Tesla was asked by an owner and "magnanimously" made the upgrade, then decided on their own hook to extend it to other owners in the path of the storm. It wasn't the fact they did it that attracted my attention, it was the very minor improvement, and how useless that 30 mile increment really is. I did some research. If charging from a 110 (or 120?) volt outlet, the charge time is ONE HOUR PER FIVE MILES OF RANGE. So for a range of 200 miles, in your home garage it needs 40 hours to recharge.
I've looked at this a bit. If you're buying an EV, does it make any sense for you to NOT install a 240V charging port in your garage?
A model S uses about 260 watt-hours to go 1 mile. 1.3 kWh for 5 miles. 12Amps@120V = 1.44 kWh/hour, off a 15Amp circuit. Close enough.
Go to a dryer socket, 30A@240V, charge at 24 amps, and you have 4 times the charging speed. Should actually be a bit more, you should be able to pull 26-28 Amps long term without burning the breaker, and you're less likely to have other stuff on the circuit, thus can pull more that way as well. 5 times the charge speed is more likely. This means 8 hours from empty.
Thing is, you're not restricted to a 30Amp circuit. The Tesla can use a 50 or even 100 Amp circuit. Put a 100 amp charger in? You can be charged in 2 hours.
As for flipping the switch remotely - it's true that Tesla is a leader in OTA updates, but that's generally a good thing. It means that you don't need to go into the shop for an upgrade, and Tesla has been good about keeping OTA updates to actually being upgrades and fixes, not disabling things. Well, after the one Tesla ran over one of those multi-ball trailer hitches on the road, where it penetrated the battery and the car ended up burning, they disabled some of the height adjustment(rides lower on the highway for improved stability and mileage) until they were able to install a titanium shield that, well, ensured that whatever the car hits either smashes flat or lifts the car before the battery pack is penetrated.
However, it doesn't mean that you still need to bring the newest Ford, GM, or VW vehicles in for firmware updates, especially GM. What do you think ONSTAR is?