The news surrounding a 2016 video meant to demonstrate Tesla’s Autopilot capability is only getting worse. Days after the automaker’s director of Autopilot said that the video was staged it turns out that Elon Musk himself oversaw its creation. Internal documents indicate that he had a very clear intention for its creation and release.
On Tuesday, we told you about how Ashok Elluswamy, director of Autopilot at Tesla testified that the video in question wasn’t exactly as it seemed. The film shows a Tesla “driving itself” through urban areas, onto a highway, and then to the company’s then-headquarters in Palo Alto, CA.
Today, Bloomberg is reporting that emails surrounding the video show Elon Musk’s personal role in the video. Evidently, those emails contain the CEO’s instructions where he says “Since this is a demo, it is fine to hardcode some of it, since we will backfill with production code later in an OTA update… I will be telling the world that this is what the car *will* be able to do,” Musk said, “not that it can do this upon receipt.”
More: Tesla Autopilot Boss Testifies 2016 Self-Driving Video Was Staged, Says Car Crashed
Nine days before the video was released to the public, the report says that Musk emailed employees about the project. The subject line was ‘Absolute Priority’ and the contents indicated that Musk wanted each recipient to record their contributions to the project each day and that he would then personally review those logs.
In another email, the publications says that he allegedly instructed that the video open with three specific statements. “The person in the driver’s seat is only there for legal reasons. He is not doing anything. The car is driving itself.” That’s exactly how the video, which is still available for viewing on Tesla’s website and above, begins.
One aspect of the situation that makes all of this look bad is the fact that the car evidently had multiple issues completing the journey. On top of that, utilizing the hardwired software that Musk mentioned isn’t a great look either.
Defending that action, Elluswamy said that “The intent of the video was not to accurately portray what was available for customers in 2016… It was to portray what was possible.” Of course, more than six years later, Tesla still doesn’t sell an autonomous car that can drive without human supervision.
That hasn’t stopped Musk from remaining outwardly optimistic about the technology and its future. “Something that Tesla possesses that other automakers do not is that the car is upgradeable to autonomy,” Musk said during a Twitter Spaces conversation recently. “That’s something that no other car company can do.” When that happens is up for debate though.
