Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable

[avoigt]

I wanted to hit "Like" on your YouTube video, but I couldn't mess up the number.

View attachment 589810

Feel officially excused

In fact, it looks like I am the only one from Europe who is flying from Europe to Battery Day , and I'm the only Author from CleanTechnica who can go. No pressure

I consider myself a small fish in the Tesla community but feel very honored to have received the invitation from Tesla and pleasantly surprised to have received a travel ban waiver from the US Embassy. I still can't believe that... Its called NIE, National Interest Exception.

You can call me now a person of national interest to the USA

They likely arrest me at immigration

It is my plan to report about that trip in a comprehensive way, write articles, make videos, and tweet.

Beside battery day and shareholder meeting, I will have a meeting with investors, influencers, YouTubers a.o.the day before. All of them you know as they are a part of the Tesla supporting community. There is, even more, to happen which I am not allowed to talk about.

The trip goes on my personal account and is a net negative for me which is fine, I don't complain.

.........MODERATOR-DELETED MATERIAL - Violation of very explicit TMC Terms Of Service

I will post here if time permits but the more safe place to catch the latest and greatest is Twitter, YouTube, and of course Patreon.com

 

[FrankSG]

Rivian and JB's new venture both looking good:

Rivian is building a couple hundred pre-production vehicles, and will launch 3 vehicles next year.

JB's recycling startup is working with Panasonic and Amazon.

 

[charlesgres]

AFAIK from posts from folks with actual access to see what the computers are actually doing, this guy is talking complete nonsense and almost nothing works like he seems to think it does.

For example last I knew from Greentheonly, the B node wasn't running anything at all until almost the end of 2019, and since then has just run an exact, fallback, copy of node A in case of failure (so that B can instantly take over instead of waiting 5 minutes for A to reboot) so his speculation of it running some secret "beta" copy to compare notes is complete fabrication.

Except that Tesla itself has explained on autonomy day they run their FSD in shadow mode, see this Teslarati article: Tesla Autopilot's stop sign, traffic light recognition and response is operating in 'Shadow Mode'

That's what Cringely is referring to.

He also doesn't seem to have even a basic grasp on technology in several places of the article for example where he says:





That's a word salad of nonsense that makes it clear he's using words he doesn't understand. 3 computers voting on a decision isn't redundancy. And redundancy is exactly why you'd bother with total hardware duplication.

It's the same reason there's 2 independent physical radar wire runs to the computers on the later HW- in case one fails.

One can discuss semantics, but he sees only two other reasons for hardware duplication: odd-numbered redundancy as used in space industry where all run in parallel and the odd one out is ignored, and two systems running in parallel presumably for load balancing..

So what you are saying is that there is a third explanation for why hardware duplication would makes sense: failover..

While true, that doesn't make his statement a word salad..

 

[joh01652]

Rivian and JB's new venture both looking good:

Rivian is building a couple hundred pre-production vehicles, and will launch 3 vehicles next year.

JB's recycling startup is working with Panasonic and Amazon.

Thanks for sharing. JB said (starting about 8 minutes in) was that in the future 90%-95% of the metals in auto batteries will be recoverable/recyclable--this is really great news. He's really focused on low-labor, cost-efficient, environmentally-friendly battery recycling, and he makes it sound like Panasonic, Rivian and Amazon are all driving towards the same goal.

 

[Lessmog]

Tesla won the self-driving car war, they just aren't telling us | I, Cringely
Tesla won the self-driving car war, they just aren’t telling us
I, Cringely / by Robert X. Cringely

AFAIK from posts from folks with actual access to see what the computers are actually doing, this guy is talking complete nonsense and almost nothing works like he seems to think it does.

For example last I knew from Greentheonly, the B node wasn't running anything at all until almost the end of 2019, and since then has just run an exact, fallback, copy of node A in case of failure (so that B can instantly take over instead of waiting 5 minutes for A to reboot) so his speculation of it running some secret "beta" copy to compare notes is complete fabrication.


He also doesn't seem to have even a basic grasp on technology in several places of the article for example where he says:





That's a word salad of nonsense that makes it clear he's using words he doesn't understand. 3 computers voting on a decision isn't redundancy. And redundancy is exactly why you'd bother with total hardware duplication.

It's the same reason there's 2 independent physical radar wire runs to the computers on the later HW- in case one fails.

I am unable to contribute to this particular techical discussion, but I do remember the name Cringely from oh 30 years ago, reading paper magazines (imagine that!) in one of which he had a regular column. But I gave him up, and later that magazine ahead of the others, when it slowly occurred to me that he was mainly there just to bask in his own importance and to stir up controversy, what is now referred to as click bait, with insufficient factual knowledge behind.

