"Operated as a unit" is not an inaccurate description of Tesla's footprint. Every one of their cars, assuming factory-ish conditions, is sending live, realtime data back to Tesla-owned servers. That data is analyzed, and the output of that analysis impacts the driving behavior of the vehicles in the future (training their AI models). Commands are sent from Tesla's servers to change the operational state of the car every single day (most of the time, I hope, at the behest of the owner, e.g. "turn on the AC").

That's a fleet. You may not like it, but that's what Tesla owners knowingly opt-in to.