Speaking of Fraud

Following a certification of a class action lawsuit against Tesla for misleading about, "Full Self Driving," Tesla retroactively and surreptitiously changed the terms of existing contracts.

I'm an engineer, not a lawyer dammit,* but this seems to me to be to be a deliberate attempt at spoliation of evidence, which would mean that the judge could (probably should) instruct the jury that this behavior is an indicator that the party in question was acting from a knowledge of their guilt/responsibility.

Here's hoping that the Apartheid Era Emerald Heir Pedo Guy™ gets his flabby white ass handed to him in court.

Tesla has retroactively modified “Full Self-Driving” purchase agreements to add “supervised” language that did not exist when owners originally bought the product. In some cases, the original documents have been made entirely inaccessible.

Electrek has confirmed the issue with multiple owners. The contracts in question were signed between 2016 and early 2024, when Tesla sold the package as “Full Self-Driving Capability” — with no mention of “supervised” and the implicit promise of unsupervised autonomy.

……… 

The critical detail: on both accounts, the only documents that are inaccessible are those that would reference FSD purchase details. Every other document, including purchase agreements for vehicles without FSD, opens without issue.

“It’s crazy because there are zero issues opening any documents on both accounts except those that would have the FSD purchase details documented,” Abcarius said. “Super fishy.”

Electrek has confirmed that other Tesla owners, specifically those with Tesla HW3 vehicles and FSD, have the same issue. The issue specifically affects contracts from the era when Tesla sold FSD without “supervised” language.

………

Making original purchase agreements inaccessible fits a broader pattern.

In August 2024, Tesla deleted a blog post from October 2016 that stated “all Tesla vehicles produced in our factory — including Model 3 — will have the hardware needed for full self-driving capability at a safety level substantially greater than that of a human driver.” The post was removed without explanation while lawsuits were building. It is still accessible through the Wayback Machine.

 Now, the original contracts that would show Tesla sold FSD without any “supervised” qualifier are becoming inaccessible — right as Tesla faces up to $14.5 billion in lawsuits spanning FSD false advertising, Autopilot crash liability, and securities fraud.

When will Elon be frog marched out of his offices in handcuffs? 

^*I love it when I get to go all Dr. McCoy!

From the Department of, "About F%$#ing Time"

The California DMV has issued new regulations allowing police to ticket robotaxies.

Hopefully cops will take this responsibility seriously.

The California Department of Motor Vehicles announced new autonomous vehicle regulations on Tuesday that will, among other things, allow police officers to issue moving violations to AV companies like Waymo and Tesla when their robotaxis break the law.

The new regulations, which will be enforced starting July 1, also require AV companies to respond to first responder calls within 30 seconds. Emergency officials will be allowed to issue geofencing instructions that force robotaxis to be cleared from areas where an active emergency is taking place.

………

Back in 2023, NBC Bay Area was the first to report that robotaxis were immune from traffic tickets since humans needed to be present to accept the ticket. It took almost three years, but that problem has now been fixed.

………

Wired published a new piece on Thursday about complaints from emergency responders, including firefighters, police officers, EMTs, and paramedics, who have warned that some robotaxis seem to be performing worse than when they were initially introduced. Wired cites a private meeting between emergency responders and federal officials in March, where robotaxis were described as blocking fire stations and “freezing up” in dangerous ways.

One question though, how do you handcuff a Waymo?

I Was Today Years Old When I Learned This

With both my late (and not particularly lamented) 2025 Toyota Prius and my current 2026 Corolla, I have noticed a pronounced whine at low speed and in reverse.

I had assumed that the whine was caused by using higher speed electric motors in the drive train which would allow for smaller and lighter motors.

I was wrong.  Both of these cars have speakers to generate noise to warn pedestrians.

It appears that this was regulation put in place by the NHTSA. 

Now, how about making SUVs safer to pedestrians, particularly the cheese grater on wheels that is the Tesla Cybertruck? 

I Want This So Badly

This is positively brilliant. 

Are there online plans for this? 