Credit due, though, for a very apt name choice!

 

[Jack6591]

Little If Any Choice...

For more than a century, utilities have owned their customers. Utility business models are built upon infrastructure that provides energy to 100% of all available homes and businesses; infrastructure that is embedded into the earth. When your product is buried into the landscape, a culture of entitlement metastasizes your industry. Customers without choice, feel hopeless. Utilities without competition, become supremely arrogant.

These realities are self-evident in customer surveys:

LADWP Ranked 13th Most-Hated Company In America..

https://www.theacsi.org/benchmarks-by-industry-14729

Tesla’s disruption of the automotive industry has thrived in the face of intense worldwide competition. The car-buying public has enjoyed hundreds if not thousands of choices. Like the number of channels on a new smart TV; a dizzying range of choices.

The contrast between between the utility and automotive industries is stark. While the automotive industry has remained steadfast in their commitment to the internal combustion engine, they have been innovative across almost all other technologies. All the while, electric utilities continue to bury power poles — a blight upon the landscape.

Versus

Tesla’s disruption of the electric utility industry will be met by an eager customer base. A customer that loathes their supplier, as opposed to a customer in love with their car.

Actionable Trading Ideas, Real Time News, Financial Insight | Benzinga

Excerpted from the article:

Piper Sandler expects Tesla's energy business to reach more than $200 billion per year in revenue.

“We anticipate sharply higher demand for these products, particularly in the late 2020s and 2030s as renewable energy grows toward 40% of electricity generation,” the analyst said.



Tesla’s new energy storage technologies will offer attractive, cost effective alternatives to a customer base yearning for choice. In my view, Piper Sandler is severely underestimating the opportunity.

 

[StealthP3D]

IMO this is a misconception.

Average iPhone app revenue is about $10 a year per phone.
With 1 million Teslas, that's 10 million a year.
With 10 million Teslas, that's 100 million.

Obviously this is nothing. This is the reason Tesla is in no rush to make an app store.

For comparison there are something like 3-4 billion smartphones and only 1 million Teslas. Or 3500 times more phones than Tesla's.

The software profit is all about FSD and high value software like performance upgrades. Not selling apps/games.

Also, it is not easy to implement. Most likely requires a total rewrite of their OS and pushing complexity 3 orders of magnitude.

In summary... Tesla app store will not happen for quite some time, and revenue will be insignificant.

I'm not talking about an "app store" in a Tesla. They can sell car washes, parking, tires, hotels, drive-thru meals, coffee, anything you might need on the road. Tesla can sign contracts with providers of these services. $10/year doesn't even scratch the surface. Use your imagination.

 

[Knightshade]

Except that Tesla itself has explained on autonomy day they run their FSD in shadow mode, see this Teslarati article: Tesla Autopilot's stop sign, traffic light recognition and response is operating in 'Shadow Mode'

That's what Cringely is referring to.

Except shadow mode doesn't work even slight like he (or I guess you) think it does.

Green does a deep dive on how much less than you (and he) think is actually happening in the actual code.

It doesn't work at all like he suggests.


See here:

https://twitter.com/greentheonly/status/1096322810694287361?lang=en

One can discuss semantics, but he sees only two other reasons for hardware duplication: odd-numbered redundancy as used in space industry where all run in parallel and the odd one out is ignored, and two systems running in parallel presumably for load balancing..

So what you are saying is that there is a third explanation for why hardware duplication would makes sense: failover..

While true, that doesn't make his statement a word salad..

It does though. Failover is redundancy.

See also what the word RAID in the term RAID1 means.

REDUNDANT array of inexpensive disk.

It's 2 disks with the same content mirrored- so that if one fails, you have a REDUNDANT copy of your data on the other via hardware duplication.

(there's other RAID levels of course, but that's getting deep into the weeds, and R is for redundant in all of em except RAID0 which should really be called that)


Which is exactly like loading up an exact copy of the same AP code on both node A and node B and thus having B available to take over if A fails.

Which is exactly what has been observed as actually running on Node B- instead of some imaginary "special beta double-checking" software there's no evidence of existing as Cringely suggests.


Again he appears to keep using terms he barely (if at all) understands.

Even worse- he's making claims and speculation that 5 minutes of googling would've shown him is known for a fact by folks with access to the code to be incorrect.


