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Tesla CEO Wrong About Model S Timeline? $1,000,000 Says Yes
thecarchik writes with the snarky-sounding claim that Elon Musk, CEO of electric-car startup Tesla Motors, sometimes says "things that later prove not to be quite true." thecarchik continues: In that, he's like many entrepreneurs, who spend a portion of their time persuading the unconvinced and painting pictures of the rosy future, despite inconvenient facts that may contradict that vision of the future. And in the case of the 2012 Tesla Model S all-electric sports sedan, which Tesla says it will launch before the end of next year, skeptics abound. Pulitzer Prize wining Journalist Dan Neil said the schedule promised by Musk was 'an audacious timeline that makes many in the car industry roll their eyes.' And, he added, 'Even people inside Tesla are leery.' The implication was clear: Neil didn't believe Tesla would be able to deliver on Musk's promises. A week later, Musk e-mailed Neil and told him in no uncertain terms that he was wrong. After several lively rounds of e-mail, he challenged Musk to a $1 million bet on the outcome based on the Tesla Model S hitting 4 targets. If the Tesla Model S misses any of the targets, Neil wins the bet." I'd like to see many more media statements backed by explicit wagers, and not just the indirect gamble of the stock market.
The system now is broken. Today's CEO get paid multi-million dollar bonuses win, lose or draw. Someone has to lose, and right now that is the rest of us. Every CEO should be given an agreed goal, and their bonus works both ways. If they achieve it they win their bonus, if they lose they pay out. How much more effective would executives be under this system? It would certainly weed about the bullshit-artists and big talkers.
I hope they were in a state where wagering is legal. Otherwise, a public bet like that should be for token gifts and/or bragging rights.
...to say that I, for one, welcome our new electric-powered gambling overlords. That's some good publicity they've both got there. I'm sure this will help push preorders along for Tesla.
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just wondering
Here's their market for Gaddaffi no longer be Libyan leader by the end of August 2011
https://data.intrade.com/graphing/jsp/closingPricesForm.jsp?contractId=750841&tradeURL=https://www.intrade.com
The value of the contract can be interpreted as the market's perception of the probability of the event.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
What a bitch, seriously. I mean, really guy, put your money where your mouth REALLY is. $1M vs $1k? Laughable. Grow a pair, and make a real bet, or STFU. Can't afford it? Don't publicly call someone a liar.
I'd like to see many more media statements backed by explicit wagers, and not just the indirect gamble of the stock market.
What?
Is Timothy seriously saying he wants journalists to have a direct financial stake in the outcome of the events they cover?
It also sounds like he's saying most journalists gamble on their reporting by investing in the stock market. Reputable publications tend to have ethics policies that forbid that.
Whether Tesla ships its car or not, this whole "bet" is nothing more than a self-promotional push by a conceited glory-hound.
Breakfast served all day!
Rich people throwing around more money than most of us will see in a long time.
Douchebags come in at all pay grades.
Seems that Steve Jobs' pact with the devil has come to bite him on the ass, and he wants to squirm his way out of this... before it's too late. Lucifer is quoted as saying, "It's too late, baby, it's too late, though you really did tried to make it. Something died inside and you're really are mine now." Stay tuned to see how this turns out.
Lucifer is quoted as saying, "It's too late, baby, it's too late, though you really did tried to make it. Something died inside and you're really are mine now."
Somehow I always thought the devil spoke better English than that.
I wonder how many betting pools are running right now. It's got to be less than a year. Six months is more likely to be the best. Unless Corolla is standing in, then who knows, maybe Woz will be taken instead.
Wha?
Musk is no fool. The dates matter far less than not delivering an electric Edsel. Musk may be betting that a big auto manufacturer (not necessarily Toyota) buys Tesla before the end of 2012. Once he has a mainstream luxury vehicle, Tesla will suddenly need a luxury dealer network to support it. That means everything from showrooms to parts warehouses. He doesn't have the capital for that, and there is no reason to build out when others have so much capacity (e.g., Chrysler). If oil stays above $100/barrel for very long, then Tesla's sale may be a much better bet than the 2012 delivery of that car.
Electric Cars, are so 1900's, silly Elon, trusting the green jobs hoopla. SpaceX (Another company Elon owns) put a capsule in orbit and brought it back on target. Has any other company achieved that?
For in politics, as in religion, it is equally absurd to aim at making proselytes by fire and sword. - Publius
Read the article! It's not a symmetrical bet. $1,000 says yes, $1,000,000 says NO!
Cut the poor red guy some slack, he's not a native speaker.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
SpaceX gets $1.6B of government money (aka cash from the pockets of the masses) and you hold them forward as a model of how to do things without taking money from our pockets?
This doesn't make any sense.
The 787 was finished (approved for sale) today. 3 years late, but better late than never I guess. "Literally to save their lives" is some kind of crazy hyperbole I can't understand.
