MASTER THREAD: FSD Subscription Available 16 Jul 2021

[stopcrazypp]

For @Knightshade, @Wigan, @ucmndd, @rxlawdude, and all the others that are so sure I'm just one nutjob that thinks the $1500 is completely unfair for HW2/2.5 owners, there is a 750+ comment, 1,000 upvote thread on Reddit on the same topic, that, on average, has most people agreeing that this situation is not correct or fair.

It's really not a good look for Tesla, and for anyone that really supports Tesla and believes in FSD, it shows you what will happen to you when they realize they need HW4 to do what they promised in 2016. There's a very good chance given the number of annoyed customers that this will be tested in court. Tesla should hire all of you as their lawyers since you are all so sure that a "FSD capability" subscription has nothing to do with the hardware in the car being FSD capable.

Just browsed through that thread. The thread is all over the place. Note that a lot of the people commenting (and certainly those giving upvotes or downvotes) don't even own Teslas, much less are the group of HW2.5 owners looking to subscribe (the ones that would be affected). Some are FSD owners that are pissed a subscription even exists now. Some are unhappy about the current FSD features. Some say FSD as a whole is a scam in the first place. Some want FSD to be transferable with the owner. A bunch are owners that bought FSD with the understanding that it came with a free hardware upgrade (or understood it was a perk due to paying for FSD upfront), and feel that it's only fair that those that didn't buy FSD should pay a fee for HW3. Also many comments brought up that they remember the hardware upgrade was a condition of buying FSD. Some brought up the minimum contract idea that I mentioned previously as a way to address concerns of both sides. Some comments said Tesla should just straight out not offer the FSD subscription at all to those without HW3.

Seems like a hodgepodge of topics in that thread, and no moderation to keep things on topic. I guess that is expected of reddit. I think the result of your small claims suit is going to be more enlightening than looking at internet arguments on reddit.

 

[jjrandorin]

Just browsed through that thread. The thread is all over the place. Note that a lot of the people commenting (and certainly those giving upvotes or downvotes) don't even own Teslas, much less are the group of HW2.5 owners looking to subscribe (the ones that would be affected). Some are FSD owners that are pissed a subscription even exists now. Some are unhappy about the current FSD features. Some say FSD as a whole is a scam in the first place. Some want FSD to be transferable with the owner. A bunch are owners that bought FSD with the understanding that it came with a free hardware upgrade (or understood it was a perk due to paying for FSD upfront), and feel that those that it's only fair those that didn't buy FSD should pay a fee for HW3. Also many comments brought up that they remember the hardware upgrade was a condition of buying FSD. Some brought up the minimum contract idea that I mentioned previously as a way to address concerns of both sides. Some comments said Tesla should just straight out not offer the FSD subscription at all to those without HW3.

Seems like a hodgepodge of topics in that thread, and no moderation to keep things on topic. I guess that is expected of reddit. I think the result of your small claims suit is going to be more enlightening than looking internet arguments on reddit.

Your description above also describes basically every thread on the topic of FSD here on TMC, as well.

 

[arri]

Before you click on subscribe, I would advice to check with Tesla what features you will get. Maybe do a Testdrive with a car with FSD autopilot hardware. I get the impression that all the nice YouTube video's are for FSD BETA and you will be subscribing to FSD. Which is more like a cruisecontrol & stay in lane. Rest of the functions are near to useless.

 

[Matias]

Good news

All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware | Tesla Finland

www.tesla.com

So no need to pay 1500 USD for new hardware

 

[willow_hiller]

Why is it now coming as a surprise to people that their HW2.5 vehicles do not have the hardware required for FSD?

Surely you folks realized that the moment HW3 was introduced around April 2019.

Any other automaker in the world would tell you to pound sand and buy a new car if you wanted the latest features.

 

[Matias]

Why is it now coming as a surprise to people that their HW2.5 vehicles do not have the hardware required for FSD?

Maybe because 2016 Tesla wrote “all Tesla vehicles produced in our factory – including Model 3 – will have the hardware needed for full self-driving capability at a safety level substantially greater than that of a human driver.”?

 

[Knightshade]

Have you ever heard the concept of early adopters getting burned?

There's a reason a lot of us are "late" adopters.

PS, its still not ready, and it wont be for a long time. My car is a 2021 Y, and I know it doesnt have the HW for fully autonomous driving. It doesn't exist yet. We got a kindergartener that figured out how to draw between the lines faster than the rest of the class in regards to autonomous driving.

