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What We Do Not Know - Important Information Still Needed to Make an Informed Decision

zipityzi

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A few major questions I've not seen Rivian officially confirm / deny on their site.

Leaving a vast quantity of information hidden in CEO interviews or media spots is not necessarily encouraging (Tesla-like, in a bad way), but there's still ~9 months to go. Hopefully, they can start confirming & finalizing what day-to-day ownership will entail.
  1. What is Rivian's decision for how long and how often should we expect OTAs / lifecycle support? Noting that Android Auto / Apple CarPlay are seemingly not coming, that means all map updates, missing features, and bug fixes are on Rivian.
  2. What is Rivian's decision on the 4G connectivity pricing? Any reason they've avoided "LTE" in their marketing?
  3. What security hardening is expected on their operating system? Have they had any third-party security audits and/or will they offer a bug bounty for independent testing?
  4. What is Rivian's decision on releasing service manuals to the public?
  5. What is Rivian's decision on the Rivian Adventure Network charging pricing?
  6. What is Rivian's decision on phone-based unlocking / locking? Any support for Apple's Car Key or the Digital Key 2.0 specification (Rivian is a Car Connectivity Consortium Member, but is that for future vehicles or the R1T/R1S?) or something proprietary/in-house with the Rivian app?
  7. Many, many small details: exact storage capacities, finalized tire dimensions, driver profiles & syncing, etc.
For all these, everyone can assume "Uh, maybe / probably like the rest of the $70k SUV / pick-up truck market," but many questions are still needing to be speculated, still three years later.

All in all, it looks like a very promising vehicle that deserves a lot of praise, but this thread is fair: plenty left to fill ~9 months of time.
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Eeyore

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A few major questions I've not seen Rivian officially confirm / deny on their site.

What is Rivian's decision for how long and how often should we expect OTAs / lifecycle support? Noting that Android Auto / Apple CarPlay are seemingly not coming, that means all map updates, missing features, and bug fixes are on Rivian.
BOOOOO. I really want Apple CarPlay. I do NOT want anything to do with Alexa.
 

electruck

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BOOOOO. I really want Apple CarPlay. I do NOT want anything to do with Alexa.
Alexa isn't mandatory, Rivian has stated it can be disabled. But you're out of luck on CarPlay.
 

zipityzi

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Only slightly over two years, November 2018 was the debut.
Rivian had already publicly announced the SUV & truck in December 2017. A stroll down memory lane (aka the WaybackMachine) lines up quite close: they've been announced for a very long time.

December 12, 2017: "Rivian also unveiled its new website which revealed what we suspected hours before the announcement, the development of an SUV and truck. The company is planning to put the truck variant into production in 2020, followed by a seven-passenger SUV."
December 12th, 2017 -> December 15th, 2020 = I'd call it dead on three years later. Even in late 2017 / early 2018, Rivian noted its SUV's "Connected digital platform", one of the notes I'm particularly curious about.

The "late 2018 debut" was more the first major consumer update to Rivian's many prior, smaller investor announcements / media reporting.

BOOOOO. I really want Apple CarPlay. I do NOT want anything to do with Alexa.
Yep, I'm a bit bummed here, too. If Rivian is really interested in being its operating system + app developer & maintainer, then ideally Rivian will share more information about how it'll all work. It is a first-gen, first-product situation, but these are monumental tasks to finish and ~9 months is shorter than it looks.

Is Spotify supposed to write its own app for Rivian? Do I need to start begging Spotify to make an app? What about podcasts? To sync with a new app, how will we import XMLs? Or I need to sit in the car for about 20 minutes and keep it up to date on my own?

Or will it be like the 2010s where you just "get by" with Bluetooth and control our ~5" to 6" phones on third-party mounts? Or some convoluted phone mirroring? Or some proprietary Rivian connection? Or are they running Android on the touchscreen, a la Volvo? Or Amazon's Fire OS, aka a skinned / branded Android?

Sure: it's maybe the long-term outlook to make Rivian's touchscreen OS a "platform" for self-driving cars in some decades. But...interoperability & convenience are too important these days. Look at Tesla: Spotify shipped seven years later for US owners after the 2012 Model S debut, which initially promised "many third-party apps!"

