a little confused at the end of trip, expect they will continue to iron out such issues. What's kinda lost in the video is that there's a person in the Tesla's driver seat (not pictured) whereas there's literally no one in Waymo's driver seat -- it's actually driving itself, which means it drives itself to pickups and is a true robotaxi. On the surface this may seem like a minor difference, but it's actually a huge deal that Waymo has the confidence and regulatory approvals to drive people around without a human driver.

TomTX

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Re: Is Tesla a good investment?
« Reply #1899 on: April 13, 2023, 06:41:28 PM »
Anyway, the stuff that they add on top of the vehicle is lidar, etc which should increase the ability for the vehicle to "see" it's surroundings without visual input (foggy, snowy weather, etc).
LIDAR is actually pretty crappy at dealing with fog/snow/rain. It's good for getting really precise distances/scans in clear weather.

 

Wow, a phone plan for fifteen bucks!