If that's the scenario we end up in, Tesla's very much put itself in a box. It told about two million Tesla purchasers in the U.S. that their cars would one day drive themselves. That one day, Tesla would be able to flick a metaphorical "switch" and "turn on" self-driving in all those vehicles. But if that's only partially true - if Tesla flicks that switch for some Teslas - and only when they're in certain areas - and not for any of the others or for other times, that's going to be very problematic for them.


Yes, it's kind of amazing that so many cars could be sold to so many people with such big promises without generating more backlash, whether it is legal or just damage to the brand. If I had paid $5000 (or whatever it was) for the FSD promise 6-8 years ago, I don't know how happy I would be to just have a car try to drive itself while I watch it like a hawk. I understand very recently this has improved a lot, but still, the promise has still not been delivered on and my understanding is that most FSD owners weren't using it much until recently.

Progress does seem to be accelerating, though, from what I have heard from Tesla owners, so while it is far from a certainty that they solve this problem before their competitors, it seems like a more reasonable bet given the recent progress.

But even FSD limited to Cybercabs with some remote supervision in most cities would be a pretty big deal, if they can do it while keeping the hardware price down to $30k.