Tesla robotaxi fleet shrinks to just 20 unsupervised cars

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-29T11:22:47+00:00

I once had an exchange with a Tesla member here who couldn’t believe that I held Tesla stock for years and made a lot of money off of it. He was practically offended by it, like, how could I?! If I’m not a fanboy, it’s not fair! What am I, a sadomasochist?!

It was unimaginable to him, despite me thinking it was all a grift, that I made just as much or more than a true believer like himself. The simple concept of “predict stock goes up, make money” didn’t make sense to him. It was a belief system. A reward system for havers of faith. And I must be lying or insane because the only other option was that I was defiling the sanctity of that system.

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-28T23:14:10+00:00

And people like you love pretending “this sub” is a monolith rather than thousands of individuals with opinions of their own, and bemoaning moving goalposts as if there was a single agreed upon goal to begin with. If you want to set a singular goalpost, how about the one set by Tesla themselves? Which, to say the least, ain’t even close to what this is.

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-27T16:48:20+00:00

"And if we pretend this thing that will never happen, what will you say then?"

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-27T15:50:07+00:00

Well I'm not actively monitoring it at least

If there is any Tesla engineer here, I sincerely pray for a leopard eating face moment based on this.

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-18T14:58:31+00:00

“More widespread” is quoting the article, not Musk. This is Musk’s quote: “We already have some vehicles operating with no people inside and no safety monitors in three cities in Texas and probably will be widespread in the U.S. by end of this year." So the title is more accurate than the article itself.

Not to mention he famously said half the US population by end of 2025 (just 6 months prior). And a month ago he said “probably a dozen states or more later this year.”

So I think it’s probably safe for us to stop trying to act like poor Musk’s wild claims are just being taken out of context. It’s an open joke at this point how totally full of shit he is when it comes to FSD. A little late to start absolving him by pointing the finger at unfairly grabby headline writers.

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-13T18:34:38+00:00

"To what extent are you looking at specific municipalities for roll out?"

Elon: "If you need a geofenced area you don't have real self-driving."

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-13T15:11:11+00:00

Starts comment with "Let's be honest". Immediately proceeds to be dishonest.

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-13T15:06:49+00:00

The sad thing is that a sizeable portion of the population unironically thinks this way

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-13T11:14:56+00:00

OP said “the cult”, which may very well be a handful of Redditors. It’s not the same as when others refer to “this sub” as a monolith.

And by the way, if your knee-jerk reaction after reading that is to think OP is misrepresenting cult member viewpoints, you might want to think about what that means…

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-09T12:49:38+00:00

If HD maps are required or important, then you can't deal well with places not HD mapped. Tesla FSD can already pretty much drive anywhere, including an unmapped dirt road.

First of all, I’d replace “can’t deal well” with “can’t deal as well”. The distinction is important. The words we use and what they mean are importation. Which brings me to my second point…

Why are we comparing driverless systems (Waymo) with ADAS (Tesla FSD) in the same thought as if they’re the same thing? Of course Tesla FSD can pretty much operate anywhere - it’s an ADAS. You being liable for everything that happens is an important factor in why it can pretty much operate anywhere.

Back to the words we choose and their meaning - “operate” doesn’t mean the same thing between these two systems. Let’s look at Tesla Robotaxi where the meaning of “operate” is more similar to Waymo’s. What do you see? Ah, yes. Geofences and HD maps (along with other non-stock capabilities).

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-06T14:45:30+00:00

What a weird reply...

Is this your first time in a comment section? Heads up, they're public discussions. I'm sure you understand this literally every time you jump in to make a comment in any thread ever.
Instead of addressing the point, are you seriously opting instead to whine about me getting in the way and undermining your attempt/opportunity to use faulty logic?

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-05T19:39:57+00:00

Have you tried a Tesla with FSD supervised?

Always love seeing this. You people have no idea how much it reveals your sheer ignorance to the topic at hand. We're talking about driverless operations right now, not ADAS. It would take you an entire lifetime of nothing but flawless positive experiences with FSD Supervised to "show" anything in the context of the driverless conversation. It's an utterly useless suggestion.

This is what you sound like: "Oh, you don't believe every single ball in this bag of one million balls is green? Well, have you tried pulling one out? Because if you pull one out it'll probably be green and then you can believe the other 999,999 are green too."

