GM Killing Customers to Find Flaws in Their Manufacturing Process

Here is Tesla's write-up of their autopilot feature. Note the unfortunate use of the term "autopilot" in the description.

https://www.teslamotors.com/presskit/autopilot

Model S is designed to keep getting better over time. The latest software update, 7.0 allows Model S to use its unique combination of cameras, radar, ultrasonic sensors and data to automatically steer down the highway, change lanes, and adjust speed in response to traffic. Once you’ve arrived at your destination, Model S scans for a parking space and parallel parks on your command.

Today’s update increases the driver’s confidence behind the wheel with features to help the car avoid hazards and reduce the driver’s workload. While Model S can’t make traffic disappear, it can make it a lot easier, safer, and more pleasant to endure.

Along with the new Autopilot features, the instrument cluster’s new driver-focused design shows the real-time information the car uses to intelligently determine the vehicle's behavior in that moment relative to its surroundings.

The instrument panel provides a visualization of the road as detected by the car’s sensors, giving drivers the information their car is using for features including lane departure, blind spot detection, speed assist, collision warning, adaptive cruise, and autosteer.

Autosteer (Beta)

Autosteer keeps the car in the current lane and engages Traffic-Aware Cruise Control to maintain the car’s speed. Using a variety of measures including steering angle, steering rate and speed to determine the appropriate operation AutoSteer assists the driver on the road, making the driving experience easier.

Tesla requires drivers to remain engaged and aware when Autosteer is enabled. Drivers must keep their hands on the steering wheel.

Auto Lane Change

Changing lanes when Autosteer is engaged is simple: engage the turn signal and Model S will move itself to the adjacent lane when it’s safe to do so.

Automatic Emergency Steering and Side Collision Warning

Side Collision Warning further enhances Model S’s active safety capabilities by sensing range and alerting drivers to objects, such as cars, that are too close to the side of Model S. When the car detects an object close to its side, fluid lines will radiate from the Model S image in the Instrument Panel to alert the driver.

Autopark

Model S can now parallel park itself, eliminating the need for drivers to worry about complex and difficult parking maneuvers. When driving at low speeds around cities, a “P” will appear on the Instrument Panel when the Tesla detects a parking spot. The Autopark guide will appear on the touchscreen along with the rear camera display, and, once activated, Autopark will begin to park itself by controlling steering and vehicle speed.

Can't leave out Takata....13 deaths and over 100 injuries....Living on the beach with a Takata airbag still in my car...

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-06-02/sixty-million-car-bombs-inside-takata-s-air-bag-crisis

Those monsters at Ikea are using our kids to test their new dresser designs!

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/after-3-deaths-ikea-recalls-millions-dangerous-dressers-n600011

OK let's just stop pussy footing around and expose this animal....there are around 35,000 consumer product related deaths each year in the US...and this probably doesn't include prescription medications, which is a whole nuther can of worms....

"In 2010, an estimated 38,573,000 people sought medical attention for an injury related to, but not necessarily caused by, a consumer product."

https://www.cpsc.gov/PageFiles/134720/2010injury.pdf

"Few people know that new prescription drugs have a 1 in 5 chance of causing serious reactions after they have been approved. That is why expert physicians recommend not taking new drugs for at least five years unless patients have first tried better-established options, and have the need to do so.

Few know that systematic reviews of hospital charts found that even properly prescribed drugs (aside from misprescribing, overdosing, or self-prescribing) cause about 1.9 million hospitalizations a year. Another 840,000 hospitalized patients are given drugs that cause serious adverse reactions for a total of 2.74 million serious adverse drug reactions. About 128,000 people die from drugs prescribed to them. This makes prescription drugs a major health risk, ranking 4th with stroke as a leading cause of death. The European Commission estimates that adverse reactions from prescription drugs cause 200,000 deaths; so together, about 328,000 patients in the U.S. and Europe die from prescription drugs each year. The FDA does not acknowledge these facts and instead gathers a small fraction of the cases."...

http://ethics.harvard.edu/blog/new-prescription-drugs-major-health-risk-few-offsetting-advantages

...and on the bright side....