It's kinda funny you hold SpaceX forth as amazing when what they've done is deliver a private rocket program 10 years after your whipping boy Boeing (with Sea Launch) and Tesla has delivered an electric car 10 years after another of your whipping boys, GM did. Oh yeah, and Tesla also took $465M in government money "from the pockets of the masses" to make the Model S. And that doesn't even count the handouts California gave them in their sweetheart deal for NUMMI.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
That one made me suspicious, since all of the Model S concepts I've seen were for a 4-door hatchback. But it seems that Tesla published plans to (optionally) fit two rear-facing kid seats in the 'boot'.
That is completely incorrect. $1,000 says yes.
If the wager is accepted $1,000,000 would be saying NO, he is NOT wrong.
Elon Musk sure has to put up with a lot of you-know-what. First, he went through that ugly divorce, where his ex-wife blogged about all his dirty laundry. Then, he had to pilot his two fledgling companies through near-bankruptcy in the worst financial environment since the Great Depression. Then, some Venturebeat journalist developed a personal vendetta for some reason, and starting scaring away investors. Now, he has this naysaying LA Times journalist crawling up his ass. I mean, the guy's got #billionairerproblems
So what if Tesla's production schedule slips by six months? Delays are extremely common in bleeding-edge research. So the Tesla slips into 2013. That's only a decade sooner than anyone ever dreamed we'd see practical elecric cars! Let's all pile on Musk because it took him an extra few months with his plan to save all our asses from climate change.
Just look at these pictures of Musk and Neil, and tell me who's the asshole here?
...it should be illegal for entrepreneurs to be optimistic. They should be legally obligated to know the realistic probabilities of their endeavors' success based on hindsight available years later.
If I wanted a sig I would have filled in that stupid box.
If Musk makes the charitable contribution, it will be a $1m tax deduction, which is accounted for by reducing the net pre-tax income. Given that SpaceX and Tesla are both in startup phase, I doubt he's drawing any kind of significant salary. Even given his cash-out of eBay stock for living expenses and the capital gains involved, the deduction will probably offset his total income for the year, resulting in zero taxes.
The money isn't free -- he could buy expensive cars with it and pay taxes -- but it is significantly discounted.
If I wanted a sig I would have filled in that stupid box.
Ain't that the truth.
Anybody remember DiamonDisc?
http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/09/11/13/019202/Synthetic-Stone-DVD-Claimed-To-Last-1000-Years
The guy that wanted to make that available to market is now little more than a SEO/PR chap.
http://www.cranberry.com/
With zero mention of the DiamonDisc.
Most of you seem to have forgotten, this Elon Musk swine started PayPal,
which is a large-scale con job with a nasty reputation among those who actually use
their brains for something more than video games.
The Tesla is not a viable car, nor does it bring any worthwhile innovation to the
electric car market. It is a toy for people who can afford to make a fashion statement.
I realize that might include some of the crowd here, but the truth remains.
Oh, right, it's one of those "figurative" bets.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Now that Steve Jobs is gone we need a new scapegoat to blame for trying new things and getting rich.
Don't worry Elon, everybody will love you when you are dead, like they we love Michael Jackson & soon Steve Jobs.
Have you ever had a project fail? How prominently do you feature it on your resume?
Alternatively, if you're too young to have had a failure, do you plan to emphasize your failures in future resumes?
If I wanted a sig I would have filled in that stupid box.
I have generally have disdain for most CEOs who are just in their position from being part of the old boys network.
But Musk seems to be the real deal. Someone with vision, engineering chops, and the business acumen to actually execute on that vision.
Yet he still falls into the trap of feeding the trolls.
Seriously hiccups happen. There could be some regulatory hiccup, the price of aluminum could shoot up... Many things beyond Musks control. Why enrich a thorn in your side. This bet seems childish and ill conceived.
SpaceX has already delivered on its promises with the Falcon I and the Falcon V and the dragon test flight to the ISS is scheduled for this year.
Paypal is a con job? Apparently Ebay doesnt think so neither does most of the people who use it.
The truth is hes putting his name and his money on the line which is more than I can say for you.
Is that a typo or did this turn into an SUV?
And if the journalist loses, will he pay Tesla $1 million? I'd like to see that more, to keep the media honest.
I'd like to see many more media statements backed by explicit wagers, and not just the indirect gamble of the stock market.
I wouldn't.
Which would you prefer, a founder setting millions aside to cover useless bets, or investing all of their time and money in making sure their company succeeds?
... it must be recognized that most individuals apply the principle of the "noble lie", (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_lie), to their own circumstances as readily as politicians do to the ship of state. "A deception to promote harmony and understanding, that's all, honest." It's a toxic fraud in either case.
If i would be on the board of investors of the company i would congratulate the CEO for getting such attention and make an agreement that if he loses he will get the million back. How much is it worth to be in the tech news and have a CEO betting one million on keeping some deadline.
