Gizmodo: “Just what everyone wants, their own personal tail.”
Tesla Hoot of the Day
Electrek reports Tesla didn’t remove the Robotaxi ‘safety monitor’ – it just moved them to a trailing car
Earlier today, Elon Musk announced on X that Tesla had “just started Tesla Robotaxi drives in Austin with no safety monitor in the car.” Tesla’s stock immediately jumped over 4% on the news. Headlines across the financial press celebrated the milestone.
There’s just one problem: it appears to be another game of smoke and mirrors. The Robotaxi cars spotted without “safety monitor” were all being followed by a trailing black Tesla supervising the “driverless” Robotaxi.
Tesla didn’t remove the safety monitor. It simply moved them from inside the Robotaxi to a chase car following closely behind.
The move comes just as Musk claimed that Tesla “solved autonomy” again on stage in Davos. Tesla’s CEO has been making this claim every year for the last 6 years.
Electrek’s Take
When Musk says there’s “no safety monitor in the car,” he’s technically telling the truth, the monitor is in a different car, following right behind. But the implication that Tesla has achieved true unsupervised autonomy is misleading at best.
True unsupervised autonomy means the vehicle can operate safely without any human backup ready to intervene. That’s what Waymo does, their vehicles operate genuinely alone, without chase cars, across multiple cities. They’ve accumulated over 100 million fully driverless miles.
Tesla’s approach is fundamentally different. Having a chase car follow your “autonomous” vehicle everywhere defeats the entire purpose of autonomy. It’s not scalable. It’s not cost-effective. And it’s certainly not the breakthrough that Musk has been promising for a decade.
Think about it: if the system were truly ready for unsupervised operation, why would you need someone in a trailing car ready to intervene? The chase car exists because Tesla knows the system isn’t ready to operate without a human safety net.
Now, of course, Elon cultists and shareholders will say that this is just temporary for testing, and while this is certainly the case, it’s not really the problem here.
Tesla’s entire valuation thesis depends on investors believing that full autonomy is right around the corner. Each carefully worded announcement that implies progress, even when the underlying reality hasn’t fundamentally changed, helps maintain that narrative.
Gizmodo Piles On
Gizmodo reports Tesla Appears to Have Moved Its Robotaxi Safety Monitors to a More Sneaky Location
Tesla’s self-driving Robotaxis have been operating in Austin, Texas, with a safety monitor in the passenger seat, a trained person who can intervene in case anything goes wrong with the autonomous vehicle. On Thursday, CEO Elon Musk announced the monitor would no longer be in the car, which was positioned as a major step forward in the company’s capabilities to operate autonomously without human intervention.
Turns out, it’s not quite that simple. Electrek reported that, based on social media videos, it appears that Tesla hasn’t actually gotten rid of the safety monitor. Instead, the company has seemingly simply moved the person into a trail car that follows the Robotaxi for the duration of its journey.
In a video uploaded by Tesla enthusiast Joe Tegtmeyer, he can be heard identifying the “chase car” that is following his ride in what he identifies as his “first unsupervised Robotaxi ride.” Tegtmeyer suggests the car is there for “validation,” which seems like a nice way of saying “being on scene in case anything goes horribly wrong.”
The fact that safety monitors are still involved at such a granular level suggests Tesla is still lightyears behind Waymo, which is currently operating a fleet of around 2,500 cars without a human around to intervene physically (though they do still have remote operators who can take over at any point). Tesla, meanwhile, is reportedly operating about 80ish Robotaxis in total, and usually only a handful at the same time.
Despite this, Musk went on stage in Davos, Switzerland, at the World Economic Forum and claimed that Tesla has solved autonomy. “I think self-driving cars is essentially a solved problem at this point,” he said before claiming that Tesla’s Robotaxis will be “very widespread by the end of this year within the U.S.” If that’s true, get ready for some major traffic jams considering every Tesla Robotaxi ride actually puts two cars on the road: the one getting you to your destination and the one that makes sure you don’t burst into flames.
Waymo vs Tesla
Waymo reached 100 million autonomous miles in July of 2025.
Waymo LLC this week said it has surpassed 100 million fully autonomous miles without a human driver behind the wheel. The Alphabet Inc. subsidiary said it has doubled its mileage in just six months while expanding to new cities like Atlanta.