"According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2010,3,999,386 infants were born in the United States, 3% less than in 2009. The number of births fell for nearly all races and Hispanic origin groups. The birth rate in 2010 was 13.0 per 1,000 people.Apr 12, 2013"

The population in the US is growing at a rate of around.07% per year....

Now approaching 324 million souls...

http://www.census.gov/popclock/

The prescription drug commercials, just listening to the side effects you really have to weigh against the benefit/side effect issues of the drug. And not only drug but food additives, that suppose to be better for you.

Such as Olestra, a fat substitute????, that has since lost it's popularity due to side effects, such as Steatorrhea.

going with the theme of 'Killing Customers to Find Flaws in Their Manufacturing Process'

means that Frito lays have been using their consumers as lab rats.

In reality, that has been going on for a while, as demonstrated from my previous posts that any new product there are no long term analysis on the effects.

Caveat emptor.

An example, dairy and eggs were once bad for you, and now, there is evidence that they are actually better for you for all around good health.

I think people need to be on better guard against sensationalistic crap like that.

Thanks for stating it was a parody, clearly the use of the term "autopilot" is ill-advised. I am clearly opposed to any form of autonomy being used by the general public, it is no different than letting me sit at the controls of a 777 when it is on autopilot.

To paraphrase an old saw, "A person who has a computer driving his car has a fool for a passenger."

I think it will be a long, long time before we have cars that completely drive themselves. More likely we will hand over control in steps like highway driving, parking, etc.

I do think Tesla cars ought to provide audio and visual warnings to increase alertness when a situation which is deemed outside of the autopilot's safe operating parameters is detected.

"it is no different than letting me sit at the controls of a 777 when it is on autopilot."

It is far different than letting you sit at the controls of a 777 when it is on autopilot! Another world different.

Some commercial aircraft autopilot systems can taxi, take off, fly to a destination and land without any human intervention.

This does not mean that qualified air transport pilots are not present, but there is NO comparison between these two systems, except the misapplied name of Tesla's cruise control.

Well paraphrased, doctor. :-)

You forgot the Ford Pinto.

Ford's Pinto was, for the most part, pretty forgettable. It arrived as an answer to increasing market penetration of imports through the 1960's (to nearly 10% in a few markets -- imagine THAT!), many of which were being bought merely as symbols of youthful rebellion and protest against anything American in the late 1960's. Let's face it -- a Fiat, Simca, or a Volkswagen (or, even, a Toyota!) of that era was NOT a better automobile than the average Ford or Buick. Furthermore, Chevrolet's Vega bested the Pinto in just about every way, according to nearly all of the automotive magazines of the day. Vegas then proceeded to rust away like tin cans at the beach.

Anyway, the Pinto arrived fortuitously at a time to see insurance rates on "muscle cars" going skyward, and, a few years later, a good time to take advantage of the first "Arab oil embargo" of 1973. Without those two circumstances, it would have faded away into autoblivion before 1976. As things were, though, the Ford Pinto was "in the right place at the right time." For a while...

...Its "economy car" image was shattered when, in the late 1970's, "Car and Driver" magazine tested a "loaded" Pinto Squire station wagon (V-6, A/T, P/S, A/C...everything) bogged down with crude "emission controls", and that vehicle returned a hideous "fuel-economy" number in the ten-miles-per-gallon range. At the time, one could buy a full-size GM (Chevrolet, Pontiac, or Oldsmobile) station wagon, similarly equipped but with the soon-to-be-known-as-execrable Olds 350 Diesel engine, and get twice the fuel mileage while having a great deal more room and comfort.

Like Frank Sinatra, the Pinto was on the stage a few years to long. So, too, were GM's poorly-engineered 350 and 260 Diesel engines. Let's not forget the Vega's sleeveless aluminum block: "Check the gas and fill it up with oil, please!" This sleeveless stupidity was copied by Porsche in their early 928 and 924 models. More recently, Mercedes had customers suffering from bugs in their engine management software for over a decade of production. Ford's cruise-control brake-disengage switch burned down a lot of cars and a few houses while killing several people. Volkswagen's "fast-and-loose" emissions testing. Takata airbags. Tesla's "Autopilot"...

...The list is endless. The point, though, to bring this post back "on-topic", is that every manufacturer is guilty of having customers do some development work for them.

"to long" above should be "too long". Poor preafrooding; sorry.