Before the Model S, purchasing an electric car would mean that you are sacrificing performance, luxury, styling, and range for a clean, efficient, electric car. With the Model S, the only sacrifice you make is the range. Everything else is on par, or better, than other vehicles in it's class. People aren't only buying it because it's electric, they're buying it because it's a great car.
Of course, the range issue is only due to an already existing fuel-distribution network in place built over decades.
It could well be that Tesla's goal would be to disrupt that fuel-distribution network, first by selling great client devices (i.e., cars) and then implementing and selling access to the network that provides current petroleum cars with "near-infinite range"
