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Posted on 09/30/2026 5:26:17 AM PDT by Red Badger
"I do not think we should be letting people run any software they want on their self-driving car."
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The software that powers self-driving cars is no longer the domain of proprietary systems built by billion-dollar companies.
Open source assisted driving systems like Comma AI’s Openpilot have made it possible for anyone tech savvy enough to turn their set of wheels into a self-driving experiment. If you have $1,000 to spare and possess a willingness to serve as a lab rat in pursuit of automotive automation, you can buy a kit from Comma to retrofit your grocery getter with autonomous-driving ready sensors and cameras.
With all the attention that Tesla’s Full Self-Driving system and Waymo’s robotaxis get, these DIY options have largely flown under the radar. We may have recently gotten a taste, however, of what the reaction to this aftermarket tech going mainstream might look like.
Over the weekend, a man going by Mike LaBarbera on X posted a video of his Tesla Model Y driving itself using Comma Four, the latest version of Comma AI’s self-driving hardware.
“My FSD subscription ended last January, and this isn’t Tesla Autopilot,” LaBarbera said. With this open source alternative, he boasted, he was “no longer renting a closed system.”
Actually, LaBarbera clarified, what was running the car in the video is “Sunnypilot,” an Openpilot fork — someone else’s custom version of the software, essentially.
While a compelling testament to how far self-driving tech has come along, the video has also alarmed some observers with how easy it apparently is to install custom tech to control your car.
“I do not think we should be letting people run any software they want on their self-driving car,” said Cairo Smith, a writer, in a post that attracted more likes than the original. “It is not Skyrim for Linux. You do not get mods on the freeway.”
Interestingly, some of the most scathing critiques came from apparent proponents of mainstream self-driving efforts. One viral hot take fumed at the possibility of getting into a fatal accident because of choosing to drive “an opensource repo with 3,000 stars instead of just buying the actually good system” on a car that was originally built to support self-driving, like a Tesla.
Another called it a “joke.”
“Imagine getting home with your family, and this guy crashes into you because of some vibe coded PR in a GitHub repo with 2k stars,” the user wrote.
The software has also gotten the attention of federal regulators. Last week, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration opened an investigation into Comma AI after five crashes involving cars that were running Openpilot. In each of the crashes, the vehicles slammed into slow-moving or stopped vehicles in their lanes. Eleven people have been injured across these incidents, and three have died.
Per Electrek’s coverage, the investigation covers 30,000 Comma hardware kits, including Comma Four. One area that the agency is zeroing in on is Comma AI’s marketing, which promises “hands free driving for the car you already have,” despite its fine print stating the cars require constant supervision.
It’s a problem that becomes yet more thorny when you consider that many Comma users may not be using it out of the box, but installing modded versions of the software. Your head starts to spin at all the subtle ways that these mods affect a car’s safety, all without the ostensible accountability you get from a system being built at a large, commercial entity like Tesla.
And that’s without getting into how the rise of vibe coding means that it’s also not a remote possibility that someone inexperienced will use an AI model to customize Openpilot to their liking. Barring major regulatory intervention, we may have to get used to sharing more of the road with people’s homemade robot chauffeurs.
More on self-driving vehicles: Scientists Download Frontier AI Model Into Self-Driving Car Let It Loose
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As long as the involved meatbag is held fully responsible for adverse outcomes, I have little issue with non-meatbag systems.
You’re probably right about that. Their world will be quite different. The thing that’d be missing tho, and maybe it’s reasonable trade-off, would be the joy of driving. For example, I managed when in college to buy an old convertible British Sports Car. It had a distinct personality. It had it’s own smell, feel, and sound. I lived near the coast. Early Sunday morning drives with zero traffic out through the hills and to the ocean with the top down and the heater blowing will never be forgotten. It was in need of constant maintenance and adjustments, which I did on my own and which brought me even more joy and peace. It was unsafe, to be sure, statistically, but it is sad to think of a world where such things are only read about and never experienced.
What race are they? ;-D
GREAT QUESTION. It was bad enough before, we had to just worry about people driving under the influence- now we have to consider software-driven vehicles that may not be up to task, as well.
How many more people are going to get injured or killed before something is done. This is scary stuff.
Our grandkids will not know better they will be slaves to the machines with no freedom or critical thinking.