Well, That Was Quick

After decades of lyings about their self driving capabilities, and a decision by the California DMV to make them clean up their act, I wrote about this yesterday, Tesla has filed a lawsuit to protect their 1st Amendment right to defraud consumers.

Tesla is apparently still insisting its “Autopilot” and “Full Self-Driving” labels are acceptable for the advanced driver assistance systems it offers on its vehicles. The automaker is suing the California DMV to reverse a ruling in December that the automaker had engaged in false advertising and could suspend its license to sell vehicles in the state. 

As reported by CNBC, Tesla filed a complaint on Feb. 13 that the DMV ruling “wrongfully and baselessly labels Tesla a false advertiser for marketing its industry-leading advanced driver-assistance systems (‘ADAS’) under the brand names ‘Autopilot” and ‘Full-Self Driving Capability.’”

Maybe it's time to deal with this sort of fraud aggressively, and (all together now) frog-march Elon Musk out of his corporate offices in handcuffs.

Go China

At least on car safety, where China has announced a ban on hidden car door handles.

This is not a surprise.

They make it difficult for first responders to make a rescue, and, in the case of Teslas at least, they do not function if electrical power is lost.

There is talk about similar regulations in the United States, but I'm not holding my breath, since they have allowed the pedestrian box grater known as the Cybertruck on the roads.

China will soon ban concealed door handles on electric vehicles (EVs), becoming the first country to do so after several deadly incidents triggered global scrutiny of the controversial design first popularised by Tesla.

According to regulations announced on Monday by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, cars sold in China will now be required to have a mechanical release on both the inside and outside of every door except the boot.

The new regulations will “improve the level of automotive safety design”, it said.

Due to take effect on 1 January next year, the regulations stipulate every car should provide hand-operable space measuring at least 6cm by 2cm by 2.5cm in order to manually release the door. Within the vehicle, there must also be signs showing occupants how to open the door.

The flush-mounted pop-out door handle was first popularised by Elon Musk’s Tesla Model S, released in 2012. The design integrates the handle into the door and uses electrical signals to activate the latch. Such door handles provide a slight boost to efficiency by reducing drag.

 

Headline of the Day

Tesla Loses Trademark to "Cybercab" Due to Its Own Staggering Incompetence

—Futurism, letting their schadenfreude freak fly.

In a blunder that sums up Tesla’s struggling efforts in the self-driving space, Electrek reports that the Elon Musk-owned automaker has badly screwed up trying to get a trademark for its upcoming “Cybercab.”

………

According to a US Patent and Trademark Office suspension notice obtained by Electrek, the trademark “Cybercab” has been formally suspended as of November 14, 2025, for two main reasons: a “likelihood of confusion,” the USPTO’s examining attorney wrote, and because another company called Unibev, a French beverage outfit, beat Tesla to the punch.

This wasn’t down to bad luck. Per the reporting, Musk unveiled the Cybercab at the “We, Robot” event on October 10, 2024, but neglected to file an application until November — an astonishing oversight for a company so large and ambitious. Unibev, meanwhile, saw the opening and filed a “Cybercab” application before the end of the month. Tesla had weeks to secure its trademark, even after making the questionable decision of not filing for it before unveiling the new product at a highly covered event.

Unibev is using a tactic called trademark squatting, and it apparently has a vendetta with Tesla, having three trademarks for “TESLAQUILA” in the US, the same name Tesla tried to use for its own line of tequila, Electrek noted.

As we alluded to earlier, this isn’t the only branding blow Tesla has suffered for its self-driving cab efforts. Last summer, the USPTO turned down Tesla’s application for trademarking the term “Robotaxi” for being too generic. Or in the examiner’s words, “merely descriptive,” since the term robotaxi is “used to describe similar goods and services by other companies.” It may as well have tried to trademark its cars as Cars. 

So, not only did they fuck this up, they fucked this up at least twice before. 

If you think that they can screw the pooch like this on business 101 and still make self-driving work, you are smoking some bad LSD. 

