i thought so too, but the fiction (i actually.. read the books :/ )
points to otherwise. apparently they need crew to.. i don’t know what, exactly. oil the door hinges(which they wouldn’t need without crew) and dust the place once in a while, or something. maybe load the guns, manage the cargo, and make sure that the oh-so-precious cap’n-in-a-can is OK, despite that the pod pilots don’t give a shit about their crew and will blow up their own ship for insurance money or fly it into a suicide mission just for kicks or cash.

i always thought that capsuleers were pretty much permanently installed in the capsules, too, but that also turns out to not be the case. all the capuleer does is drive the thing and make it shoot, apparently.