I thought LEDs had crazy burn hour ratings (around 10,000 hours).

thats what i thought...
Ricky Bobby is right... they did get cheap... might as well shell out the dough.

It's most likely from not turning off the cold monitoring checks on the tail lights via coding, that contributed to shorter lifespan of a few of the LED's. LED's hate being flicked on and off quickly like they are when bulb checks are ran.

When I installed mine in 2012 I noticed when I started up the car that my tails would "strobe" on startup, even though they did not throw errors and I had the capacitors installed for the adaptive brake light flickering, but that is unrelated. The LCM is checking the bulbs in the tails at startup. (you also wouldn't know this unless you have your garage door shut, or someone is behind you and tells you)

When i had some LCM features coded, I also coded off the bulb checks on the brake/running lights in the tails. 3+ years later, all LED's are good, and no strobing upon startup which will prolong long life for the LED's.

The 36 LED plate lights I installed strobe on start up too.

^You can code that off on the LCM as well, I had to code the tails, license plate lights, fog lights (converted to xenons), and reverse lights monitoring off because all are now LED

this.. makes.. sense...
I never did any coding off ...

I just installed LEDS and capacitors and checked that off as a done deal.

Any guidance on this coding?
can I do it myself and what do i need to buy? etc.. i know this is a loaded question.. :)