Give it time. An entire fleet rapidly growing is training. Every unit Tesla sells is another sensor platform learning.

Do Teslas have something like a black box so that if there's a catastrophic accident at least the precious data will survive?

Not extensive Autopilot data, but basic vehicle state attributes (speed, throttle, seatbelts engaged, etc). All vehicles have this black box (event data recorder) in their airbag subsystem.

There have only been a handful of Tesla accidents while autopilot was engaged where the vehicle was catastrophically damaged, so it’s a bit of an edge case.

https://www.edmunds.com/car-technology/car-black-box-recorde...

I’m pretty sure they store far more than your standard black box. This guy was pulling video (and seemingly more) of crashes off Tesla computers from salvage cars: https://twitter.com/greentheonly/status/1329499639402389506

"Not extensive Autopilot data" -> This is false. The car not only records extensive Autopilot data when it crashes, it also records video.

and can Waymo? or other self driving cos? AFAIK the only real world data we have from Waymo is in flat and sunny suburban Phoenix.

They appear to have just added a facility in Ohio. https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/waymo-self-driving-cars-s...

I would assume no. I actually don't even know of another company that is putting self driving software directly into consumer hands.

AFAIK, Waymo pays far less attention to road markings than Tesla. Tesla FSD drives like a human, looking through the cameras and trying to figure out where the car is supposed to go in the lane. Waymo relies heavily on super precise mapping to determine where the road is. In theory Waymo should be able to drive correctly with no road markings at all.

The reliance on maps means Waymo can drive in Wayless places, but more reliably in those places.

Waymo hasn't generally launched any "full-self driving beta" though.

Probably not, but we're talking about Tesla here, not Waymo.