Elon Musk Talks About Tesla Model 3 Production Challenges, Social Media Regulation (VIDEO)
Elon Musk sat down with Gayle King of CBS News this week to talk about the challenges Tesla is facing on the Model 3 production line. While she had his attention, King asked Musk about issues roiling the world of social media following revelations about how Facebook misused the data it accumulated on tens of millions of its users.
You’ll Definitely Get Your Car
Asked if people with reservations for a Model 3 should be worried, Musk replied, “No. It’s best to look at this not in an exact, numerical way, but in a, on a calendar basis. There shouldn’t be a question mark as to whether somebody’s gonna get their car, it’s just, yes, you’ll definitely get your car. It’s gonna be six to nine months longer than expected. It’s a six to nine month time shift, that’s literally it, and three of those months have already passed.”
King then asked whether people are cancelling their reservations because of the delay. Without getting into specific numbers, Musk said, “It’s mostly like people cancel because, you know, they just needed a car and we didn’t have a car for them.” What about all those people who have placed their faith in him and his promises? “Okay. Well, I hope their faith is not misplaced,” he said.
The Reservation Queue Flap
Over the past weekend, some Model 3 reservation holders have complained on social media that they stood in line through the rain and cold to reserve their cars on the first day but people who reserved their cars months afterward were getting invitations from the company to configure their cars for production ahead of them.
Musk replied on Twitter that it probably had to do with early reservation holders wanting different features on their cars than others. For instance, Tesla is not yet building cars with dual motors or the smaller battery. Not so, complained one customer.