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Elon Musk turns “Teslaquila” April Fools’ booze into the real thing

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Elon Musk just shared a picture of a real “Teslaquila” bottle on his personal Instagram page.  

References to Teslaquila were first mentioned by Musk on April 1, when the Tesla CEO decided to pull a prank on Twitter. Musk’s dark-humored April Fool’s joke featured an announcement saying that Tesla has gone bankrupt. According to one of Musk’s tweets, he was found passed out against a Model 3 and surrounded by “Teslaquila” bottles. Musk coupled his tweets with an image of him holding a torn cardboard box of a Tesla Wall Connector with the words “Bankwupt!” written on it.

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The mention of a Tesla-branded alcoholic beverage was received with excitement by Musk’s followers, many of whom called on the executive to make the product a reality. Showing his trademark wit, Musk stated that Teslaquila will really be happening, and that it would be offered as part of Tesla’s merchandise soon. Musk even added another dash of humor, saying that there will be free Teslaquila shots in Tesla showrooms every April 1.

Based on Musk’s recently-shared Instagram image, Teslaquila bottles would contain 40% alcohol, which is standard for the beverage. The label also states that Teslaquila comes in a 750ml dose, which would provide a healthy number of Tequila shots for Tesla fans.

Teslaquila actually follows a tradition of Elon Musk-inspired beverage. Back in 2016, SpaceX released the SpaceX wine for the holiday season, which included a lighthearted message wishing “many happy returns.” Our Teslarati Space reporter, Eric Ralph, provided us with an image of this equally special alcoholic beverage.

 

 

Musk’s image of his Teslaquila bottle comes amid Tesla’s apparent rebound in the stock market after the release of the company’s Q1 2018 production and deliveries report. As we noted yesterday, Tesla posted a 40% increase in production from Q4 2017. The production rate for the Model 3 also revealed a fourfold growth over the past quarter. Deliveries hit new levels during the first three months of 2018 as well, with Tesla delivering 29,980 vehicles in total during Q1. Among this number, 8,180 were Model 3.

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Perhaps more importantly, however, Tesla announced that it was able to hit a production rate of 2,020 Model 3 in a seven-day period. The Elon Musk-led company also stated that it would not require an equity or debt raise this year, apart from standard credit lines. These developments appeared to have helped Tesla’s shares recover from a 52-week low last week. By the end of Tuesday’s trading, $TSLA was trading up 5.96% at $267.53 per share.

In a series of tweets a day before the release of its first-quarter reports, Musk stated that he and Doug Field, Tesla’s Senior VP for Engineering, are adopting a “divide and conquer” strategy to improve Model 3 production.

“About a year ago, I asked Doug to manage both engineering & production. He agreed that Tesla needed eng & prod better aligned, so we don’t design cars that are crazy hard to build. Right now, tho, better to divide & conquer, so I’m back to sleeping at factory. Car biz is hell,” Musk wrote.

Considering what appears to be a rebound of Tesla’s shares in the stock market and improving rates of Model 3 production, it seems like a good bottle of Teslaquila might be in order for Elon Musk and the Tesla team.

Simon is an experienced automotive reporter with a passion for electric cars and clean energy. Fascinated by the world envisioned by Elon Musk, he hopes to make it to Mars (at least as a tourist) someday. For stories or tips--or even to just say a simple hello--send a message to his email, simon@teslarati.com or his handle on X, @ResidentSponge.

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Elon Musk

How to use Grok Bot to block spam calls and texts

Musk told users to ask Grok Bot to scrub their phone numbers from spam lists.

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Elon Musk has a new use case for Grok Bot, and it is the spam call. On Thursday he replied to an X user named Arash with a short instruction: “Ask your @Grok @Bot to remove your phone number from spam call & text lists!” Arash had said he got tired of the calls, had an AI bot find his number on listing sites and file removal requests, and packaged the process as a free skill for others.

The skill is called Spam-Call Scrubber, which is described to find a phone number on people search sites and data brokers, submits the opt outs, completes the confirmation emails those sites send back, and rechecks on a schedule the user picks. Using it requires the Grok Bot app. The pitch is time saved, since most broker opt outs sit behind separate forms on separate sites.



Musk said Grok Bot now gives each bot its own email address, and that it can detect scam emails. On Thursday he also said SpaceX would make users whole if the bot botches a purchase or leaks a card, then told users to shop away from Amazon after the retailer blocked the agent, as Teslarati reported. The terms of service we reviewed at the time put responsibility for what an agent does on the user.

For Tesla owners, Grok Bot is not just a phone app. Tesla brought Grok Bot into its vehicles on September 22, and we argued earlier this week that the Cybercab’s real advantage may be the errands it runs during a ride. Every Cybercab and the rest of the Model Y Robotaxi fleet has it enabled. The more routine tasks like this one become, the more a rider has reason to hand over something personal in the back seat.