See in this case though, the LATE adopters are burned.

They'll need to spend an extra $1500 if they want the subscription.

I bought FSD back when it was 3k.... so now it feels like I got it half price


And one of the reasons I paid for it then was I was confident the car would NEED hardware upgrades (at least the computer) and that buying it then would insure FREE upgrades as needed.

It's worked out pretty well so far.



BTW Gearcruncher-- All of my remarks were explaining the legal argument around why you wouldn't win the case I don't even believe you're going to file.

That's unrelated to how it "looks" to some angry customers, or what the "right thing by the customer" would be.

It would've been the "right" thing for example for Tesla to refund me $1000 since I paid 3k for FSD and at the time they promised it would always cost more later, but then they put it on sale for $2000 briefly....

They admitted the sale was a mistake to have done, and ended it early, but they didn't give me the difference back.

Legally, there might have been a "good enough to file small claims and hope they don't show up so I win by default" case there too.

To my knowledge 0 people impacted bothered though- which suggests the legal ground there was also pretty shaky.


What is legal, and what is right, aren't always the same thing.

 

[CapeOne]

Don't forget, some portion of the 100 will try it for a month or 2, and find that they really; arent missing out on much, find it too unsafe or not mature enough to trust their lives with.

Sure, there are various possibilities. It was all hypothetical and, as I said, Tesla will likely tweak the subscription option or possibly remove it completely depending on how the numbers turn out. The low $99-$199 price will generate a lot of "trials" but will also generate a lot of feedback, both good and bad. Too much bad publicity may force Tesla to cancel the subscription option although at that point, the horse would've already left the barn as far as public complaints and poor reviews.

 

[Knightshade]

but every vendor is working on this, or willing to pay for black boxes that do this when its safe enough to use. the bosch's and conti's will own this field, in the long run (my prediction).

If you believe their press releases, "every vendor" has been working on good EVs for 10+ years now too.

And yet Tesla still dominates the market with the vast majority of sales.

Hell Waymos been working on self-driving since 2009... with GOOGLE money behind it... and still has nothing a consumer can buy, and operates nothing except a tiny RT fleet in a tiny geofenced suburb in Arizona.

You try backing out of a spot when parked next to an F-350 pickup truck and get back to me on how well you can see the oncoming cars. In the real world you don't see crap until you are fully backed out into the lane of traffic.

In an angled spot in a 1-way lot? That's absolutely untrue.


In a 90 degree 2-way lot it's true- but as mentioned you should be BACKING into those spots-thus pulling out forward which is vastly safer with much better visibility to cross traffic.

Notice the car parks itself by backing into those spots? That's the intended, correct, way to park in them.

 

[Knightshade]

I really wish tesla sold only Navigate on Autopilot and Auto Lane Change as an "Autopilot +" for like $4-$5k, I would happily buy that. The rest i dont care for as its not yet widely out or a finished product yet.

They did. For years.

It was called Enhanced Autopilot.

And all the time they sold it- everyone complained they just wanted BASIC AP, and to pay less for it.

So in ~March 2019 Tesla listened to them.... and moved all the "fancy" features to FSD, raising FSDs price....and putting just the 2 basic ones (TACC and AS) into a BASIC autopilot that today comes "free" with the car.

And ever since people complained they wanted EAP back instead.

 

[CapeOne]

The thing is, the subscription model is great for Tesla because it turns a bunch of zeros into $200 or $400 a year. And sure, it's not autonomous, but I can see how it's close enough for intestate road trips that folks not willing to spend $10K on a hope would be willing to spend $200 - $400 a year, year after year after year, for their family vacations and heavy driving months. So it's just another revenue stream 'free', that's all.

But it can also turn some $10ks into only a few $100s if buyers that would've otherwise spent $10k upfront (if a subscription option didn’t exist) may now only subscribe a couple of months a year or a few months and then quit. It all depends on how much the subscriptions “stick.”

 

[willow_hiller]

Maybe because 2016 Tesla wrote “all Tesla vehicles produced in our factory – including Model 3 – will have the hardware needed for full self-driving capability at a safety level substantially greater than that of a human driver.”?

And on Autonomy Day in April 2019 Tesla said HW3 will be required for FSD.

Anyone actually affected by this knew their cars would need an upgrade for the last 2 years.

