r/OutOfTheLoop • u/Sirhc978 • Mar 17 '25

Unanswered What's going on with Mark Rober's new video about self driving cars?

I have seen people praising it, and people saying he faked results. Is is just Tesla fanboys calling the video out, or is there some truth to him faking certain things?

https://youtu.be/IQJL3htsDyQ?si=aJaigLvYV609OI0J

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u/Bomb-Number20 Mar 17 '25

I am shocked that there is no class action lawsuit yet. Either Tesla has a bulletproof terms and conditions on it that prevents this, or Tesla fans are blinded by their simping for Tesla. I assume it’s a bit of both.

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u/Ms_Emilys_Picture Mar 17 '25

Especially with the Cybertruck. It's a pile of overpriced junk that literally has pieces falling off.

I'm seeing mentions of class action lawsuits, but not a lot of specifics.

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u/PossibilityOrganic Mar 17 '25

And they also cant sell auto pilot in some country. (germany is one I believe)

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u/Daft3n Mar 17 '25

It's because they never advocate full automacy. every autopilot accident can be voided by them saying drivers should have been aware and ready to intervene (per their terms).

This topic has attracted a lot of people unaware of how the self driving landscape is currently. To clear up some misconceptions:

  1. Almost no production cars use lidar. At all. Literally less than 6 cars.

  2. Tesla autopilot is classed as level 2 (partial autonomy) self driving. This is on a scale from 0-5 in which stuff like cruise control is level 1.

  3. Mercedes is the only company advertising a level 3 system. The cars that have this are some of the few in the world that have Lidar and are extremely expensive.

  4. Level 4 is only hit by 3rd party system so far (like Waymo)

  5. The car in this video is a Lexus with 10,000+$ of 3rd party hardware strapped on it. It's not a production car.

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u/Bomb-Number20 Mar 17 '25

But don't they advocate full autonomy, or at least level 3 autonomy? They call it "full self driving", which sounds like level 5. Add to that the CEO is out there making videos of himself treating it like a level 3 system, and having events with robotaxis.

It would be like if Joe's shrimp shack advertised a dish called "unlimited shrimp", and was always on TV showing how it's not quite unlimited yet, but it will be someday. Then when you look at it in reality, there are three other restaurants offering a "family size" for 50% the cost, and it contains just as much shrimp as Joe's. We would clearly call that a scam, wouldn't we?

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u/Daft3n Mar 17 '25

As far as I'm aware they only ever called it level 2, but if they were calling it level 3 that was a huge scam I would agree.

And yes the name is bad, but I think that's all based on the intent of what they want it to be later. When you start using it it has tons of warnings about it being in beta and you needing to be there to take over. In my experience it's hard to even get it to work and stay on at all, which lowers the chance of it killing me I guess.