Waymo is saying a lot to “drive alone”.
Google’s sister company says it uses the term “self-driving cars” to describe its fleet of self-driving vehicles. And he’s subtly pointing his finger at Elon Musk’s Tesla as the reason.
Waymo says he is committing himself to “using more deliberate language” in his marketing, educational and promotional materials in the future. This means that the company will no longer refer to its vehicles as “autonomous”, says Waymo. For example, the company is changing the name of its public education campaign, which started three years ago, from “Let’s talk about autonomous driving” to “Let’s talk about autonomous driving”.
“It may seem like a small change, but it is important, because precision in language is important and can save lives,” wrote the company in a blog published on January 5. “We hope that consistency will help differentiate the fully autonomous technology that Waymo is developing from driver assistance technologies (sometimes mistakenly called ‘autonomous driving’ technologies) that require supervision of licensed human drivers for safe operation.”
The references to driver assistance technologies appear to be an attempt to reach Tesla, which last year activated a software update on some of its cars called “Full Self Driving”. The software, which allows drivers to use many of Autopilot’s advanced driver assistance features on local, non-highway streets, is still technically in beta. But an unknown number of drivers on the white list received it and actively tested it on public roads – often filming and uploading those tests to YouTube.
Tesla said that fully autonomous steering should only be used by attentive drivers with both hands on the steering wheel. But the feature was designed to help the driver, and it is not infallible: there were several high-profile incidents in which some drivers activated the autopilot, braked and died.
Waymo never mentions Tesla by name in his blog post. But Alphabet is clearly motivated by Musk’s controversial decision to use the term “Full Self Driving” when deciding to police his own language more rigorously. A key paragraph in the post says (emphasis added):
This is more than just a branding or linguistic exercise. Unfortunately, we see that some automakers use the term “autonomous driving” imprecisely, giving consumers and the general public a false impression of the capabilities of driver assistance technology (not fully autonomous). This false impression can lead someone to unknowingly take risks (such as taking their hands off the wheel) that can jeopardize not only their own safety, but the safety of those around them. Combining standard terminology will not only avoid misunderstandings and confusion, but will also save lives.
There have been more and more urgent calls to standardize the language used to describe autonomous driving. Ford recently came out in favor of standardized visual cues that autonomous vehicles could use to communicate the intention of pedestrians, cyclists and other drivers. In the meantime, critics continue to attack the five levels of automation set by the Society of Automotive Engineers, the global standard for autonomous driving, for being overly broad and possibly dangerous. Most experts agree: we need a better and more unified way of talking about self-driving cars.
Tesla, in particular, is seen by most experts as abusing the lack of a common language around autonomous vehicles to overdo its products. Musk recently called Waymo’s approach to autonomous driving “impressive, but a highly specialized solution”. But there is a widening gap between what Tesla says its vehicles can do and how they actually behave. Musk said Tesla’s “Full Self-Driving” driver assistance feature was capable of “no intervention”, but within hours of launch, videos emerged of Tesla customers swerving to avoid parked cars and other near misses.
Years ago, Waymo considered developing an advanced driver assistance system like Tesla’s autopilot version of “Full Self-Driving”, but ended up giving up, being “alarmed” by the negative effects on the driver. Drivers lost control or fell asleep at the wheel.
The experience in driver assistance helped to solidify Waymo’s mission: fully autonomous or bankrupt. To that end, Waymo recently started offering rides in their vehicles completely driverless to the general public in Arizona.