 

[Matias]

And on Autonomy Day in April 2019 Tesla said HW3 will be required for FSD.

Anyone actually affected by this knew their cars would need an upgrade for the last 2 years.

But Tesla can’t change a deal retroactively.

 

[Knightshade]

When Tesla standard practice is to add FSD to a used Tesla that comes in when they put it in inventory (zero cost to them,10K extra profit when they sell it), they are adding 10K of negative depreciation artificially making the car look like it has an awesome resale value. This artificially pumps up the resale value on the open market as well.

So there's a few flaws in this argument.

For one, if you read the links, those prices are from all used car sales- not sales specifically by Tesla...

But the larger one is the data is covering 2017-2019 as the 3 year period... FSD didn't cost $10,000 for ANY of that period- in fact it was $3000 for the vast majority of it.

But Tesla can’t change a deal retroactively.

There was no "deal" regarding eligibility for a subscription service in April 2019.

I feel the wording here regarding eligibility for subscription is very intentional by Tesla for legal reasons.

 

[Matias]

There was no "deal" regarding eligibility for a subscription service in April 2019.

I feel the wording here regarding eligibility for subscription is very intentional by Tesla for legal reasons.

This is still in Tesla’s home page. Isn’t this very clear text?

All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware | Tesla Finland

www.tesla.com

 

[Knightshade]

This is still in Tesla’s home page. Isn’t this very clear text?

All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware | Tesla Finland

www.tesla.com

Where on that page does it mention eligibility for a new subscription product that wouldn't exist until almost 5 years after that post?




BTW one more data point for the flawed "COMPETITION IS GONNA PUSH THIS PRICE DOWN" argument.

When did legacy ever push prices down?

https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/attachments/screenshot-2021-07-18-at-9-10-36-am-png.685537/

It costs between 15k-25k to get arguably worse features, that operate on FAR fewer miles of road, from GM for example. (It does significantly less, but you don't get the hands-on-wheel check, instead you get an eyes-on-road check).

 

[CapeOne]

But the larger one is the data is covering 2017-2019 as the 3 year period... FSD didn't cost $10,000 for ANY of that period- in fact it was $3000 for the vast majority of it.

It's kind of misleading to say FSD only cost $3k back then as you also had to have/buy EAP in order to get FSD for $3k. Today's FSD is essentially EAP+FSD for $10k versus EAP+FSD for ~$8k before. Adding FSD to a used inventory car is really adding EAP+FSD.

 

[linux-works]

But Tesla can’t change a deal retroactively.

sure they can; just edit the webpage and there, history has been modified.

happens regularly, in fact, around here.

 

[Knightshade]

It's kind of misleading to say FSD only cost $3k back then as you also had to have/buy EAP in order to get FSD for $3k. Today's FSD is essentially EAP+FSD for $10k versus EAP+FSD for ~$8k before. Adding FSD to a used inventory car is really adding EAP+FSD.

Since the take rate on EAP was much higher (since that's where most of the features were at the time) the trade ins were far more likely to have that, thus they'd only have been "adding" FSD to it, which was 3k. In either case though the original claim that Tesla was 'adding' 10k to the price of all their used cars is not accurate.


Plus again, those resale values are ALL sales not just "the ones Tesla resold used"

 

[Zacster]

At this point I don't fully trust the basic AP in my 2021 M3. I won't go anywhere near the FSD features that are currently available, and not at $199/mo. I've had at least 3 phantom slow downs at highway speed, have it shut off from a traffic cone outside of the lane that was a little close. I only use it now in stop and go traffic where I'm under 15mph anyway, and when I'm on an open empty interstate. In any kind of traffic, even light traffic on the NYS Thruway, I stopped trusting it. As for auto-park, I'm skeptical that it would even be useful in Brooklyn where most parking spots have maybe 6 inches leeway. I can whip a car into those with ease, even my old minivan. I saw a Tesla try to get in and it couldn't do it. I also tried perpendicular parking on my test drive, and while it did it just fine, it would have taken me a fraction of the time. I'd have just pulled straight in. And then there is everybody you hold up while it does it. At least Elon promises it'll be able to read hand gestures!

Just about the only feature that I'd actually use is the green light bong, and only if it were fast enough to avoid the guy behind me honking within .25 seconds of it turning green. I was disappointed to find that was only a FSD feature even though I could see it on screen with visualization. NY'ers are so impatient...