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Jailbreaking Used Teslas
- ncallaway 6y agoIf I buy a Tesla (Car A) with FSD, then sell it and buy a new Tesla (Car B, without FSD), do TSLA enable FSD on Car B? Do they view it as a property of the account, and any Tesla for the account has FSD? Or do they view it as a property of the specific vehicle that somehow vanishes in a transaction?
- fiddlerwoaroof 6y agoIt follows the car but, iirc, at least the Tesla certified preowned cars get it reset before they are resold.
- ncallaway 6y agoGot it. So it seems in the Jalopnik case, Tesla missed disabling those features while it was in their possession, so did so after they sold the vehicle to a dealer and after the dealer sold the vehicle to a private party? Then it would seem to me, in the Jalopnik article that Tesla was just in the wrong in this instance. They could have disabled the feature when they sold the car, but once they transferred title of it and it retained that feature, they should no longer be able to revoke that feature.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- ilamont 6y agoTeslas are notoriously expensive to fix, partially because the automaker retains a tight hold on parts availability. So when a Tesla gets into a crash, insurance companies are quick to declare them a total loss because the cost of repairs approaches the value of the vehicle. At that point, Tesla stops supporting the vehicle, meaning all warranties are voided and Supercharging is disabled, even after the repaired vehicle passes a high-voltage inspection by Tesla’s own repair staff. I take it most crashed vehicles written off in this way can't really be used for parts because Tesla is sabotaging the market for used vehicles and wants to boost sales of new/replacement parts at dealerships, correct? Also, is the warranty of a Tesla voided if an independent repair shop makes repairs with such parts?
- sheepdestroyer 6y agoAs I understand, The FSD package (and I guess the performance package too) is linked to the car, not your account. It doesn't follow you from car to car. Then, what is the justification of Telsa's " you did not pay for it" given to second hand owners as seen in this article? This is really disingenuous and in total contradiction with Musk's "your car is an appreciating asset".
- malka 6y ago> what is the justification of Telsa' [...] "fuck you, give us money".
- refurb 6y agoSure. But isn't that every company that has every sold a product? I mean, they aren't giving it away.
- toomuchtodo 6y agoThere is a belief running around that Tesla should act like a charity instead of a business while trying to claw its way up to a volume automaker. Software sales are high margin compared to physical auto sales. Tesla is free to do whatever is supported by contract law as it relates to software licensing, including stripping licenses off vehicles when transfers (like trade ins) done through Tesla (versus a private transfer). Disclosure: We own several Teslas.
- kadoban 6y agoThey don't need to act like a charity and nobody expects them to. They should decide if the features are a purchase or not, if they are why are they taking them back? If they're not, why are they selling them like purchases?
- toomuchtodo 6y agoI don’t see anything in my purchase agreement that indicates you own it or can resell your Autopilot license. Agree the messaging could be improved.
- KMnO4 6y agoMaybe Tesla should link these features to a user's account, not the vehicle. If I sell my iPhone, I'm not selling the apps that I have installed on it. A side effect of this approach is that you could get a new Tesla and log in to activate the features you already paid for. If you crash your Model 3 and insurance buys you a new one, should you have to pay for Autopilot again? That said, that approach may piss off people as well. Imagine paying $50k for a Tesla, and only being able to get $30k when you sell it because you paid $20k for features that won't transfer over to the new owner. Even worse if your new car isn't a Tesla: that money would be lost.
- ncallaway 6y agoI agree. It should either be tied to the account holder, and transfer from vehicle to vehicle owned by that person, or be attached to the car and be transferred right along with every other part of the car. From a little bit of reading, it really seems like TSLA is trying to have it both ways on this, where it can just disappear after any private transaction? The fact that there's question here is insane. This should be an easy question to answer from the purchase agreement, but I downloaded a purchase agreement I could find, but it didn't say anything about FSD. Has anyone here bought a Tesla with FSD? Did your purchase agreement say anything on the subject?
- dcow 6y agoFSD and other software upgrades follow the car. Cars can transfer owners just fine. If the car is wrecked and declared salvage, the software value is gone and only the parts can be used. If you rebuild the VIN you don’t magically get the software features back because in the Tesla DB it’s a salvaged car and they can’t (or won’t) be liable for it.