So Much Winning, Not Sarcasm Edition

I am referring, or course, to New York City's congestion pricing, which, much like London's earlier program, is a resounding success, with decreases in air pollution, noise, congestion, traffic deaths, pedestrian fatalities, and improved commute times.

Gee, hoocoodanode? (Basically anyone who saw what happened when "Red" Ken Livingstone did this same thing decades earlier.)

Surprise! A public policy initiative panned by drivers and pro-car pundits turned out to instead be a roaring success that improved traffic congestion, road safety, and even reduced pollution — a godsend not just for those living in Manhattan, but for transit riders, drivers, and outer-borough residents.

Congestion pricing is a policy which charges drivers a toll of up to $9 for using surface-roads below Manhattan’s 60th street, an area known as the Congestion Relief Zone (CRZ), which is enforced by over 1,400 license-plate cameras.

……… 

As a result, those who do drive or use surface-level transit like buses experience much less traffic. Over the past year, average travel speeds increased 4.5 percent in the congestion zone, while the rest of New York City experienced a 1.4 percent increase. Local bus speeds are also up noticeably, increasing 2.4 percent in the CRZ, and 0.8 percent throughout the rest of the city.

The gains haven’t just been about convenience, either. The reduced volume of cars has led to marked improvements in pollution and traffic safety for motorists, cyclists and pedestrians. It also raised more than half a billion dollars for the city’s beleaguered public transportation system. 

Car centric cities are an idea that has failed.

Only 10 at a Time

Someone managed to get the number of robotaxis that Tesla is operating in Austin, and simultaneously operating vehicles could be counted without taking off your shoes.

Yep,fewer than 10 cars at a time. 

If Elon Musk is to be believed, millions of driverless Tesla Robotaxis are set to conquer the streets of America by next year.

Right now, however, his tiny fleet would be stretched thin covering a couple city blocks.

With Tesla remaining tight-lipped about how many self-driving cabs it has in operation, Texas A&M engineering student Ethan McKanna tells Electrek that he’s created an online tracker that keeps tabs on the automaker’s service in Austin, Texas by reverse-engineering its ride-hailing app. It shows that just 32 different Tesla Model Ys are currently operating as part of the Robotaxi network — and worse yet, most of the cars don’t even operate concurrently: the data suggests that fewer than ten robotaxis are giving rides at the same time.

This to me seems to be an indication that there are a small number people who are constantly monitoring the vehicles, and so they cannot scale at the rate that the Apartheid Era Emerald Heir Pedo Guy™ is claiming.

Elon Musk is a snollygoster.

Not Gonna End Well

You may not have read about it, but one of Waymo's self-driving taxis ran over a beloved bodega cat in San Francisco, prompting community outrage.

It appears that Waymo's response is to activate asshole mode for their artificial intelligence driver software:

It was like a scene out of a movie: a pair of white Jaguars zipping through a two-lane tunnel, changing lanes at the same time in a zigzag formation. But this one had a twist. They were both Waymos, the self-driving vehicles known for their achingly cautious behavior. 

“I had never seen anyone switch lanes in that tunnel,” says Sophia Yen, a startup founder who was in her car behind the two autonomous ones this past September. “It’s driving more like a taxi driver—an aggressive, New York taxi driver.”

For years while training on the streets of San Francisco and eventually transporting passengers, Waymos were the most polite drivers on the road. Pull up to a stop sign at the same time as a Waymo and it would wait, as if to say, “No, please, after you.” If you were trying to go around another car making a left, a Waymo was sure to let you in. In short, they were drivers you wouldn’t want to get stuck behind while in a hurry. 

The training wheels are off. Like the rule-following nice guy who’s tired of being taken advantage of, Waymos are putting their own needs first. They’re bending traffic laws, getting impatient with pedestrians and embracing the idea that when it comes to city driving, politeness doesn’t pay: It’s every car for itself.

In September, police in San Bruno, Calif., pulled over a Waymo after witnessing it make an illegal U-turn. Last month, a Waymo hit and killed a well-known neighborhood cat in the Mission district. On a recent Thursday in Pacific Heights, a Waymo at a multilane four-way stop hit the gas along with the car next to it so it wouldn’t have to wait its turn. Seconds later, the same car decided signaling a lane change wasn’t necessary. 