(that's apart from the idea "he might already have solved it" and is sandbagging it runs quite counter to Teslas entire mission to ACCELERATE the transition... )

 

[Navin]

https://twitter.com/kelvinyang7/status/1307644570101059584?s=21
Wow!
Wall Street loves subscription models if this is true. Apple / Netflix / Peloton

 

[Chunky Jr.]

In summary... Tesla app store will not happen for quite some time, and revenue will be insignificant.

Smartphone apps sell for a buck or two. I don't think any apps on a Tesla store would be that cheap. I would expect them to be more like $10-$20. Fewer apps, but much higher price. And lots of apps that have something like a $5 monthly fee rather than a one time purchase. Even if they aren't a huge revenue source at first, it would be a huge differentiator for Tesla and would provide lots of great functionality for owners.

 

[JusRelax]

2 more sleeps.

 

[Chunky Jr.]

Rob's summary of why battery day is so important. Short but interesting.

 

[SmartElectric]

So can we finally get a $30k car?... too many people in my life saying $35k is too expensive for them....these are small families my age (mid 30s) that have at least two kids.

Buy a used Tesla, we did, amazing car. Buying a new gas car in this time of change is like buying a horse in 1940.

 

[charlesgres]

Except shadow mode doesn't work even slight like he (or I guess you) think it does.

Green does a deep dive on how much less than you (and he) think is actually happening in the actual code.

It doesn't work at all like he suggests.


See here:

https://twitter.com/greentheonly/status/1096322810694287361?lang=en

Thanks, that was interesting to read.. Bummer though that it is not what it sounds..

It does though. Failover is redundancy.

See also what the word RAID in the term RAID1 means.

REDUNDANT array of inexpensive disk.

It's 2 disks with the same content mirrored- so that if one fails, you have a REDUNDANT copy of your data on the other via hardware duplication.

(there's other RAID levels of course, but that's getting deep into the weeds, and R is for redundant in all of em except RAID0 which should really be called that)


Which is exactly like loading up an exact copy of the same AP code on both node A and node B and thus having B available to take over if A fails.

Which is exactly what has been observed as actually running on Node B- instead of some imaginary "special beta double-checking" software there's no evidence of existing as Cringely suggests.


Again he appears to keep using terms he barely (if at all) understands.

Even worse- he's making claims and speculation that 5 minutes of googling would've shown him is known for a fact by folks with access to the code to be incorrect.


(that's apart from the idea "he might already have solved it" and is sandbagging it runs quite counter to Teslas entire mission to ACCELERATE the transition... )

Yeah, that's what I mean with semantics.. What he meant was pretty clear though.. (even though incomplete)

 

[willow_hiller]

Again, the mainstream media completely missing the mark on battery day: Sober investors hope to get a buzz from Tesla’s 'battery day'

... Assuming us investors are sober

 

[jerry33]

I'm not talking about an "app store" in a Tesla. They can sell car washes, parking, tires, hotels, drive-thru meals, coffee, anything you might need on the road. Tesla can sign contracts with providers of these services. $10/year doesn't even scratch the surface. Use your imagination.

Commercials on the screen would really be irritating unless you can opt out of them (one opt-out kills them all). I'm not even sure it would be worth it if the the car was free.

 

[gabeincal]

One of our neighbors purchased a brand new e-tron...... Wondering how long it’s going to stay in their household...

Question to members: when would you like a drone flyover? Tue morning? During battery day? Afterwards? Anything specific beyond Kato and the Factory? I’m ready!!

 

[Bet TSLA]

I'm not talking about an "app store" in a Tesla. They can sell car washes, parking, tires, hotels, drive-thru meals, coffee, anything you might need on the road. Tesla can sign contracts with providers of these services. $10/year doesn't even scratch the surface. Use your imagination.

Elon hates advertising. So the chance that they can sell anything from the screen is pretty low. Elon will see this as "Should we give merchants the ability to annoy our drivers and lie to them?" I can see automatically providing a list of services available at superchargers, but little else. In any case, there's no real advantage over people using their phones to get information like this.

 

[ABCTG]

One of our neighbors purchased a brand new e-tron...... Wondering how long it’s going to stay in their household...

Question to members: when would you like a drone flyover? Tue morning? During battery day? Afterwards? Anything specific beyond Kato and the Factory? I’m ready!!

Tuesday morning please. Doors open at noon.

 

[AZRI11]

That is just simply not true.

VW Group made 16.96B Euros profit in 2019.

Penalties will only get worse, as will deliveries. Pablo Escobar did very well for a while, until he didn't