Soon you might be able to binge-watch your favorite show while in your Tesla — provided your Tesla is parked.
In a tweet on July 27, Tesla founder Elon Musk announced that the ability to stream Netflix and Hulu through the car’s display is on its way: “Ability to stream YouTube & Netflix when car is stopped coming to your Tesla soon! Has an amazingly immersive, cinematic feel due to the comfy seats & surround sound audio,” says Musk.
Ability to stream YouTube & Netflix when car is stopped coming to your Tesla soon! Has an amazingly immersive, cinematic feel due to the comfy seats & surround sound audio.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 27, 2019
At E3 earlier this year Musk teased that the ability to stream YouTube via Tesla’s display was coming, so the fact that Hulu and Netflix will one day be available as well isn’t exactly surprising.
Enabling streaming video on the vehicle’s central display will happen through a software update. Currently, the screens do not support HTML5, which is required for the services to work. Presumably, version 10 of the software for Tesla’s screens will add that ability. As we noted when Musk made that initial YouTube announcement, by enabling YouTube there was no reason why Tesla couldn’t enable Netflix and Hulu (and other video services) as well.
Tesla has long offered games and other “Easter eggs” on its display. During Musk’s E3 announcement he revealed that Fallout Shelter would be coming to the vehicles in addition to YouTube. Cuphead, 2048, Missile Command, Asteroids, Lunar Lander, and Centipede are already available in the vehicles.
Requiring the vehicles to be parked in order to stream video begs the question of when exactly Musk sees the display being used as a video player.
Of course, it makes sense not to allow someone to be streaming Stranger Things while they’re cruising down the freeway, even with autopilot engaged, but are consumers really interested in strapping in for movie time while they’re inside a vehicle? In a follow-up tweet, Musk suggested that streaming on the road might one day be a possibility:
When full self-driving is approved by regulators, we will enable video while moving
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 27, 2019
Until then, it will be interesting to see how the feature is used. Sure, Teslas have “comfy seats” and “surround-sound audio” as Musk suggests in his tweet, but the display is also positioned in such a way that those in the car viewing a movie might not quite get the “immersive cinematic feel” that you’re after — at least not as immersive as simply getting out of the car and watching the video on your home television instead.
BYD has launched the third-generation Qin Plus DM-i in China, and the first thing that caught my eye is its price. According to CarNewsChina, the plug-in hybrid sedan starts at 79,900 yuan, which is about $11,980. That’s an incredibly low price for a brand-new car, especially by US standards.
What’s even more impressive is the range. The Qin Plus DM-i can drive up to 137 miles on electricity alone, which should cover most people’s daily commutes without using a drop of gas. Once the battery runs out, the 1.5-liter engine takes over. Thanks to its 17-gallon tank and roughly 91 mpg with a drained battery, the combined range reaches up to 1,423 miles.
Apple won the PC market’s worst quarter, but that’s not the entire story. It won the race by stumbling less than everyone else.
PC makers shipped just 57 million computers worldwide in Q3, which might look good, but it’s a 21% year-over-year plunge (via Counterpoint Research). And despite Apple’s Mac shipments falling by 11%, to 5.6 million, its market share rose from 8.7% to 9.8%. How did that happen?
Update (October 22 23:54 PT): In response to our query, GM clarified that offline recording support is already available on eligible vehicles. Like Tesla's Sentry Mode, it requires owners to connect a USB drive to save incident recordings, which can be viewed on the vehicle's infotainment screen. The upcoming Connected Cameras feature will build on this by giving owners remote access to these recordings via the revamped OnStar app, allowing them to check footage without walking out to their car.
General Motors has announced plans to add a new Connected Cameras feature to its OnStar service starting next year, giving drivers a way to monitor parked vehicles remotely and capture footage of certain incidents.