………

Waymo has been trying to make its cars “confidently assertive,” says Chris Ludwick, a senior director of product management with Waymo, which is owned by Google parent Alphabet. “That was really necessary for us to actually scale this up in San Francisco, especially because of how busy it gets.”  

Let me translate what Mr. Ludwick is saying into the truth.  He's saying, "We talked with our lawyers, and they have told us that WHEN our car kills someone, we won't be in legal jeopardy."

Here's a suggestion.  When the cars do something bad, start arresting Waymo management.  That should make them think more about safety.

Driving is arguably one of the most difficult things that a human can do, and for companies to train their cars on squished cats is something that should land their flabby white asses in jail.

A Stopped Clock Moment

Images from WikipediaIt looks like Donald Trump finds Kei Cars kawaii, (かわいい, meaning cute) and wants to make them legal in the United States.

These tiny vehicles, limited by Japanese Law to having engines no larger than 660 cc engine displacement, 47 kW, and 3.4 meters long are available in Japan as normal(ish) passenger cars, sports cars, and tiny pickup trucks.

During his Wednesday announcement regarding shifting fuel economy regulations, President Donald Trump dropped a surprise victory for car enthusiasts here in the United States. While outlining how his new plans will improve the affordability of new cars in America, Trump announced that he has tasked U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy with clearing the regulatory deck to allow small cars of the sort sold in Asia, such as Japan's kei cars, to become available in the United States.  

………

Trump explained how he saw these small cars during his recent trip to Asia, which he described as both “cute” and “beautiful,” but was told they could not be sold in the United States due to regulations. The president's remarks suggested he thought that silly, and that these small machines could be sold at a more affordable price point than other traditional models. Trump also touted how smaller cars are more efficient thanks to their smaller engines, and specifically named brands like Honda and Toyota as potential sources for these machines.

For those who are not familiar, kei cars are a segment of vehicles that are quite popular in Japan. They are built to strict dimensional standards, and must feature an engine no larger than 660 cc. The form factor can range from pickup truck to mid-engine sports car and everything between. They’re absolutely tiny however, with many being utterly dwarfed by the likes of the Mazda Miata.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure how well they will do in America, the land of 5,500 pound death machines.

So, It Turns Out That My Prius Was Totaled

Remember when I wrote about someone side-swiping my Prius on I-83? (Reminder, neither Nat nor I were injured in any way)

It turns out that it was totaled, needed (at least) replacement of the front bumper, radars, wheel, tire, suspension parts, the steering rack, and the engine sub-frame.

I got a check from my insurer, plus coverage of my deductible because the other driver was uninsured, and got another car.

It was a used 2026 Corolla. (138 miles, long story from salesman)

While I liked everything everything automotive about the Prius, I was still out some bucks for depreciation, and I found the car cramped and claustrophobic.  (For all the raving about the new look, it sacrificed a lot in the way of vision and space)

The Corolla is more comfortable, and while it does not get the same mileage as the current Prius, it does get about as much as my old 2004 Prius, with better back seat room, visibility, etc.

It's just more comfortable. 

The decision to make the Prius look like a Tesla in 2022 was IMHO the wrong move by Toyota. 

Today in the Internet of Sh%$

The good folks at Stellantis issued an over the air software update that bricked thousands of Jeeps.

While I think that the removal of Jeeps from the highway is an unalloyed good, it is increasingly clear that the whole over-the-air infrastructure is a disaster waiting to happen. 

A software update to Jeep 4xE models caused major malfunctions over the weekend – leaving many owners stranded and some in danger after their power failed.

The culprit appears to have been a buggy "over the air" (OTA) software update to the company’s uconnect software on Friday October 10, which “bricked” vehicles if owners installed it.

A Jeep customer support representative on a 4XE forum posted Saturday: “Please exercise extreme caution this evening if you have completed the update. If you have NOT completed the update and see the pop-up, please continue deferring..."