The company is now driving more than 2 million fully autonomous miles and providing over a quarter million rides per week, it said. It has served more than 10 million fully autonomous trips to date. Waymo currently operates services in Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Austin.
“Reaching 100 million fully autonomous miles represents years of methodical progress now accelerating into rapid, responsible scaling,” said Saswat Panigrahi, Waymo’s chief product officer. “It would take the average human driver more than 7,000 years to drive that much!”
“We’ve doubled our mileage in just six months while launching in new cities like Atlanta, and [are] finding further evidence that the Waymo Driver is improving road safety,” he asserted. “As we expand to serve more riders in more cities, we’ll encounter new challenges that will continue strengthening our service while bringing the benefits of Waymo to more people.”
In March, Waymo said it planned to bring its robotaxis to D.C. in 2026. The company said it will work closely with local policymakers to formalize the regulations it needs to operate without a human behind the wheel in the District.
Washington gets an average of 13.7 in. (34.7 cm) of snow a year, according to the National Weather Service. This marks the first time that Waymo is deploying its technology in a city that regularly gets snowfall.
Waymo founder: Tesla FSD would FAIL a DMV eye test
Also consider Waymo founder: Tesla FSD would FAIL a DMV eye test
On today’s highly observant episode of Quick Charge, Waymo founder John Krafcik takes aim at Tesla’s Full Self Driving hardware limitations and Volvo Cars rolls out their most important new product of the 2020s: the all-new EX60 electric SUV!
The Waymo founder says it’s Tesla’s antiquated camera tech, not necessarily its FSD software, that’s keeping the company from offering truly autonomous robotaxis – and even says they’d fail a DMV eye exam!
Bad Case of Myopia
Elon Time
While on the subject of Musk’s claims vs reality, please note China shuts down Elon Musk’s claim that Tesla FSD will be approved next month
Just as Tesla investors were getting excited about a potential rollout of Full Self-Driving (Supervised) in its second-largest market, China has reportedly shut down Elon Musk’s latest timeline.
According to a new report from Chinese state media, Musk’s claim that FSD would be approved “next month” is simply “not true.”
This feels like a case of “Elon time” meeting China’s no-nonsense.
Yesterday, Elon Musk made a splash at the World Economic Forum in Davos, claiming that Tesla FSD could be approved in Europe and China as soon as next month.
But less than 24 hours later, China is pouring cold water on that timeline.
China Daily, a state-run English-language newspaper often used by the government to signal official stances to the West, published a report today citing a “reliable source” close to the government.
The source bluntly stated that Musk’s claim of an approval next month is “not true” and that the timeline does not align with the current regulatory reality.
Either way, I’m not as optimistic about Tesla’s FSD rollout in China as Tesla shareholders clearly are. That’s because several other companies are releasing similar products included in the price of the vehicles, which are already lower than Tesla’s prices.
Ultimately, I think Tesla will find it hard to sell its supervised FSD in China.
That last line above is interesting. Will Chinese buyers go for Tesla’s subscription model? I think not a chance.
Self-Driving Is a Solved Problem
As of late 2025, Waymo has driven over 127 million fully autonomous (rider-only) miles, a significant milestone reached by September 2025, with rapid growth continuing, encompassing operations in cities like Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Austin, and Atlanta, showcasing extensive real-world experience beyond human driving capabilities.
- Cities: Services operate in Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Austin, and Atlanta.
- Trips: The service has completed over 10 million fully autonomous trips.
Self-driving is a solved problem, by Waymo, not Tesla.
But without LIDAR and better cameras, self-driving will never be solved by Tesla even if it can scrape by in good weather.
A Rebuttal
Why the bull-headed insistence on calling inferior tech “good enough”? Reminds one of Yahoo turning down buying Google because Yang said “70% accuracy in search is all our users want”. Ooops!
Let’s look at the big picture. This is Tesla grovelling for a hockey-stick cash flow. Cars are consumer durables; the adoption curve minus competition always flatlines. Tesla trailing twelve-month (TTM) Price-to-Earnings (P/E) ratio is approximately 236x to 310x. Mercedes is 9 (nine).
Elon, you look mmmmarvelous with the tan! Keep digging in the hat, there’s a rabbit in there somewhere!