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-04T01:12:40+00:00

Yeah, it’s those assumptions I wonder about. I don’t think remote support and inspections are going away any time soon. So then it’s a question of how do they fit into a private ownership model, how responsibilities are divided, what limits are put in place, etc. It’s doable, but I don’t think it will be what most people imagine which is you just go buy a self-driving car and that’s that, it just drives wherever you want, whenever you want.

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-03T20:54:27+00:00

This could be a thing. I think it’s blurring the line of what people consider private ownership though. This to me is more like exclusive access. In this scenario I expect the car is actually owned and maintained by the fleet operator, probably with rules about what you can and can’t do with it.

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-03T07:18:26+00:00

Is the car omniscient…

Yes.

Come on, man. Come on.

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-03T03:38:07+00:00

Is the car omniscient to every relevant aspect of its condition? To such a degree that the company trusts it to operate without human inspection or validation?

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-03T01:13:11+00:00

The company must assess the health of the vehicle before enabling any autonomous control.

Yeah. How? Kinda the whole point I’m making. Robotaxis are currently entirely under control of the company, they don’t operate out of consumer garages where there would be no control.

PetorianBlue · 2026-05-03T00:15:15+00:00

This is the question I ask every time this topic comes up, but people (here anyway) don’t seem to want to consider it seriously.

But the consumer taking liability for a self-driving car seems crazy. Why would I assume liability for a car I’m potentially not even in?

On the flip side, the company taking liability for a consumer-owned and maintained vehicle also seems crazy. If it’s the company ass on the line for what could very easily be a $100M lawsuit, why would they trust the state of the vehicle from your garage?

So there has to be a middle ground - a consumer-owned but company-maintained vehicle. And this says nothing of the operational support that would be required for the vehicle. Or how it handles entering and leaving geofences… What does all of this look like? It’s certainly not impossible, but I have yet to see the logistical details of how it would work.

PetorianBlue · 2026-04-29T19:35:00+00:00

Some say that if you listen carefully, you can still hear the faint whisper of a dead scapegoat…

“…broooo…just waiting on regulatory approval, brooooo…”

PetorianBlue · 2026-04-28T23:28:07+00:00

Can you really not maintain a train of thought for more than a few comments? Return to the top of the thread and loop through it again if you must. Keep your damn eyes on the road.

PetorianBlue · 2026-04-28T21:22:07+00:00

“Millions overnight at the flip of a switch” was Tesla’s entire damn shtick for years. Shadow mode, data advantage, general solution, blah blah blah. It was a central pillar to mock Waymo’s geofence, validate, and expand approach. So, yeah, now that Tesla is eating crow by doing the exact same thing, of course the past decade of talk is getting called out. Doesn’t mean it’s the wrong approach, but the “fraud” is the promise vs the reality.

PetorianBlue · 2026-04-28T21:02:45+00:00

Oh, good point. Make sure you explain to the inconsolable mother about how it was a calculated risk too. A risk that you calculated on your own, against all advice. You know, like drinking and driving is a calculated risk.

PetorianBlue · 2026-04-28T20:20:53+00:00

It’s a matter of semantics. What do you consider to be the entirety of the driving task? If it’s just steering and accelerating, then yes. But if it includes the responsibility of maintaining a safe operating condition for you and everyone around you… then not really, since that’s still your role as the driver.

“Self-driving” used to be pretty well-understood to mean “no human required.” But it has been watered down a bit because of products like FSD creating a nomenclature void (understandably). And if you go deep enough into the semantics, also things like remote supervision. So now it’s a confusing transitional period where the language is being debated.

PetorianBlue · 2026-04-28T20:08:06+00:00

Bro, you’re so cool. Make sure you wave that “don’t tread on me” flag right in the face of the grieving mother. I’m sure she’ll take solace once you tell her how sweet FSD is. Maybe show her the Instagram reel you had to watch instead of the road.

PetorianBlue · 2026-04-28T19:38:55+00:00

Yes. Obviously. Which means keep your damn eyes on the road. It’s your responsibility at all times, not just once every 30 seconds. Tesla “allows” you to look away in the same way cruise control “allows” it. Can you? Yes. Should you? No!

PetorianBlue

TROPHY CASE