I think it's a mix of effects. Tesla is definitely pushing car engineering in some respects, but as far as I can tell the only thing new in this story is that the feature was added to the cars in a software update. Do you really think Audi would be #1 on Hacker News if they updated the 5 series over the air to stay in it's lane automatically while on the highway?
I've had a bit of cognitive dissonance recently while reading Elon Musk's comments on Apple's electric car project because I have to remind myself Tesla isn't owned by Apple. Tesla does do some great engineering, but I think they have also Apple levels of hype within technology circles.
> Tesla is definitely pushing car engineering in some respects, but as far as I can tell the only thing new in this story is that the feature was added to the cars in a software update. Do you really think Audi would be #1 on Hacker News if they updated the 5 series over the air to stay in it's lane automatically while on the highway?
If they played it the way Tesla did, they probably would. Recall that nobody buying Model S knew about those capabilities up until the moment Tesla announced, "by the way, at some point we've started packing Model S with sensors; if you've bought recently then you have self-driving capabilities that we'll enable soon with a software update". This came as a surprise for everyone.
It's tiresome enough to read ignorant people alleging that Apple's success is due to "hype" rather than superior product when Apple is actually the topic at hand. Do we have to read it at other times, too, now? I hope not.
I've had a bit of cognitive dissonance recently while reading Elon Musk's comments on Apple's electric car project because I have to remind myself Tesla isn't owned by Apple. Tesla does do some great engineering, but I think they have also Apple levels of hype within technology circles.