- eganist 6y ago> the software value is gone and only the parts can be used. why?
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- giantg2 6y agoAll I want is the work truck equivalent. I don't want all the features. I want it to be cheap and just have basic features. It needs to be reasonably repairable too.
- ncallaway 6y agoI'm wondering how the Cybertruck will care on that front. Aren't other Tesla models pretty awful on the repairability front? I bet there's a market niche for what you're describing
- foepys 6y agoAfaik the bad repairability of Tesla is mostly down to the lack of parts. You cannot just order parts from Tesla, you need to be an approved shop and even then it sometimes takes months for basic things like a bumpers or fenders to be delivered.
- giantg2 6y agoI'm not sure how that's even legal under the magnufson-moss act. If Tesla requires you use their parts (the software portions and other many other parts are copyrighted to prevent aftermarket suppliers), then they would be required to provide them.
- colejohnson66 6y agoIf they are providing them, but it just takes a month or two to get the part, it’s not much different than Apple
- giantg2 6y agoMy understanding was that individuals were supposed to be able to order parts independently of a specially licensed shop or dealer.
- giantg2 6y ago
- crazygringo 6y agoNone of this adds up -- there must be details missing. First, if a dealer advertises a car with a feature and the car is missing that feature, then you have recourse -- with the dealer. Second, how does Tesla even know that a car has changed owners? What triggered Tesla disabling the feature at this time for this car? I mean look, if you want to sell your Tesla back to an official Tesla dealer and they have an agreement with Tesla to disable software add-ons before reselling... then that's Tesla's right. But then the purchaser would never have seen any extra features enabled in the first place -- there would be nothing to complain about. So what is actually going on here?
- WrtCdEvrydy 6y agoSo the story is that the dealer had it enabled for demos and included it in the sale info but didn't actually pay for the actual customer to have the product.
- judge2020 6y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24930269 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24930269
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- vaccinator 6y agoIt would be pretty easy to know that someone else is driving the car with all the data that they are gathering.
- beervirus 6y agoThere’s some confusion in the article between normal private sales vs. buying a salvage car that has been totaled. They’re different situations.
- jpambrun 6y agoSelling car AND user bound features is pretty disgusting. I just can't get behind that. Pick one.. not both.
- spodek 6y agoIt's remarkable how the personality and ethics of founders (or early investor in Musk/Tesla) appear in how a company behaves, as in Zuckerberg/Facebook and Newmark/Craig's List for other examples.
- eightysixfour 6y agoWhile I don’t believe any of this is acceptable, I understand the supercharger disable for salvage title vehicles. Tesla has no idea what damage has been done to the battery pack and how they were or were not repaired. If the car catches fire while supercharging then Tesla is the one in the news, not the company that rebuilt the car. Battery safety and compliance testing is going to be a big industry in the next decade as a result IMO.
- maxerickson 6y agoThey don't allow Supercharging in the case where they've had a good close look at the battery: meaning all warranties are voided and Supercharging is disabled, even after the repaired vehicle passes a high-voltage inspection by Tesla’s own repair staff.
- eightysixfour 6y agoYes, and I still understand why Tesla does that. The stresses a battery undergoes during supercharging are incredible and, as far as I am aware, there is no fool proof way to make sure things are in good enough condition. Tesla is relying on the initial construction of the battery pack for supercharging safety - it only takes one cell with damage to overheat and cause a cascade to nearby cells. The Model 3 has 4,416 of them. To an extent, it even makes sense for FSD. If you're going to take on that much risk and liability, you don't want to rely on other people. We need new frameworks to handle this kind of stuff.
- darksaints 6y agoUgh. I'm so sick of this shit. Why can't we just own the car if we buy it? I was actually researching a model 3 recently, now I have to go scratch it off the list.
- thrill 6y agoYou do own the car. You just don't own the service.
- kwhitefoot 6y agoSelf driving is not a service, it is a feature of the car.
- colejohnson66 6y agoIf it’s optional, is it really a feature? I know that’s a technical question, but a few years ago, when one got a car with a nav system, that was sometimes an optional purchase. Basically, it’s not that clear cut.
