A recall is the legally defined process to address a safety issue. From NTSHA’s documentation.
Manufacturers voluntarily initiate many of these recalls, while others are either influenced by NHTSA investigations or ordered by NHTSA via the courts. If a safety defect is discovered, the manufacturer must notify NHTSA, as well as vehicle or equipment owners, dealers, and distributors. The manufacturer is then required to remedy the problem at no charge to the owner. NHTSA is responsible for monitoring the manufacturer’s corrective action to ensure successful completion of the recall campaign.
There was a safety issue and it was addressed by the manufacturer: huzzah!
Even physical mechanical changes don’t usually require the car to go back to the factory, they’re often addressed as part of routine maintenance.
The term may feel misleading, but it exists and is used in a specific context.
It doesn’t feel misleading, it is misleading. We understand that use of the term “recall” in reference to cars happens to include over the air software updates in its legal definition. However many people likely do not. I’d also wager that many people who do know occasionally forget when they first see the headline. So while the use of the word “recall” here is technically correct it leads people to assume that they are physically recalling the cars.
Long ago “drive” meant urging an animal to move forward. And “dialing” a phone number meant entering the “digits” by turning a rotary dial with your digits.
Words aren’t as static as you seem to think.
Yeh, but all of those are currently defined by dictionaries in that regard.
A software update delivered over-the-air, with no end user interaction, without having to move the car is not in the dictionary definitions of the word “recall”.
The dictionary definition says “return item to company”
