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takyon writes:

Waymo says it's ditching the term 'self-driving' in dig at Tesla

The Google sister company [Waymo] says it is through using the term "self-driving cars" to describe its fleet of autonomous vehicles. And it is subtly pointing fingers at Elon Musk's Tesla as the reason why.

Waymo says it is committing to "using more deliberate language" in its marketing, educational, and promotional materials going forward. This means the company will no longer refer to its vehicles as "self-driving," Waymo says. For example, the company is changing the name of its three-year-old public education campaign from "Let's Talk Self-Driving" to "Let's Talk Autonomous Driving."

"It may seem like a small change, but it's an important one, because precision in language matters and could save lives," the company wrote in a blog post published on January 5th. "We're hopeful that consistency will help differentiate the fully autonomous technology Waymo is developing from driver-assist technologies (sometimes erroneously referred to as 'self-driving' technologies) that require oversight from licensed human drivers for safe operation."

The references to driver-assist technologies appears to be a shot at Tesla, which last year activated a software update in some of its cars called "Full Self Driving." The software, which enables drivers to use many of Autopilot's advanced driver-assist features on local, non-highway streets, is still technically in beta. But an unknown number of white-listed drivers have received it and have been actively testing it on public roads — often filming and uploading those tests on YouTube.

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