Curiosity has some autonomy

Ron Czapala

http://news.yahoo.com/martian-curiosity-drive-2-5-billion-mars-rover-104710372.html

Some autonomy
While Curiosity is ultimately dependent on its Earth-bound handlers, it does have an autonomous navigation mode that allows it a bit of freedom on the Martian surface.
"The rover is going to be able to choose its own path," Biesiadecki said of this mode. "It will take images as needed to look for obstacles along the way, and drive around them. The disadvantage is that it's much slower for it to do that."
Curiosity's autonomous mode will come in handy when the MSL team wants to send the rover somewhere not covered by the previous day's set of images, Biesiadecki said. But the drivers won't test out this capability right off the bat.