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They seem to have handed over the keys to the first 30 owners during the event:

https://www.recode.net/2017/7/28/16053662/how-to-watch-live-...

Around the 3:42 time mark, they seem to hand it over to the first 30, aside from the 20 for the internal testing.

First 30 Tesla employees who had reservations, I think. Other articles make this clearer, e.g. http://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-model-3-deliveries-begi...

The day after that event is when I cancelled. All of the first 30 cars went to employees, none have actually been released to 'customers'. I wouldn't attribute it to the event alone though!

They're also using this as a 'public beta' I think. The idea is that employees could get the car back to the factory if they had to fix something faster than the general public (and is probably more willing to forgive issues).

In software terms, it's an inhouse beta. None of the people who have received "access" to it are unrelated to Tesla. In automotive industry terms, it's low-rate initial production. Every car manufacturer does this in the lead-up to high volume production, so that any issues in the process, materials, robot coding etc. can be ironned out before they try producing one car a minute. They just don't make a big deal about it.

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