Tesla's response is of course self serving. It should be expected from their legal department as a cost control measure. You cannot expect corporations to act benevolently or morally, hence the need for legislation (right to repair, warranty periods set by statute as is done in the EU) and regulation (NHTSA forced Tesla's hand to issue a recall, which they were strongly attempting to avoid).
This disagreement happens often, and I think that's partly because there are two meanings of 'expect': to regard something as likely, or to regard it as the rightful or obligatory standard of behaviour.
If you expect (in the first sense) benevolent corporate behaviour, in the absence of incentives that align benevolence with self-interest, you're generally being naive. But if you expect (in the second sense) benevolent corporate behaviour, and act accordingly, you may be helping to create that alignment -- because corporations and the people who control them usually care about their public image (certainly when it directly affects consumer behaviour), and legislators are usually at least somewhat responsive to public pressure.
So having the first kind of expectation leads to unhelpful complacency; but lacking the second kind of expectation leads to unhelpful cynicism, cashing out as acquiescence to the status quo.
You can't change the people owning or running a corporation, but you can change the rules they operate under.
In this case, though, I don't think the rules should be changed. I'm fairly certain that Tesla is not the first automaker to have come up with this kind of money-saving idea. This has to be well-trodden ground in consumer rights.
In this case, people should vote with their wallets, and the occasional class-action lawsuit, or, if things get too far out of line, expect the same kind of regulator intervention that would happen against any other car company. If regulators would not intervene against any other automaker trying this sort of thing, then I don't think they should intervene against Tesla.
I expect both. We have regulations because oftentimes corporations need a little inspiration to stay honest. And I expect a good corporation to stand behind their product, and not overtly attack their customers at every opportunity. Tesla's culture strongly reflects Elon's personal ethics, and it shows.
why shouldn't they cover their butts when people will look to extort? I'd much prefer a situation where companies take responsibility and customers show grace and courtesy, but that's not the world I live in...
Tesla will actively throw you under the bus to defend themselves.
"His vehicle had warned him about having hands on the steering wheel" (... fourteen minutes prior to the accident).
Leave aside the fact that if you have an accident in your Tesla you will need to go to court to subpoena telemetry data. But they'll happily publish your telemetry data without your (explicit, I know, I know, TOS) agreement if they think they're being painted in a bad light.
And if you disclose information about the vehicle, they'll happily force push neutered/old firmware to your vehicle to hide or prevent such activities, lock you from future upgrades, and disable ethernet and OBD ports in your vehicle.
Or a Douglas Adamsesque approach to right-to-repair, where there's a website with parts you can "order" (except everything down to the most commodity bolt says "Call Tesla" and they will tell you its unavailable to order via the website), that's if you know what parts you need, a process which required making an appointment with Tesla to look at the service manual, several months out, which required a fee, had a time limit, and put you in a room where you were not allowed a computer, phone or camera, just a notepad and pencil), all the while touting their "corporate commitment to transparency" as they pulled out of NHTSB testing.
I wasn't speaking specifically to this situation. The previous comment was about knee jerk legal reactions, which is what I was referring. On that note, flash memory isn't a durable good though.
Can you provide a citation to another automobile with an infotainment system that is only spec'd to last 6 years (due to flash wear)? The one in our 14 year old Toyota SUV is still working without issue.
nope. But I can cite expectations for vehicles' parts that should last longer, but don't. It only takes a viewing of Consumer Reports to see that.
Note that many electronics are designed to last 10 years (i.e. electromigration). Obviously, use cases matter (24 hour use, high temp or lots of heat cycles).
Usual disclosures: We own Teslas and TSLA.