Many mistakes Waymo makes are similar to a drunk driver, except the drunk driver gets their license taken away.
Musk is no genius, a century ago he would have been Snake oil salesman selling false Snake oil.
You mean their is real snake oil?
Yes. genuine snake oil originated from Chinese water snakes, brought to the U.S. by 19th-century railroad workers as an effective, omega-3-rich anti-inflammatory for joint pain. However, it became synonymous with fraud when American imitators, notably “Rattlesnake King” Clark Stanley, sold fake versions containing mineral oil, peppers, and fat, rather than actual snakes.
Even in the 1800’s China was kicking American ass, lol.
Musk doing what Musk does best – LYING.
What a sorry ass excuse for a human. Of course it’s obvious he’s a blight on humanity when he has an insane amount of money, and rediculous salary demands. Not to mention only gives small amounts TO HIS OWN related charities who’s benefits are neglible and controlled by cronies. (Sounds Trumpish right?!)
He has no Tesla salary – only stock options tied to extremely ambitious performance milestones
Imagine that a billionaire would lie to push his stock price and wealth up! Note anybody running for US president would win with the slogan Jail elon musk
i’m gonna bet that even in a civil war in usa, most places will be uneventful. And some places deadly. And to try to guess which is which is a fools game only for the arrogant and ignorant. The marauding armies of nazis or civilians and militias like bikers and gang bangers might be on Long Island or MN or eastern KY or wherever………from Maine to Hawaii. perhaps some international enemies take pot shots via militias or hyper sonic missiles……….
Mexico and Columbia much safer. Might want to check out
CDMX is my favorite city in north amerika. plenty of great places on the globe.
I think the leaders will be taken out quickly by drones.
Elon musk is right when he says humans drive using mainly their eyes (though biologicial eyes are advandced sensor and more than just advandced cameras).
However he wrong when he claims ai don t need to understand what they are doing (unlike humans).
Maybe time to stop telling Yann le cunn and his world models are useless wokism work?
By the way it might work in all cities, just like humans.
the movie Total Recall showed us the Johnny Cab
tech isn’t there yet
the author seems to be more sensitive than usual
perhaps a snowflake break is in order?
Tesla reminds me of the book Lies That Came True, It refers to all of the selling of swampland in Florida bak in the 1950’s and 60’s. Towns like Cape Coral and Fort Meyers were the bastion of slick salespersons that sold swamp land that had not been developed and needed to be dredged to be livable.
Eventually this technology will work but not until Musk shifts the technology to a system that works.
Hid speech was infinitely better than the POTUS’s though.
Might be true and justifies a higher P/E ratio but not 300x.
Tesla FSD has been in development commencing in 2016 with autopilot 3 years earlier. Waymo commenced in 2004. It is not surprising that Waymo is leading having been in the business roughly 40% longer. The US commenced space exploration in the early 1960’s and cannot get off the ground now. Tesla was formed in 2002 and is the go-to company for space travel by far and the only company to reuse booster rockets routinely. I think it is fair to criticize Musk for over hyping Tesla’s capability but do not think it is valid to bad mouth Musk for his technical achievements because he is not up to par with Waymo given his late start. I am also hesitant to criticize his choice of equipment, he may know something we do not about its capabilities; the man is not stupid. He will alter his hardware choice if it is beneficial.
As for the chase cars, all the authors imply affirmatively but do they have capability to control the lead FSD taxi? If not, the authors are misleading as the chase cars are just monitoring for performance confirmation and for future improvement. Giving Tesla a bad time for overly cautious monitoring is unjust in my opinion. As for the China approval comment, notice the timing is associated with Musk kissing up to Trump in Davos. It probably much more to do with current politics and protectionism for the local manufacturer than capability.
My son owns one and loves it. It drives him a hundred miles daily for his work commute. His insurance is half for his previous Elantra. His utility has a plan where he pays more during the day for electricity in exchange for no charge power during the wee hours of the morning, so his ‘fuel’ bill is essentially zero as he can program when the car charges. He lives in a major city and one feature he really enjoys is the autonomous rerouting for traffic issues. He has let me drive it and I like it, but not enough to trade my nearly new ICE vehicle.
One big disappointment about Waymo is the common person cannot buy one.