Posting as “Kori”, they told Jeep customers on the forum that the issue was “a telematics module box update” – and later added that the software update was cancelled the same day.

But not before multiple users across the US had updated their vehicles and suffered the immediate consequences.

 BTW, if you think that the slapdash use of telematics by the automobile manufacturers is concerning, just wait until someone hacks into the network.

Tumblr of the Day

https://www.tumblr.com/tawked/780179429249908736/superman-desperately-scanning-the-street-during-a

The author owes me a screen wipe.

This is brilliant. 

Headline of the Day

Tesla Withheld Data, Lied, and Misdirected Police and Plaintiffs to Avoid Blame in Autopilot Crash

—Electrek a brief description of how Tesla attempted to suppress and despoil evidence in the autopilot crash that they recently lost.

Why the f%$# are these guys not being frog-marched out of their offices in handcuffs? 

Tesla was caught withholding data, lying about it, and misdirecting authorities in the wrongful death case involving Autopilot that it lost this week. 

The automaker was undeniably covering up for Autopilot.

Last week, a jury found Tesla partially liable for a wrongful death involving a crash on Autopilot. I explained the case in the verdict in this article and video.

But we now have access to the trial transcripts, which confirm that Tesla was extremely misleading in its attempt to place all the blame on the driver. 

The company went as far as to actively withhold critical evidence that explained Autopilot’s performance around the crash.

What happened:

• The airbag deployed.
• Tesla collected all the camera, CAN Bus, autopilot, and performance data, put it in an archive file, and sent it back to the mothership.
• The car then automatically deleted the data archive.
• Their lawyer, under the guise of "helping" police investigators, gave them instructions in writing a request that, "Specifically crafted the letter to omit sharing the collision snapshot, which includes bundled video, EDR, CAN bus, and Autopilot data." (If there is a lawyer or paralegal among my reader(s) can you confirm to me just how f%$#ing unethical this is?)
• Lied to the police that the data on the onboard computers was corrupted. (Definitely illegal)
• Lied about the existence of this archive on their servers. 

I really hope that the judge refers Tesla counsel to the bar for disciplinary action, and I REALLY hope that the judge refers Tesla to the authorities for wire fraud.

This is RICO sh%$. 

Corruption Much?

The Trump administration has removed reporting requirements for self-driving cars, because ……… Elon has been lying about Tesla self-driving capabilities for years?

Hoocoodanode?

Automakers and tech developers testing and deploying self-driving and advanced driver-assistance features will no longer have to report as much detailed, public crash information to the federal government, according to a new framework released today by the US Department of Transportation.

The moves are a boon for makers of self-driving cars and the wider vehicle technology industry, which has complained that federal crash-reporting requirements are overly burdensome and redundant. But the new rules will limit the information available to those who watchdog and study autonomous vehicles and driver-assistance features—tech developments that are deeply entwined with public safety but which companies often shield from public view because they involve proprietary systems that companies spend billions to develop.

………

The new rules allow companies to shield from public view some crash details, including the automation version involved in incidents and the “narratives” around the crashes, on the grounds that such information contains “confidential business information.” Self-driving-vehicle developers, such as Waymo and Zoox, will no longer need to report crashes that include property damage less than $1,000, if the incident doesn’t involve the self-driving car crashing on its own or striking another vehicle or object. (This may nix, for example, federal public reporting on some minor fender-benders in which a Waymo is struck by another car. But companies will still have to report incidents in California, which has more stringent regulations around self-driving.)

And in a change, the makers of advanced driver-assistance features, such as Full Self-Driving, must report crashes only if they result in fatalities, hospitalizations, air bag deployments, or a strike on a "vulnerable road user,” like a pedestrian or cyclist—but no longer have to report the crash if the vehicle involved just needs to be towed.

Cui Bono?  Why the Apartheid Era Emerald Heir Pedo Guy™, of course!

