So when, earlier this month, Musk swore on Twitter that the “FSD Beta 9 is shipping soon,” it came as a surprise that he actually held true to his word.
Generalized self-driving is a hard problem, as it requires solving a large part of real-world AI. Didn’t expect it to be so hard, but the difficulty is obvious in retrospect. Nothing has more degrees of freedom than reality. — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 3, 2021 On Saturday, the company released the software update to some 2,000 users in its “Early Access Program.”
Beta 9 addresses most known issues, but there will be unknown issues, so please be paranoid. Safety is always top priority at Tesla. — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 9, 2021 While Musk usually presents updates and new releases in a rather overconfident way, this time you can notice on his post an emphasis on potential limitations and oversights. Interestingly, this is even more amplified in the software release notes:
— Tesla Raj (@tesla_raj) July 10, 2021 Well, look at that! Tesla is finally warning about complacency, while admitting that its system may fail and “do the wrong thing at the worst time.” That’s definitely a step in the right direction, as much as it is a necessary move for the company’s safety reputation. Since the Autopilot release in 2015, there have been at least 11 deaths in nine crashes in the US, where the driver assistance system was engaged. There have also been too many Autopilot abuse instances to name. At the same time, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) now obliges car makers to report autonomous vehicle crashes within 24 hours. So again, a necessary move.
What does the Beta version 9 bring to the table
According to release notes, which you can see above, the update claims to improve the FSD visualization that “will expand to show additional surrounding information.”
— Eli Burton (@EliBurton_) July 10, 2021 What’s more, the cabin camera above the rearview mirror “can now determine driver inattentiveness” featuring audible alerts that remind the driver to keep their eyes on the road, when Autopilot is engaged. Yeah, it seems that the new Beta is all about enhanced safety, but then again Tesla is more willing than its competitors to test its software updates on its customers… In any case, here are some videos, where you can get an idea of what the upgraded software looks like: Do EVs excite your electrons? Do ebikes get your wheels spinning? Do self-driving cars get you all charged up? Then you need the weekly SHIFT newsletter in your life. Click here to sign up.