A real shame, but hopefully Rivian will make a compromise here. I can't imagine Amazon loves the idea of running stock Apple & Google frameworks.
 
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Hexijen

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I thought I would start a complementary thread to the excellent “What We Know - Collecting Information Directly From Rivian” maintained by Hexijen
The year is 2022. The sun sets on an abandoned mining town nestled in the foothills of the Rockies. Tumbleweed lazily rolls between the headlights of a R1S and R1T, squared off in the town's only road. Two figures simultaneously step out of their vehicles.

"Well, if it isn't @photontorque, leader of the Don't Know Gang. I thought that after the launch that you'd be long gone... anyways, when do you think everyone else is going to show up for the meet up? Do you think this town is big enough for everyone's Rivian? It's supposed to be a pretty good turnout"

I like your "last updated date" idea, I'm stealing that.
 
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Eeyore

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DucRider

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Haven't seen this mentioned before:
Delivery or destination & doc fee?
  • Tesla is $1,200 (and you never see it included in any pricing shown in their configurator - only if you hit "more details" in the summary page and even then it is not added to the total)
  • Audi is $1,095 on the e-tron
  • Ford is $1,100 on the Mach-E
  • Polestar is $1,300

I think we can count on at least $1K above the MSRP numbers we have been seeing
 

Mjhirsch78

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preorder deposit eaten by this. Heh.
 
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photontorque

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The year is 2022. The sun sets on an abandoned mining town nestled in the foothills of the Rockies. Tumbleweed lazily rolls between the headlights of a R1S and R1T, squared off in the town's only road. Two figures simultaneously step out of their vehicles.

"Well, if it isn't @photontorque, leader of the Don't Know Gang. I thought that after the launch that you'd be long gone... anyways, when do you think everyone else is going to show up for the meet up? Do you think this town is big enough for everyone's Rivian? It's supposed to be a pretty good turnout"
@Hexijen and photontorque slowly reach into their vehicles at the same time, tensed for sudden movement . . . then, in a flash, the removable speakers are out, music starts blaring, and the lidars -- once intended for navigation but subsequently offered (with some modification) as a light-show option -- flash across the landscape, as the Rivians spin into tank turns. And the historic first year of the Rivan Adventure Vehicle Escapade (RAVE) ensues.
 

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Gshenderson

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@Hexijen and photontorque slowly reach into their vehicles at the same time, tensed for sudden movement . . . then, in a flash, the removable speakers are out, music starts blaring, and the lidars -- once intended for navigation but subsequently offered (with some modification) as a light-show option -- flash across the landscape, as the Rivians spin into tank turns. And the historic first year of the Rivan Adventure Vehicle Escapade (RAVE) ensues.
Sound kinda like the Tesla Model X Trans Siberian Orchestra Easter egg...

 

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I want to know when's the earliest we'll have to commit is. I'm in a third group of preorder holders I think. That assumption is based on those preorder # gaps - seemed like the early access batch emails went to three groups split by those. Will we all have to commit to our configs like in May, possibly sooner, or will it be more like weeks ahead of when they're ready to start on each group? Doing it on an individual by individual basis seems like it could get messy.

Hope I don't have to bail on my LE but I have lots of ifs between here and there, now that 69k doesn't get a mid-range when or as well-equipped as I'd hoped. Especially without an electro-chromic roof or any actually trimmable options to reduce principle a bit further.

Having to commit before June would be a bummer for me.
 

tscanjr

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On delivery or your place in line as a ore order holder, does how quickly you configured your preorder (right at midnight vs 4 days later) have any bearing on your place in line? Or time of delivery?

Is it still your place in line among preorders that dictates how soon around the August R1S release?

asking because I was a bit late in configuring my LE and reading people had their done the night of!! I hope waiting for the wife and making a thing out of picking her out doesn’t delay me
 

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What is Rivian's decision on the 4G connectivity pricing? Any reason they've avoided "LTE" in their marketing?
I think its all marketing since they may not have 5G hardware in the vehicles, so all they can offer is upto 4G.
True 4G is still unavailable in most places, so phones usually default to LTE which is slower, but more common variation of the 4G standard. I think there is also LTE-A which is closer to true 4G speeds.
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