“I do believe anyone letting their car self-drive is still the actual driver legally responsible.”
In Florida you are..........
“I do believe anyone letting their car self-drive is still the actual driver legally responsible.”
In Florida you are..........
The Tesla needs a grenade port so you can wake the driver.
All you really need is a brick on the gas pedal.
You go right ahead & install one of those systems on your vehicle. I only hope & pray I’m not on the same road with you at the same time. Just human control is a bit risky, but computer-asssited seems more than a little risky. Neither way can be considered a 100% perfect, but there are too many possibilities with electronics failing, even if it was a perfect-designed system.
You go right ahead & install one of those systems on your vehicle. I only hope & pray I’m not on the same road with you at the same time. Just human control is a bit risky, but computer-asssited seems more than a little risky. Neither way can be considered a 100% perfect, but there are too many possibilities with electronics failing, even if it was a perfect-designed system.
These CommaAI devices have been around for several years. I have not personally tried them. I have not heard anything specific about their safety. I do think people using them will be more likely to treat it as an assistant, not a “self driving” solution as I believe it is mainly for freeway use.
The “level 3 autonomy problem” still persists - once you let the driver go “hands free” there’s the temptation to not pay attention, but automakers always have the legal caveat that these systems are “assistants”, and the driver must continue to pay attention and be in control at all times.
That said, it is a curious legal question - should an aftermarket product like this, with no regulation, be allowed? Although the instances of somebody “vibe coding” an AI self-driving car is almost a preposterous supposition, as CommaAI isn’t some “if then else” program, it is a trained neural network, the data and training process remain closed-source - only the inference model, the weights and biases, are open source. But the question of “what should be legal?” is still a question that deserves an answer.
Generally speaking, legislation has continued to be “hands off” this topic due to the desire to foster innovation in this space - but can that extend to open source? There may be a Constitutional question here (?).
How does that work on a 1956 Dodge Powerwagon with 4 speed manual?
“does State Farm automobile insurance cover accidents when aftermarket or DIY self-driving modules have been installed?”
paraphrasing, kinda BUT with this disclaimer:
The Risk of Policy Non-Renewal
Installing autonomous hardware changes the risk profile of your vehicle, exposing you to strict underwriting penalties IF LEFT UNREPORTED:
• Material Misrepresentation:
• Concealing modifications can void your contract.
• Insurers can deny your entire claim.
• Policy Dropping:
• State Farm may immediately cancel coverage.
• They may choose non-renewal at policy end.
• Federal Scrutiny:
• Federal agencies actively investigate aftermarket plug-and-play kits.
• This heightened risk makes insurers strictly enforce guidelines.
Before driving with a modified system, you should explicitly ask your State Farm Agent if your specific policy permits Level 2 autonomous retrofits.
Hard cases make bad laws....................
About 30 feet...............
LOL
So much hype.
Comma.ai has driver monitoring built in and it must be connected to their servers to ensure that you didn’t code out their mandatory eye ball monitoring and attention requirements. If your comma doesn’t connect it will start a count down till it won’t work.
I have with a couple of other people been working on a fully stand alone driving AI unit. No servers, no driver monitoring, no spyware. It’s based on AI vision stacks that treat your path like a bee would it flies in 2D what a bee would in 3D using sub meter GPS as the navigator and the neural network of the “bee” as the pilot.
Basically it always plots a clear path or initiates maximum effort braking if there is zero free space path.
I ported it to my model 3 as it has all the servos on the steering wheel, the electric master cylinder and full CANBUS throttle and Ebrakes built in. It does as good or better than FSD on the highway right now and doesn’t care one bit if I am on my phone i frequently post here while doing 85 mph down the tollway. Unlike FSD which I do love that would have a fit and give you strikes for even looking away and fully disconnect if it sees a phone in your hand. Yes FSD can tell when you have a phone out and are looking at it the AI looks specificity for that. It’s why I am making my own version and will sell it as a kit under a offshore LLC made by Vietnam so its immune to anything the feds could say about it.
Fact is most cars after 2022 have the servos, Ebrakes and XANBUS throttles to have comma.ai or any other autonomous driving hook up its do you know how to splice the harness in and speak CANBUS.
You raise a good point. I had a pocket rocket that had about 300HP from the factory. Turbo kits were availably to boost HP to 400. I never did, because I knew it would increase my insurance rates.
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