- mensetmanusman 6y agoMaybe, or maybe not, self driving requires constant improvement and a herd of programmers continuing to serve the service and improve it.
- anuila 6y agoWhatever it is, it’s been paid for, so you don’t just pull it from under my feet. The price was decided upon purchase and unless it specifies limits it’s “lifetime”
- postingawayonhn 6y agoIt requires frequent patching and updates. I'd call that a service.
- ponker 6y agoThe Tesla model is the iPhone model... you pay good money for the device, but it remains in the full control of the manufacturer. As Apple has had more time to demonstrate, this model has advantages and disadvantages. If you don’t want this business model, don’t buy a Tesla.
- octoberfranklin 6y ago> If you don’t want this business model, don’t buy a Tesla. I don't want this business model, so I haven't bought an EV, since basically all the EV manufacturers have adopted it. "This business model" is why I unashamedly burn fossil fuels.
- daniellarusso 6y agoSo, a non-transferrable user license bound to a specific hardware instance?
- catchmeifyoucan 6y agoFull self driving seems like an app. I think it would be okay to deactivate, but shouldn’t be included in the resale value of the car. Assume over time the capability becomes tuned to the driver, in that case it wouldn’t be the same as transferring it over.
- octoberfranklin 6y ago> Full self driving seems like an app. Serf mentality.
- catchmeifyoucan 6y agoWhat does that mean?
- grishka 6y agoSo... Don't give your car internet access in the first place, don't connect it to wifi and remove the sim card, problem solved?
- octoberfranklin 6y agoPretty soon your car isn't going to start if it hasn't phoned home recently enough.
- ydlr 6y agoHow long until Tesla (or any manufacturer) remotely disables the ignition on all used cars until the new owner pays them to turn it back on. Its only fair. After all, the new owner just bought a hunk of metal from the previous owner. They still need to purchase a license for features like starting the car.
- defterGoose 6y agoYou forgot the /s tag.
- jdmichal 6y agoI'm honestly not sure it is sarcasm at this point... The entire situation is approaching Poe's law for me.
- m463 6y agoToday's sarcasm is tomorrow's business model. Actually for a number of years there have been companies that disable car ignitions based on car payment status. https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/gadgets/remote-kill-switches-disable-cars-missed-payments-n211686 https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/gadgets/remote-kill-switches-di...
- dragosmocrii 6y agoI remember when Tesla issued that paid software update to make your car accelerate 0-100 a 0.1 seconds faster. If the hardware is there unchanged, why should the software update be a paid upgrade? It means the software was not good to begin with. Seems to me Tesla is trying to model a software development business, but they forget they're in the hardware business
- thefounder 6y agoYou pay for software updates/upgrades on your PC, right? Like it or not you don't own rhings anymore. Neither software or hardware. Everything is going towards subscription models.
- hezag 6y ago> Sadow sees the act of salvaging so-called “total loss” Teslas as, paradoxically, part of Tesla’s corporate mission to promote sustainable energy. “We (collective white hats) have saved thousands of cars from the scrap heap and put them back on the road,” Sadow said. “That's the only green thing to do!” I totally agree. The right to repair[1] should be the basic premise for any device you expect to last more than a couple of months. 1. https://www.eff.org/issues/right-to-repair https://www.eff.org/issues/right-to-repair
- Synaesthesia 6y agoThis is why the right to repair is important.
- mrfusion 6y agoI really want a Tesla but I would say my biggest misgiving is the perceived lack of “ownership”. I can’t really take it in for third party repairs. They seem to refer to me as part of their “fleet”. What data are they collecting? I can’t use it on Uber?
- vaccinator 6y agoYou have to give Tesla 30% if you use it for Ubering... /s
- jeffrallen 6y agoThe coming war on general purpose computing: https://boingboing.net/2011/12/27/the-coming-war-on-general-purp.html https://boingboing.net/2011/12/27/the-coming-war-on-general-...
- globular-toast 6y agoI own a VW and while it is a top-spec model and has most of the optional hardware, there was quite a lot of stuff disabled in software. For example, cruise control was available after replacing a switch. I have enabled a "needle sweep" which was only available on Audis and a fog light turn thing which was only available on Seats (I think). I can do this stuff because I own my car. You don't own a Tesla.
