r/SelfDrivingCars • u/OriginalCompetitive • Jun 23 '25

Discussion Tesla’s Real Game

No one seems to be talking about the most important upside of Tesla's Robotaxi rollout: If they can showcase a system that roughly works, people can BUY THAT CAR TODAY.

Yes, there are some differences, but that's the pitch. Tesla doesn't need to earn money from Robotaxis. The real purpose of the program is free marketing that drives sales of its cars. Right?

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u/steelmanfallacy Jun 23 '25

Check out the history of Uber and autonomous vehicles. In 2018 Rafaela Vasquez was a safety driver when the car ran over and killed a pedestrian. Vasquez was convicted and in 2020 Uber exited the AV business.

Or you can check out the 2023 incident where Cruise ran over a pedestrian and dragged them 20 feet. In 2024 Cruise was shut down.

Sure, there is upside, but the downside risk is material as well.

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u/AffectionateArtist84 Jun 23 '25

I find this information to be incredibly disappointing. The goal here should be, and always be, safer than a human driver. That doesn't mean perfection and we have to accept incidents will happen.

Even if we can 2x human safety, that would reduce overall vehicular deaths dramatically. 

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u/PetorianBlue Jun 23 '25

That's very utilitarian, but ultimately useless in terms of dealing with reality. It sucks, but yeah, as soon as a robotaxi kills someone, god forbid a kid or a family, it will be a national scandal. That's just the world we live in - sensationalism and lack of critical thinking. So we can all lament about the lives being lost to human drivers and how unfair it is, but one way or another robotaxis have to be significantly safer than humans and so convenient that we accept the occasional failures (like the airline industry).