To me it comes down to Tesla being disingenuous about all of this, just like every other company, you know something Tesla and the cult following claims they're nothing like. Is it possible to make a *sugar* ton of money as a robo taxi? hell yes it is, but it's not going to apply to 90+% of the country and it'll be for a select few people. Companies will buy fleets of Model 3s and push Joe Blow out. existing cab companies will replace their drivers and continue on with their day, again, pushing out John Doe. We already know Uber has self driving program and it's actually in service with a host of problems, you really think Uber doesn't have engineers working on this just as much as Tesla?
Uber literally controls 100% share in some markets as Lyft doesn't operate there, and in markets where they coexist Uber still has 60-80% market share. Lyft has been around for years and I talk to friends, or people I pick up in Uber, that don't even know Lyft exists after years in the market. How long do you think it will take Tesla to get into the market? Uber is now a noun and verb used to describe ridesharing whether or not your in a Uber, Lyft, Ding, etc. Hell Uber now does commercial freight, They have this market on lock down and it's take years for Lyft to chip away at that. Telsa not only has to engineer and test FSD cars but they have to market their rideshare service, Uber who already commands the market spent $500 million on one ad campaign last year, does Telsa have that kind of capital to burn? Sure word of mouth works for car sales, but again, people still don't know lyft exists and they spend million upon millions in advertising. Now Tesla is going to have to find out how to advertise Tesla rideshare without confusing people in the market that it's an advertisement to buy a car.
All I'm saying is Tesla's presentation about robotaixi was disingenuous at best and probably intentional deception on some level.