There are instructions for using 'apt-get' and friends for installing current releases:

https://www.erlang-solutions.com/downloads/download-erlang-o...

While R17 wasn't ready for this approach immediately upon the announcement, I'd expect it any day since other pre-compiled packages have been made available already.

Essentially:

wget http://packages.erlang-solutions.com/erlang-solutions_1.0_al...

sudo dpkg -i erlang-solutions_1.0_all.deb

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install erlang