Thank you for the video link jumping to that timestamp! To paraphrase Elon, he is saying he sees three broad goalposts;
1) internally feature complete - end of this year,
2) internally they believe reliable enough that the software can let the user not actively check in / driver does not need to look out the window - mid next year
3) able to convince regulators in some jurisdictions that drivers do not have to look out the window - end of next year.
Here's where people go wrong. Now I didn't watch the entire video, but my understanding is Elon is not saying that the car will never need a user to take over. He is not saying the car will drive anywhere, at any time, under any conditions.
He is saying that the software will be reliable enough to fully drive the car in all of the basic driving environments (highway, rural, urban, etc.). It detects stop signs, traffic lights, it navigates intersections, it makes unprotected left turns, it can merge, etc.
That's what I think Elon is trying to convey when he says "feature complete". There will be neural networks, algorithms, logical decision trees, whatever, to handle all of these common driving scenarios. He wants all those scenarios coded and demoable in some condition by the end of this year.
This is not something they roll out in a day. This is gradual feature deployment over the next year leading up until "feature complete" which is a point where some drivers are getting door-to-door in some cases under supervision with wheel check-ins but without any disengagement for the whole ride.
After that point it is 6-12 months of training, training, training the networks based on Fleet learning, billions of miles tracking every single disengagement, and aggregating all that user feedback into the algorithms.
They will know when the system needs to disengage. They will know every way that it fails. They will be tracking this data and providing it to regulators for evaulation. And Elon thinks around the end of next year, they could be in a position to make a case for removing the wheel checkins and telling users that this car can drive itself, and keep you safe, and that if it hits a threshold where it can't do that, it will fail gracefully.
So perhaps there will still be the intersections where the car gets stuck. If there is a road closure and the cop wants you to drive on the wrong side of the road, maybe the computer will refuse to do it and just sit there and you'll have to take over. But if you're cruising down the highway and an 18-wheeler pulls out in front of you, yeah, the car has to be able to see that and stop.
1) internally feature complete - end of this year,
2) internally they believe reliable enough that the software can let the user not actively check in / driver does not need to look out the window - mid next year
3) able to convince regulators in some jurisdictions that drivers do not have to look out the window - end of next year.
Here's where people go wrong. Now I didn't watch the entire video, but my understanding is Elon is not saying that the car will never need a user to take over. He is not saying the car will drive anywhere, at any time, under any conditions.
He is saying that the software will be reliable enough to fully drive the car in all of the basic driving environments (highway, rural, urban, etc.). It detects stop signs, traffic lights, it navigates intersections, it makes unprotected left turns, it can merge, etc.
That's what I think Elon is trying to convey when he says "feature complete". There will be neural networks, algorithms, logical decision trees, whatever, to handle all of these common driving scenarios. He wants all those scenarios coded and demoable in some condition by the end of this year.
This is not something they roll out in a day. This is gradual feature deployment over the next year leading up until "feature complete" which is a point where some drivers are getting door-to-door in some cases under supervision with wheel check-ins but without any disengagement for the whole ride.
After that point it is 6-12 months of training, training, training the networks based on Fleet learning, billions of miles tracking every single disengagement, and aggregating all that user feedback into the algorithms.
They will know when the system needs to disengage. They will know every way that it fails. They will be tracking this data and providing it to regulators for evaulation. And Elon thinks around the end of next year, they could be in a position to make a case for removing the wheel checkins and telling users that this car can drive itself, and keep you safe, and that if it hits a threshold where it can't do that, it will fail gracefully.
So perhaps there will still be the intersections where the car gets stuck. If there is a road closure and the cop wants you to drive on the wrong side of the road, maybe the computer will refuse to do it and just sit there and you'll have to take over. But if you're cruising down the highway and an 18-wheeler pulls out in front of you, yeah, the car has to be able to see that and stop.