The new Spam-Call Scrubber skill can be downloaded for free and works on sites that honor removal requests, while noting that listings can reappear, and illegal robocallers do not check any registry. Whether Spam-Call Scrubber cuts anyone’s call volume is something the first wave of users will find out, and Musk’s endorsement guarantees that wave is coming.

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Tesla Cybercab and Robotaxi’s real advantage won’t be the ride service

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Concept art of a Tesla Cybercab in Las Vegas Strip as rendered via Grok

For a century, the car has asked the same thing of its owner, which is basically to pay attention. Even the best ride-hailing app like Uber or Lyft only moved the problem into someone else’s hands. You stopped driving, but you still sat in a stranger’s car, while half listening, and wondering whether to take a phone call in the car without being rude. The Cybercab has no wheel, no pedals and no driver. With Grok @bot now live inside it, it becomes something else entirely, and I think that matters more than the fleet count that everyone is tracking.

Grok @bot is an agent, not a voice assistant. A rider signs in once, and from then on can say what they need and watch it happen. Order dinner from a favorite restaurant. Fill the grocery cart. Move money, answer email, adjust a calendar, push a work project forward. Tesla engineer Yun-Ta Tsai confirmed it is enabled across every Cybercab and the rest of the Model Y fleet, and Tesla’s own pitch is that Full Self-Driving handles the commute while Grok handles the errands.

Think about what that does to a thirty minute ride. Uber sells you a trip, while Waymo sells you the same trip in a more private setting. Tesla is selling the thirty minutes themselves, returned to you with an assistant attached. Errands that used to eat a Saturday get done between pickup and drop off. The ride stops being dead time between two places and becomes a place of its own.

Tesla integrates Grok Bot into its vehicles for the ultimate personal assistant

Best of all, your Bots follow you into any Cybercab, and presumably your own Tesla, then logs you out automatically when you step out. Anyone can bolt a chatbot onto a screen, but much harder to own the vehicle, the autonomy stack and the assistant at once. It also quietly ties SpaceX’s Super Intelligence business to Tesla’s fleet, after Tesla converted its xAI stake into SpaceX equity. The relationship between those two companies is getting harder to describe as separate.

This is also where the hard questions start, because an agent that can spend your money in a vehicle other people also ride in needs some answers. How does it handle a voice it shouldn’t trust? What gets recorded, who can see it, and for how long? What happens when a rider leaves halfway through a task?

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If Tesla gets those answers right, the scoreboard changes. We have been counting Cybercabs and wait times. The more telling number may be what riders accomplish per trip. That is data almost no one else will ever have, and it is the real reason to watch Grok @bot.

What do you think? Leave me a comment.

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Tesla’s mirrorless Cybercab will give riders a visibility upgrade

Tesla engineer confirms Cybercab update letting riders pull up rear and repeater cameras on demand.

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Tesla Cybercab camera visibility for passengers (Credit: Dan Burkland via X)
Tesla Cybercab camera visibility for passengers (Credit: Dan Burkland via X)

Tesla is working on a Cybercab update that would let passengers pull up the vehicle’s rear and side cameras on demand, and the request came straight from a rider.

The exchange played out on X late Friday. Cybercab rider Dan Burkland shared photos of the two-seater’s cabin screen after an evening ride, praised the UI team’s work, and left one request: let riders open the rear and repeater cameras whenever they want, “especially for peace of mind.” Tesla UI software engineer Evan (@CarCoder) answered with two words: “In development.”

The idea fits a pattern Teslarati has tracked since public rides began. Days after paid Cybercab service opened in Austin, Tesla sent riders a survey that asked them to rate the touchscreen, the app and the cabin, and to pick the features they wanted most. We reported on that survey in September, and a camera view is the kind of small software change Tesla can push quickly if riders keep asking.

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It also speaks to something unique about the vehicle. With no steering wheel, no pedals and no driver, passengers have no mirror to check and no way to see behind them. The hardware is clearly built for camera awareness, from the repeater cameras to the rear camera. Letting a passenger look through those same cameras would give a nervous first time rider a way to confirm what is around the car.

The timing matters because the fleet is growing fast. Tesla’s Robotaxi account said on Saturday that more than 300 Cybercabs are now serving Austin, an eightfold increase in 30 days, and Tesla AI chief Ashok Elluswamy named Dallas as the next city. More cars and more cities mean more people riding in a driverless vehicle for the first time, which is exactly when small trust features carry weight.

For now, the feature is confirmed only as in development. If Tesla follows its usual pattern with Cybercab software, riders could see it appear in a point release without any announcement, and Teslarati will watch for it.

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