Good. The idea that you could know what hardware would be required before successfully getting all that hardware to actually do the thing was always a bit laughable.
The car is good enough to stand on its own.
There's no other reason to put all the vehicle information so far away from the center other than planning on eventually phasing out human drivers.
Edit: to be clear, I believe that Tesla was way too optimistic on when self driving would be available, and that over reliance on the center console is a bad design.
Might be a little early to do this in a production car now, given the tech is still 10+ years away.
Do anyone actually believe that any car massproduced today will ever be self-driving? (Without major modification).
I'm not bashing on Model 3, I want one. But I'd rather see it didn't have any self-driving hardware in it at all. It just isn't ready for that.
I'd still be pissed if my car did that without explicit opt-in, but it doesn't have to be nearly as bad as you make it sound.
They call it shadow mode and it has been running since at least generation 2 hardware in 2016
https://cleantechnica.com/2017/09/01/new-tesla-autopilot-sof...
My car has its entertainment display roughly where the display is on a model 3. I can tell you that looking at the speedometer is much much quicker than glancing over to the screen in the middle. Probably by an order of magnitude or two. Even checking the clock takes a dangerous amount of time compared to checking my current speed, the difference is that drastic.
Further more, the instrument cluster is designed specifically to be easy to read and driver oriented, Porsche’s habit of putting the tachometer in the middle comes to mind. The center console has to support many more activities, including entertainment, and is thus much more distracting by design. This is true on my car, and the center screen is much simpler than a model 3.
HUDs aren’t exactly exotic supercar material these days. The Honda Accord Touring (MSRP $33k) has one standard. Now that’s the top level trim for that model, but it’s also in a much lower market segment than the model 3.
It's to the right of your steering wheel so you can see it and touch it with your hand.
The screen should not be essential to use to drive safely. No brakes, speed changes, turn signaling, etc. These should be tactile, so you can use muscle memory and focus on the traffic. Obviously any screen can also be distracting, so it's important that it is designed well and thoroughly tested.
Paying attention to your speed, means not paying attention to the road. No matter where the dial is. Checking your speed is not something you need to do to drive safely. A responsible driver can pick a safe moment to glance.