I recently bought a gm vehicle and was not given the option of their supercruise lame self driving option. They raised the price of the car essentially forcing you to buy it. It’s basically useless. Prior year models didn’t include it. Very unhappy with gm now in general. Customer unfriendly and shitty quality. Need to go bankrupt and go away.
trump will nationalize them and rebrand them as TRUMPMOBILES
The back seats will automatically molest your kids.
If so, the cars will probably hold value like his meme coins.
very nice analysis. thanks.
Except it s wrong. The difference is in technology pro and cons.
Waymo uses lidars and many other detection equipment that makes the car far more expansive.
The real objective of Elon Musk is to move the cost to software.
But he refuse to use ai models that understand what they do like humans because peoples who study them are mostly scientists so seen as woke maths.
Too bad as unlike Waymo it would make possible to deploy in any city without city trainning.
Why buy a Tesla when you can get two Chinese EVs for the same price? Now that Canada is letting them into North America, it’s only a matter a time before they start trickling in..
And before anyone chimes in with “CCP will track you” WTF do you think Elon’s spy satellite network is doing with Teslas? And that little thing you call mobile phone that tracks you everywhere you go and data can be bought from an online broker for $2.
ha ha. exactly
Because if you say ‘Elon is a tool’ while riding in your Tesla nothing is going to happen.
But if you say ‘Xi is a tool’ while riding in your Chinese EV you may find yourself in an unexpected crash when the brakes don’t work or car accelerates wildly.
Elon gets pretty butthut. We forget, because he hasn’t been in the media so much lately.
Really? How stupid are you? Forget it I know how stupid.
I’ve found that Tesla gets a bad rap, and normally it is from people that have never owned or even driven one. FSD is a novelty to most and most do not know just how much the system can do. I didn’t have an opinion of them until I purchased a new MY last year. We had been car shopping on and off for almost two years and couldn’t find anything we really liked. All it took was one test drive in the MY. For the record, we live fairly rural and in a colder climate, so all the bad things I read about EV’s and range had me never considering an EV. Range anxiety quickly went away after owning one, it is, quite frankly, overblown. We get anywhere we need to locally without needing to charge up away from home, and it is surprising where superchargers are popping up for longer trips. It is quick, efficient, and has almost no maintenance, which is a huge plus when you drive so many miles.
We liked it so much we put chased a new CT last year. You wanna talk about people having opinions on a vehicle? Drive a CT for a while and you will see, it is almost funny. People love them or hate them, without much education to back it. I am not a truck person but own one out of necessity. Let me tell you, the CT is my all time favorite by a long shot. Fast, efficient, quiet and comfortable. It doesn’t feel like a truck but performs truck duties flawlessly (I haul 2000 lbs in the bed regularly). After owning it I would buy another one in a heartbeat. Saying I like a truck is saying a lot from me.
Now to FSD. I purchased FSD outright on the truck (you can subscribe monthly as an alternative if you choose to instead of permanently installing it). It is not flawless and has limitations. My main gripe is that it drives too safe (full stop and stop signs, etc). But with every regular update they do over the air it gets better, so you can tell they are improving it. I didn’t think I would use it much but bought it anyways. After owing it I use it way more than I thought I would…like almost every time I drive it now. It is actually quite impressive. It has avoided obstacles and things I haven’t seen or wouldn’t react to in time. I don’t know if I would ever fully trust any software to get drive me around while I am sleeping or that I can’t take over immediately, but the amount of stress FSD takes away from driving is a game changer for me with the amount of miles I drive. My mind can wander and think about other things, and I can hold deeper conversations with people and delve into podcast better. I would also buy FSD again after using it.
For Tesla to eliminate the driver in their taxi and use a trail car is a big leap. Are they behind Waymo in this regard? Sure. But it is improvement and only a matter of time before they eliminate that.
Once cars become fully autonomous, what is the point of “owning” one when you can summon one whenever you need it? I get it if you live in a rural area where summoning a car might take an hour but in the city, ownership becomes pointless.
For single young people for sure. For families the ability to keep stuff in the car (car seats, kids toys, bring pets along etc) or smokers etc they will still need to own a vehicle.
Getting to ride in a car that doesn’t smell like boiled ass.
Maybe it you never drive long distances.
