California jury finds Tesla Autopilot did not fail in crash case | Hacker News Reader

California jury finds Tesla Autopilot did not fail in crash case

reuters.com

29 pointstoomuchtodo4 comments

bad title:

  After the verdict, jurors told Reuters that the electric-vehicle maker clearly warned that the partially automated driving software was not a self-piloted system, and that driver distraction was to blame.

the jury found tesla not liable for the crash because it sufficiently warns drivers that autopilot is incapable of safely driving on its own. it /did/ fail, but the driver should have expected it

Can it really fail to do something that it isn't designed to do? Like does cruise control "fail" when it doesn't stop at a stop sign?

That's weird because the article also says the plaintiffs argument was that the autopilot drove the car I to the curb, not that it disengaged.

I don't see how a company can just have a blanket disclaimer that says a product can fail in a fatal way, and be in the clear.

I think Tesla ultimately got cleared because the driver activated Autosteer (without FSD Beta) within city limits, and the car manual, delivery sheet, & several warnings on the UI they entered into evidence explicitly said not to do this.

So the question is whether those warnings were adequate. Other vendors such as Toyota tell you the same thing in the manual, but have a “dumb lock” on Auto Lane Keep so that it refuses to activate until you’re going over the city speed limit of 35mph. Expectation for a tech car should maybe be different- I would be appalled if GM, for example, just let customers activate SuperCruise on unmapped highways.

From an engineering POV your customers should have minimal (ideally zero) ability to unknowingly put themselves in danger, barring inherently bad driving that has nothing to do with the car itself.

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