………

One company in particular emerges as a winner: Elon Musk’s Tesla, which now will be able to curtail public reporting on its Autopilot and Full Self-Driving (Supervised) features, and may enjoy an easier road to federal safety approval for its upcoming Cybercab, a two-seat, purpose-built robotaxi that does not have a steering wheel or brakes.

“The company that probably benefits the most from that is Tesla,” [Telemetry Marketing VP Sam] Abuelsamid says. Though the Transportation Department cited safety as the number one motivator behind the new rules, “there’s nothing in these changes that actually prioritizes safety,” he says.

Of course it does nothing for safety.

The goal here is to make it easier for people to make money killing their customers, and other drivers, and pedestrians  ………

Seen on Maryland State Route 295 South Today

Full disclosure here, I did not take the picture, I was driving.

I spotted it, and asked Sharon* to take the picture, so no traffic rules or basic safety protocols were broken.

I hate to tell this guy, but this sort of half-assed camouflage just ain't gonna cut it.

^*Love of my life, light of the cosmos, she who must be obeyed, my wife.

Not a Pickup Truck, a 5 Passenger Portable Stove

Roll Tape!

It turns out that the Tesla Cybertruck is more likely to kill its passengers in a fire than the Ford Pinto.

Why am I not surprised? 

Elon Musk’s Cybertrucks may look indestructible: hulking blocks of aluminum and steel that appear to be better suited for a space station than a parking spot on a narrow city street. But a new report suggests that they’re actually deadlier than one of the most infamous—and flawed—American cars ever made: the Ford Pinto.

An analysis published Thursday by the auto news website FuelArc found that, in their one year of existence, the approximately 34,000 Cybertrucks on the roads had five fire fatalities, giving them a fatality rate of 14.5 per 100,000 units. That’s 17 times the fatality rate of the Ford Pintos, whose famously flawed gas tank design on the car’s rear end led to 27 reported fire fatalities in its nine years on the road, resulting in a fatality rate of 0.85 per 100,000 units, according to FuelArc.

The authors of the Cybertruck analysis openly acknowledge caveats in their methodology. First off, Tesla—the car’s manufacturer and one of Musk’s companies—has not confirmed how many Cybertrucks it has sold. FuelArc puts its best guess at 34,438, based on “a variety of means, including piecing together public reporting.” Secondly, the five Cybertruck fatalities include the one that occurred in Las Vegas last month outside Trump International Hotel, when an Army soldier fatally shot himself before the car, packed with fireworks, exploded. Musk claimed in a post on X that the explosion was “unrelated to the vehicle itself.” Thus, the FuelArc analysis acknowledges that this fatality is “controversial” since the driver’s cause of death was reportedly a self-inflicted gunshot wound, and the burns occurred after his death.

Yes, I am aware that this is a small sample, and that the data is incomplete.

F%$# being fair about this, and f%$# the Apartheid Era Emerald Heir Pedo Guy™.

Meme of the Day

I assume that this is a Photoshop, but damn it's inspired!

Goodbye Old Friend

Da Gnu Car Front


Da Gnu Car Side


Da Gnu Car Rear You may recall that I mentioned that I was busy on Friday.

I was buying a new car, a 2025 Prius LE, the first ever gnu car that I have purchased.

It took about 5 hours, and many, MANY, signatures.  (I got so punchy midway through that Ithink that I signed the toilet paper when I took a bathroom break.

At 20 years old and 378K miles my old 2004 Prius was simply falling apart.

I know that buying a new car is not smart, but the relative cost of new cars vs used cars has been insane since the start of the pandemic, and I wanted to own a gnu car. 

That being said, I feel sad about getting rid of the old 2004 Prius.  I got it in  2016 with 175K on the Odometer, and really enjoyed it. 

It was my mid-life crisis car, which makes me the dullest mother f%$#er on the fucking planet. 

The gnu car is better in almost every way, fuel economy, handling, performance, but getting rid of my mid-life crisis car, I am acknowledging that I have aged out of being middle aged.

I should note here that "Gnu" is not a name for the car, it is an adjective describing my car.  

I do not name my cars.

It simply means that my car is not Unix. (Not my joke)