Elon Musk Responds to Tesla Music Streaming Service Speculation

Tesla Tunes

Since the advent of vacuum-tube technology, audio has been an integral part of the driving experience. From radios to 8-track players, CDs to Bluetooth-connected Spotify accounts, as audio technology evolved, so did the tech that gets placed in our vehicles.

You'd expect the next step in the evolution of autonomous vehicles to at least keep pace with the latest available in-car audio as well. However, the audio options available in current model Teslas do not offer the complete integration that other vehicles may.

According to a report from a source speaking with Electrek, a recent software update has introduced a new client for a new streaming service called "TTunes." The news comes from a well known "Tesla tinkerer" who goes by the moniker Green. Right now, there is no user interface for customers to interact with, but, apparently, the code can be found on all of the company's vehicles.

"That's a Joke"

Shortly after the news broke Tesla's CEO, Elon Musk, took to Twitter to cryptically say that TTunes is a joke. He didn't elaborate on exactly what that means, so it could be that the name is the joke and the software is real, or even that the entire thing is a joke and there is no Tesla specific streaming service in the works at all. The latter would beg the question of who the joke is supposed to be on anyway.

Many Tesla owners are just not satisfied with their current music streaming radio service powered by Slacker, so it would certainly make sense for Tesla to be working on a better replacement. In fact, a few sources from the music industry recently confirmed that Tesla is in talks to license proprietary music, which supports this theory.

However, it's difficult to speculate what the service would actually look like, how it would perform, and if customers would have to pay a separate subscription fee akin to Spotify, as we aren't even sure if this is real.

Regardless of what's playing over the radio, Tesla is going to continue to ratchet up production of its vehicles into the millions so more consumers can even have a chance to complain about their audio options.