Lifestyle
Tesla Model 3 fan-made commercial invokes the elusive ‘soul’ of electric cars
Tesla fan and filmmaker Jono Seneff once drove his father’s Model S 75D, and it gave him an experience unlike any other. Jono knew the specs of the vehicle prior to his drive, such as its 0-60 mph time, its battery capacity, and its range per charge. But once he stepped on the accelerator, he realized that Tesla’s electric cars are more than just fun facts and figures — they are about that special feeling that one experiences when trying out something new for the first time.
These thoughts formed half of the inspiration behind the filmmaker’s latest project — a fan-made commercial for the Tesla Model 3 recently shared on Jono’s YouTube channel. The 90-second commercial, which would not be out of place beside the best entries in Tesla’s Project Loveday contest last year, deals with the theme of feeling, and of experiencing (and re-experiencing) things. Jono provided some details about his fan-made Model 3 commercial to Teslarati through email, where he discussed the inspiration behind his project, as well as some fun Tesla-themed Easter Eggs he included in the ad.
Jono notes that his fan-made Model 3 commercial was inspired by a dream he once had of a deaf organist blasting music in the desert, as well as his personal experiences with a Model S. A Long Range RWD Model 3 was used as the main vehicle in the ad, and it was shot with the help of volunteers from his fellow USC cinema graduate students. Ultimately, the project took a long time to accomplish, with work starting back in April in and around Los Angeles.
Following is an excerpt from the filmmaker’s message describing the project.
“My dad got the Model S 75D about two years ago. Over the holidays I was able to drive it. Everything that I had read about Tesla – the 0-60 stats, the production process, how the batteries work, all of that just fell away as I was pulling away from the stoplight. There is that inevitable stupid grin that creeps onto your face when you accelerate like that for the first time. This all made me think about what a Tesla commercial should really be about. It’s about feeling something. It’s not about knowing facts and figures; it’s about that uncontrollable stupid grin on your face as you silently accelerate out of a turn.
“I ended up trying to combine that feeling with this deaf Beethoven character from my dreams who longed to experience music again. Beethoven famously would put his body against the piano to feel the vibrations of his late compositions. Although Beethoven and my main character weren’t able to hear music again, they were able to feel it. In the end, the unperformed sheet music or the statistical data on Tesla’s website are ultimately unrelated to that feeling that can only be experienced. And trust me — whipping around the desert in the RWD Model 3 was just that. In fact, the final shot of the spec is actually me in the car by myself just gunning it towards the horizon.”
Jono also mentioned that the commercial includes some fun Easter Eggs related to the company’s other products and one of CEO Elon Musk’s favorite literature. Among these is a Powerwall 2 battery (placed cleverly at the latter half of the commercial), as well as references to characters in Isaac Asimov’s Foundation Series.
This particular fan-made Tesla Model 3 commercial is notable in the way that it invokes that all-elusive “soul” referenced by car enthusiasts about vehicles they are fond of. Being absent of any engine noise, Tesla’s electric cars have been criticized for having no soul by critics. This particular point was highlighted by Porsche in its teaser for the Taycan (formerly known as the Mission E) earlier this year, when the German veteran automaker noted that their upcoming all-electric sedan and Model S competitor would be an electric car with soul.
“All Porsche models have something in common: They have a soul. A certain feeling you get as a driver as soon as you get behind the wheel. Soon, the Porsche Taycan is coming. And although his heart is powered by a different force – electricity – the soul, once again, is the same.”
As this recent fan-made Model 3 commercial shows, Tesla’s vehicles do have a soul, though it is not found in the form of an angry internal combustion engine roaring to life as the driver presses on the accelerator. Rather, it is an entirely different feeling — one that could only be fully understood and experienced behind the wheel of Tesla’s electric cars.
Watch Jono Seneff’s fan-made Tesla Model 3 commercial in the video below.
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.
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.
Ask your @Grok @Bot to remove your phone number from spam call & text lists!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 15, 2026
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.
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?
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.
Lifestyle
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.
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 Tesla UI team absolutely crushed it with the infotainment software. Nicely done @CarCoder!
One feature request: Allow folks to pull up the rear & repeater cameras on demand. This would be great especially for peace of mind. https://t.co/mNAOSLx6pE
— Dan Burkland (@DBurkland) October 10, 2026
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.
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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