- GhostVII 6y agoThe worst part isn't even listed in the article - Tesla is remotely disabling fast charging on all salvage cars across all networks, regardless of what the actual damage is. If it was just limited to the supercharger network I would somewhat understand, it's their network and I don't think it's a huge deal to disallow salvage cars on it. But they are removing the ability to charge even at third party chargers, basically removing any ability to go on a reasonable road trip with your car, with no warning. Completely insane, especially since many salvage cars just had body damage. This is why I don't want a car connected to the internet. The behavior of my 50k vehicle should not change unexpectedly because some guy in silicon valley pushed an update.
- vaccinator 6y agoBut it is impossible to get a car that is not connected to the internet today, unless you find out how to disconnect it yourself. This near-7-year-old link[0] always make me laugh. [0] https://www.businessinsider.com/ford-exec-gps-2014-1 https://www.businessinsider.com/ford-exec-gps-2014-1
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- semi-extrinsic 6y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dacia_Duster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dacia_Duster This thing is definitely not internet connected. The basic trim does not even feature a radio at all, only standard space to fit a 1-DIN radio yourself. It has manual (roll down) rear windows. I don't know about the US, but I would be surprised if you can't buy an F150 that has no internet connection?
- vaccinator 6y agoYou probably can buy one with no network connection, that the user can use, but that doesn't mean that it isn't connected for other purposes.
- fmsf 6y agoDoes anyone know if european consumer laws can play a role here? I tried to google but couldn't find anything
- rasz 6y agoIts already illegal under magnufson-moss act, just a matter someone pissed and wealthy enough to sue.
- ipsin 6y agoHow long until "Aggressive Self-Driving Mode" is a $5,000 add-on.
- m463 6y agoThis article is from february.
- anotherevan 6y agoThis seems reminiscent of the issues farmers have been having with John Deere tractors.
- MPSimmons 6y agoI would be a lot more okay with them removing FSD from cars being sold if the FSD transferred to the next Tesla you bought, like a license to have the feature. That isn't the case, though. I paid for FSD on my model 3. If I trade it in for a Model Y, I don't get to transfer my purchase, but you know that they're going to charge someone else to enable FSD on that vehicle. It's double-dipping.
- phantom784 6y agoDo they offer a higher trade-in value if you've purchased an extra like FSD?
- INTPenis 6y agoTesla is turning out to be an environmental disaster. Normally a car is serially produced by established factories, and sometimes even re-using parts from other models. And this car will still be in use 20 years later with no restrictions on its features except wear. While a Tesla is manufactured in a brand new factory with no previous precedence of parts or processes. And on top of that, it's re-sale usability is apparently garbage. So we'll see a bunch of old Teslas litter nature because no one wants them.
- amelius 6y agoWould that give access to data of the previous owner?
- coding123 6y agoSo I'm a little confused. If I buy a tesla, and pay the extra $8000 (or whatever it is) for self driving. If I sell my car, is Tesla refunding the $8000 to the original purchaser?
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- fuzxi 6y agoHaha, no. You pay $8000 for a license that authorizes you to use the self-driving feature in that specific vehicle.
- coding123 6y agoSo basically it's not worth buying because the license is not resellable. Also what about Elon's tweets about how the "value of your car appreciates" specifically because of the self driving feature. If it appreciates that's referring to selling the car. I imagine a giant lawsuit is coming around this. Sorry quick search but take a look at this (paywall but you get the jist): https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-16/musk-stands-by-tesla-appreciation-claim-called-really-dumb https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-16/musk-stan...
- wpdev_63 6y agoHonestly surprised there hasn't been more work put into designing an open source electric car. While open source doesn't necessarily mean it's secure and bug free - it does bring a sense of security that I can look at the code that's controlling this 2 tone metal death trap I am in. The over the air updates from tesla that adjust things like the pedal heights and performance characteristics of the motor makes me want to avoid them.
- Traubenfuchs 6y agoContinuously making money on the same car by making every new owner of the same vehicle pay again for extra software. Genius, absolutely genius. The private seller can only sell the car without asking for money for the software features and the new owner instead has to pay Tesla again. Brilliant!
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]