Heck, i would even intentionally miss the deadline by a few weeks for the publicity.
I beg to differ.
Remember that phone calls from Obama are local calls now.
Mayhaps.
But get any two people to agree on what's broken about it and what will fix it, and you will have accomplished a miracle.
that's the problem with government, people have different ideas about how to handle things, and regardless of what others feel, somebody WILL pay the price.
treat sports and movie stars differently than they do people who run large corporations. Just like stars on a team or screen there are so very few who make it truly big. Most are just B-Actors/Second Team people. Then you have the myriad of support people, people who want to be part of the industry (film/sports/etc) but don't have the talent or the drive (never underestimate that - that is where most fail) to reach for the top.
Yeah the dollar amounts can be silly at times but I don't care. I am not in that league. I do as well as I AM capable of. I work at large fortune 500 company and the guys truly at the top don't see forty hour weeks unless they are on vacation, most are seeing 50+ and they have been doing for a long long time. Far too many people punch in their forty hours and quit. Just like building a house, you don't build your career all at once. Its an investment, some are just putting in far more than others and people rarely credit that time.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Stop the presses, development of a new product is delayed!
He was lucky once, now he thinks he's some kind of visionary, engineer or scientist. He's a once-lucky fool, that's all. He was thinking like a shark at the right time in history, that's his only qualification. The amount of geek jizz this guy generates is out of proportion to his actual credibility. Just like the MakerBot scammers...
It seems the Model S just gets better looking with each iteration as it comes closer to production. Now it looks a lot like the last Maserati sedan I saw. That said I still can't afford one and the closest dealer is not even remotely close to where I live.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
For some strange reason some people think that if a CEO wastes a million dollars, the consumers pay for that mistake.
Companies cannot bill consumers for their mistakes - they generally go bankrupt and the cost is passed to those
who invested in them. No wonder this country is illiterate when it comes to business, the stock market, you name it. A country of
economic morons. And out representatives that pass laws have zero education in economics. That explains why they can spend trillions and
accomplish zilch, as brainless Fearless Leader Obama has done over the past 950 days.
I'd like to see many more media statements backed by explicit wagers, and not just the indirect gamble of the stock market.
Cool! News journalists gambling!
After that, we can turn them into whores. Oh, wait... they already are.
Okay, then maybe we can get news journalists to get involved in illegal drug sales.
Listen, news reporting already lacks credibility and reeks of amateurism... let's not get excited and start hoping that it gets worse.
Must reminds me a little bit of Howard Hughes. Not that I knew him, I'm basing the opinion on what I've read about Hughes.
Reading, it's a good thing.
No, I just plan not to feed the world pipe dreams :)
There's a difference between a project that is entirely feasible but in the end doesn't pan out for whatever reason, and a project that nobody expects to work - or if it does work to be impractical in reality - and have fail for exactly the reasons people say.
That said - you're right. Given his new direction, I wouldn't think he'd want potential clients to see, as one of the things, a much-hyped and publicized product that ultimately went nowhere. Unless that brought in a lot of VC - then that's exactly what I'd want to see ;)
Didn't Musk say he as broke a little while ago.
http://www.forbes.com/2010/05/28/elon-musk-broke-tesla-business-autos-musk.html
I feel so manipulated by this article. It's like my legs and my, for lack of a better word, dick...are both being tugged. I don't know if there is an appropriate response.
Do NOT buy this car.
it's bloody easy for Musk tro grand-stand like that when he only has to fork up $1,000
i could bet that apple stock is below $300/share by end of calendar year 2015
if i win jobs pays out $10m to a charity from apple inc's coffers (first time ever)
if jobs wins i'll pony up $1k to the same charity
see how easy that is?
oh boy, just missing "CEO" in the title made me think it was some great science prize...
That's why you are some guy on slashdot, and he's Elon Mosk. Frankly, this is truly brilliant, it's a win-win-win. Here are the possible outcomes:
1) Elon Mosk loses. Pays 1M to a charity, tips his hat graciously to the reporter, AND GETS A BOAT LOAD OF PRESS COVERAGE FOR THE JUST RELEASED (but late) PRODUCT. In addition, he writes it off his taxes.
2) Elon Mosk wins. reporter pays 1k, Mosk still pays 1M, shakes hands with the reporter, gets even more press coverage, and writes it off his taxes
This isn't feeding trolls, it's a PR stunt. That much good PR and all he has to do is show up? No CEO in his right mind would pass this up.
This could possibly be the best $1,000,000 investment I've seen this week. Just imagine (or view) all the publicity this will bring, and what better way to infuse shareholders with the verve to stick in this tumbledown economy? Maybe I'm old fashioned, but having a CEO get behind me as an engineer or other worker like this would definitely boost my morale. Sure, other CEO's are betting their stock options every day, but that's not very sexy is it? But 1,000 stacks says business in terms I grok.