Tesla is offering a $1500 upgrade for early cars to support “full self-driving”
IDk anything about promises vs this but... the key point for me, here, is subscriptions.<p>Both software &amp; subscription based business models have proved <i>way</i> better than just selling stuff. Tesla&#x27;s business is increasingly proving that its in these businesses. If Tesla can normalize &gt;$200 software subscriptions, this changes the game.<p>For example, there is an interesting &amp; contested economic question about planned obsolescence in cars. Once a long lived product reaches maturity&#x2F;saturation, demand plateaus or depletes. Refrigerators, for example, are a different industry once most houses have one TVs too. Some theories of the great depression, for example, have market saturation as a primary culprit.<p>In the 30s, planned obsolescence was transparently promoted as a depression ending plan^. Orwell, writing 1984 after the war, predicted continuous low level warfare, a means of destruction to counterbalance production. It was widely thought that saturation points were the weakness in modern industrial economics.<p>In any case, Henry Ford&#x27;s engineering ideal of simple, built-to-last cars lost out to GM&#x27;s annual design changes... demand based in fashion &amp; trivial novelty, rather than utility.<p>Today, Japan absolutely enforces obsolescence for cars. EU countries, often via environmental taxes also push old cars off the road to encourage new ones. Many cars are built to last 100kms&#x2F;10yrs. Between insurance, tax, biannual roadworthiness tax and such, the most economical way to own a car is a cheap, new one.<p>Anyway... contrived obsolescence is just the most on-the-nose way of keeping the ball rolling. One of many. There are also new markets. There&#x27;s fashion, like it or not. There&#x27;s technological improvements, at least during some periods. Any can work.<p>In any case... subscription and software business models could change some real imperatives in the auto industry. Building cars to last is possible, manufacturers just haven&#x27;t had the incentives to. If the number of Teslas <i>on the road</i> becomes a multiplier for a meaningful revenue source... the incentive to build long term becomes significant. Turns a linear trajectory to a saturation point into an exponential.<p>To the extent that this succeeds, the auto industry is going to be all about the fleet, rather than the factory door, soon. As always, affordability will <i>not</i> be the endpoint.<p>^<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;upload.wikimedia.org&#x2F;wikipedia&#x2F;commons&#x2F;2&#x2F;27&#x2F;London_(1932)_Ending_the_depression_through_planned_obsolescence.pdf" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;upload.wikimedia.org&#x2F;wikipedia&#x2F;commons&#x2F;2&#x2F;27&#x2F;London_%...</a>