Interesting, thanks for your detailed perspective on these systems.
Tell the truth now, have you had your CT wrapped or is it rusting to pieces yet?
The market is speaking in other ways about the ‘value’ of Tesla’s FSD.
An insurance company is offering 1/2 price insurance coverage for private Tesla owners because the FSD is so much safer than the behavior of other drivers beside you every day in traffic:
https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a70074757/autonomous-car-insurance-cut-tesla-fsd-rates/
Carney’s opening of the NA car market to the Chinese will kill the Tesla side show. Elon’s been resting on his laurels and riding the ketamine high for 10 years.
Carney opens the market to Chinese EVs and Mexico just put a 50% tariff on all Chinese cars. One sees clearer than the other. Mexico sees industrial production and Canada sees what?
Canada sees a Mad King next door.
This story provokes a memory of the Solar Roof lies.
“Tesla’s entire valuation thesis depends on investors believing that full autonomy is right around the corner.”
Tesla investors started questioning TSLA a couple years ago according to price charts. The price difference between peaks in 2021 until the all-time high in 2025 is only 20%. Between then were huge gyrations of 30 to 50%. The Elliott waves are not supportive of a bull market since rallies look more like zigzags than 5 segment motive structures. It’s possible a couple of large degree waves 4 and 5 were made between the peaks in 2021 and 2025. At this time I expect a continued pullback to the $300-$350 range before re-evaluating multi-month buy-hold opportunities. Any further rallies are expected to be choppy as part of an historic topping process.
FSD is amazing. It’s no joke. Go test drive a Tesla. You will be blown away.
I agree that Tesla’s FSD is indeed very good. However, it is, and will remain, a novelty until such time as it is legal for the car to drive itself without a driver having to sit in the driver’s seat and supervise it. Until that happens, FSD’s novelty on its own is not worth paying so much extra for it over say what you already get with a sophisticated radar cruise control and lane keep assist systems that already come standard today in many vehicles.
This is the point so many “Supervised FSD” evangelists (who are dazzled by the technology) seem to miss.
Yeah… if I have to supervise, all that’s changed is driving is even more boring.
TESLA stock has a P/E ratio of 300+. Meaning those who are buying TESLA stocks are unqualified morons. The Chinese make cheaper and better EVs than TESLA. EVs are subsidized whereas Hybrids are the preferred alternative = TESLA is NOT SUSTAINABLE as a car company. Like Palantir, Tesla’s only valuable asset is its US Military-linked Starlink satellite network – which the BRICs appear to have defeated in Iran. X is no free speech haven either. You can’t really comment without censorship on Israel and Saudi anti-Christian related matters. So. Only morons invest in TESLA or NVIDIA or AMD or CARVANA or COREWEAVE – you get the idea but lack the brains.
There are a lot of really rich morons out there.
You’re not alone.
Are there two people in the chase car? It would be difficult to both drive the chase car and intervene unless there is just a big red “stop” button.
I really doubt that there will be any SEC enforcement against Musk’s misleading statements. The chase car really doesn’t bother me, it is the intent to deceive which bothers me.
The best and least expensive LIDAR systems are made by a Chinese company called Hesai, HSAI on NASDAQ.
Tired of Musks bullshit.
He’s been claiming FSD is right around the corner for longer than I can remember. 8 years?
Now we have robots in every pot except who can afford $150,000 robot?
He seems to have a concept of sustainability and how to achieve it that ignores 99% of economics and scarcity. He’s becoming one of those people who have money but no brains.
Twitter has turned into a horrible cesspool of racism and misogyny. He hasn’t been able to deliver on anything since the model X.
Drive a Tesla with FSD. It will immediately change your mind.
take a long walk each day. will change your mind about giving a fuck about what kind of vehicle you drive.
I owned a Tesla for 4 years before I posted this.
i don’t think anyone on the planet gives 2 fucks what type of auto any of us drive or don’t drive. perhaps, some nihilist twats. so i stand corrected.
But what is the point of car tailing a driverless car? it can’t stop it from getting into accidents.
So they can do an quick ICE style cleanup and blame the victim for vehicular terrorism.
If Tesla’s taxis crash a lot, they’re going to have to discount the fares.
Or people won’t be able to ride a Tesla taxi no matter how much riders are willing to pay.