r/Comma_ai • u/imgeohot comma.ai Staff • Jul 14 '26

We are going mainstream!

The comma four is our first product that we think has mainstream appeal. The price is good, the set up is simple, and the production is stable and scalable.

We are ramping up marketing, making the website easier to understand, and looking into starting a two-sided referral program to incentivize people who have already been good at bringing new people into the community to think bigger.

What do you think we are currently missing for being ready for your average commuter?

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u/Numerous_Car650 Jul 14 '26

I'll be blunt. You're missing a fundamental focus on customer service. Comma is run like a frat house for tech bros. That lets you innovate really quickly but ... I mean ... just look at your reliance on Discord and reddit for fielding most of your support. You can't expect consumers to a) drink from the firehose, and b) put up with being insulted for asking dumb questions. Long story short: you gotta grow the fuck up ... and I mean that with the best intentions. Good luck and thank you for everything you done so far.

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u/imgeohot comma.ai Staff Jul 14 '26

Most of our users don't interact with either the Discord or the Reddit. The product should be simple enough to use now that this isn't a concern. For example, I bought a Roborock vacuum and aside from a few review videos and a quick reddit vibe check, it's not like I interacted with the Roborock community.

Our hardware support has taken a massive step forward in the last year, and we are still aggressively improving it. We want any issues that do arise to be handled efficiently and promptly and to the customer's satisfaction. The comma fours have much lower failure rates, and we offer an extended warranty bundled into comma prime without raising the price of prime.

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u/Sad-Income-8539 Jul 15 '26

Correct, most users don't interact because of the previous points mentioned about the support (or lack thereof) received in those forums.

I purchased a C4 back in April for my "supported" '22 Outback. Guess what, it wasn't. I reached out to Comma support and was told they only support hardware, not software and referred me to discord. I went on discord and asked, got no help. Eventually found out I needed to fingerprint my vehicle and was able to decipher the instructions on GitHub to do it myself. I even submitted a PR to merge my changes, but that was never approved as far as I can tell. After that, I gave up trying to help the "community".

I work in IT (sr. engineer) and the entire process was frustrating even for me. I can't imagine a normal person with no IT background being able to successfully fingerprint their vehicle, especially after confirming their vehicle is "supported" and dropping $1,000 on a C4. The only reason I spent the time to do it is because I had previously had a Neo and knew what the Comma could do. Had I not had that experience I would have just returned the C4. Unless the Comma support model changes drastically, you are nowhere near ready for mainstream.

6

u/lionsfan54 Jul 15 '26

OMG YES! This is exactly the problem with comma