Elon Musk brags about how FSD drove him around

Tesla CEO Elon Musk touted the capabilities of full self-driving (FSD) technology, highlighting Tesla vehicles’ ability to navigate through crowds without human intervention.

What Happened: Musk shared on X (formerly Twitter), “Car just drove me around Austin all day with no interventions required, despite ACL festival crowds!” He was referring to the large crowds attending the Austin City Limits Music Festival over the weekend.

This response was triggered by a comment from X user and influencer Omar Qazi, who goes by the username Whole Mars Catalog. Qazi mentioned that his Tesla had autonomously driven him from Berkeley to San Francisco without requiring any input from the driver.

Qazi stated, “It is now normal for my car to perform entire drives on its own with just computer vision, no interventions from me. Not surprising. Not shocking. Normal. Unsurprising. Quotidian.”

Musk responded optimistically, saying, “In the fairly near future, people will wonder why there was ever skepticism about self-driving.”

It is now normal for my car to perform entire drives on its own with just computer vision, no interventions from me. Not surprising. Not shocking. Normal. Unsurprising. Quotidian.

Everyone made fun of @elonmusk but he was right. Tesla had tremendous insight about this problem. https://t.co/bB5BqjmGUs

— Whole Mars Catalog (@WholeMarsBlog) October 14, 2023

Why It Matters: Earlier this year, Musk said that Tesla is very close to reaching autonomy, implying that its FSD would move out of its beta/testing phase and will be fully ready to drive around by itself without any human input.

“I have been wrong about this prediction in the past, but I feel we are closer to it than we ever have been,” Musk said at the 2023 World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai.