Tesla's Smart Summon is making stupid mistakes- but who is really at fault?

Tesla just released its recently improved Smart Summon feature to non-Early Access Program members, and the insurance claims are already coming through.

The first major improvement to Tesla’s Summon came in March, when it was upgraded from a basic feature which could drive the car slightly forward, to “Smart Summon”, which can autonomously navigate to you from further distances.  Since then, further improvements enabled the car to navigate to you from 150 feet away, through a busy car park, based off of your phone GPS location.  The latest update to the software also brought further improvements to accuracy and timing.

However, recent videos that have surfaced of the system in action prove that the software is not quite ready for the roads- or busy car parks for that matter.

Check out these videos of Tesla owners testing Musk’s Smart Summon (and his patience).

Example 1: Man attempts to get run over.

Here we see how the Smart Summon would react to a lunatic pedestrian.  The fact that the car keeps driving when someone runs up to the doors may be reassuring in dangerous environments, but it’s questionable whether it’s appropriate in other cases.

We then go on to see the vehicle cluelessly navigate around the car park, disconnecting briefly in the process.

Example 2: pulling off at an inappropriate time

Here we see the Tesla narrowly avoiding a collision, due to the other driver sharply braking at 0:16.

It’s unclear whether it was the safety features that stopped the Tesla, or the removal of the owner’s finger off the Summon button.

https://twitter.com/eiddor/status/1177749574976462848?s=20

Example 3: this one’s up for debate.

IMO, this is the Lexus’ fault.  If the driver chooses to reverse out of a space without making observations, they should consider investing in an autonomous driving system like Tesla’s.

Other party thinks that I was actually driving because I ran to my car before he got out. Please give me some advise. @LikeTeslaKim @TesLatino @Model3Owners @teslaownersSV @teslamodel3fan pic.twitter.com/ScE12wHqA9

— David F Guajardo ? (@DavidFGuajardo) September 28, 2019

Some Twitter users are siding with the Lexus, though:

@Tesla @elonmusk at 0:02 seconds into the second video the dark Lexus IS clearly backing up. If the Tesla had detected this and honked/stopped/reversed this accident would not have happened. Tesla continues moving until collision at 0:04 seconds.

— Gort (@d4t4wr4ngl3r) September 28, 2019

Fortunately, the insurance companies are there to deal with the discrepancies.  But what do our readers think?  Are Tesla users irresponsible for testing the Beta feature in public spaces?

Source: electrek