There's a certain breed of Tesla owner who treats the steering wheel like a suggestion and the owner's manual like a terms-of-service agreement.
They've been posting dashcam clips all week showing off "Full Self-Driving" doing something mildly impressive, right before it does something that would make a driving instructor retire on the spot.
The latest round of Autopilot discourse kicked off after yet another software update started rolling out to the fleet.
Tesla says it's the smartest version yet.
It's basically the company's version of "new and improved" on a cereal box, except this cereal can merge you into oncoming traffic if the lane markings get weird.
Here's the part nobody wants to hear at the barbecue: Autopilot and FSD are still driver-assistance systems, not robot chauffeurs.
You're supposed to keep your hands on the wheel and your eyes on the road.
The name "Full Self-Driving" remains one of the great marketing achievements of the century, right up there with calling a subscription "free." Meanwhile, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration keeps opening investigations into crashes where these systems were allegedly engaged.
Tesla keeps responding with over-the-air updates and blog posts that read like a lawyer and an engineer had a baby.
Nobody has been forced to stop selling the feature, and owners keep paying thousands extra for it anyway.
The fanboys will tell you it's "basically solved" and that critics are just haters who drive Camrys.
The skeptics will tell you it's a science experiment with your family in the back seat.
The truth, as usual, is boring and lives somewhere in the middle, which is why it never trends.
What's genuinely funny is the economic angle.
People are dropping five figures on a car plus a software upgrade that's still described as "supervised." That's like paying full price for a personal trainer who only spots you sometimes and occasionally wanders off to look at a bird.
If you already own one, cool, enjoy the party trick.
Just don't be the guy filming a YouTube video from the passenger seat while your car decides whether that cyclist is a real object or a shadow.
That guy is why the rest of us can't have nice things.
The closing take: buy the car for the car, not for a feature that's perpetually two years away from being finished.
And if you're the type who trusts a beta product with your life on the interstate, at least keep one hand near the wheel.
Final Thoughts
Your insurance company will thank you, eventually, probably.