Slashdot Mirror
CNN Skeptical of Elon Musk's 'Big Promises' (cnn.com)
An anonymous reader writes:
Tesla's electric semi-truck will be launched three weeks later than planned, CNN reports. It's been bumped to November 16th because Tesla says it's "diverting resources" to address problems with its Model 3 sedan production -- they've produced just 17.3% of the cars they'd planned -- and to make more batteries to send to areas hit by hurricanes. CNN notes Tesla's Model X "didn't start shipping until two years after it was supposed to roll out," and production of its Model S sedan "was also much slower than originally promised." Michelle Krebs, an analyst with Autotrader.com, complains Tesla "may well have far too much on its plate. It should focus and deliver on some key promises."
But Elon Musk "has a history of some pretty pie-in-the-sky promises," complained CNN business anchor Maggie Lake, citing Musk's claim that he had verbal approval for an underground hyperloop connecting New York City to Washington D.C. ("This is news to City Hall," said New York's press secretary at the time, and no actual approval has ever been produced.) Lake also noted Musk's promise to fix South Australia's blackout problems by building the world's largest lithium-ion battery within 100 days back in March. Last Friday Tesla signed a contract to begin the work, so the 100-day countdown has begun.
CNN's report ran under the headline "Elon Musk: Big Dreamer or Monorail Salesman?" -- referencing a satirical 1993 episode of The Simpson's. "Here's a spoiler alert," the segment concludes. "If you haven't seen that episode...the monorail plan doesn't work out too well. Let's put it that way."
But Elon Musk "has a history of some pretty pie-in-the-sky promises," complained CNN business anchor Maggie Lake, citing Musk's claim that he had verbal approval for an underground hyperloop connecting New York City to Washington D.C. ("This is news to City Hall," said New York's press secretary at the time, and no actual approval has ever been produced.) Lake also noted Musk's promise to fix South Australia's blackout problems by building the world's largest lithium-ion battery within 100 days back in March. Last Friday Tesla signed a contract to begin the work, so the 100-day countdown has begun.
CNN's report ran under the headline "Elon Musk: Big Dreamer or Monorail Salesman?" -- referencing a satirical 1993 episode of The Simpson's. "Here's a spoiler alert," the segment concludes. "If you haven't seen that episode...the monorail plan doesn't work out too well. Let's put it that way."
I am wondering why anyone and at Slashdot especially, would take CNN any serious. Why? These are folks who spread f*k* news I know.
Musk cheerleaders, Musk naysayers, and the truth.
The way I see it, Musk is a bit of a 'showman' and in that role has a tenuous connection to the truth... but he did deliver a tail-landing rocket and he did deliver electric cars when the naysayers were calling him a liar for even saying it was possible.
So I tend to look at what Musk promises, not when.
It's rocket science. Everyone who has worked in this field has taken longer than he thought it would, starting with von Braun.
Boo hoo, infrastructure for electric cars is getting funded with help from the public. In the end we will all benefit from it with cleaner transportation infrastructure.
You know it's grade-A news when it cites a twenty-five-year-old Simpsons episode as its reasoning.
CNN is a liberal news outlet that can't even be bothered to coin its own irrelevant snark. It has to swipe someone else's.
So Musk promised more Model 3's than he ended up delivering, and bigger SpaceX rockets and spacecraft than he ended up delivering, but I still don't see the competition quite catching up. The rockets that he did deliver still dominate the launch market and manage to land their first stages ass-first, intact. So it's not like Elon is all fake, instead it's all about managing expectations. The guy promises you a city on Mars next year, and delivers only a village on the Moon five years late, while all the others give you a hut in Alaska.
She didn't get a free pass because all of her snakeoil was bullshit. Elon Musk has cut real metal and made real products delivered to real customers. I call bullshit on his pie in the sky, but I give him props for things he's actually done. Elizabeth Holmes never had anything to her name besides the hype and a black turtleneck sweater.
Well it's hard for CNN these days. They spend 99% of their time worrying about Trump and research on real news takes time.
The fact that Slashdot is quoting those ass hats is more worrisome than whether Musk can meet a deadline.
I am a leftie. I hate Donald Trump, the man is a disaster for America. I used to trust CNN, I really did.
But whenever I turn on CNN now, it is bleating about some silly shite he has said or done and not about real, actual news.
WE KNOW he's an idiot, WE KNOW Clinton forgot that men have 50% of the vote, GET OVER IT !
But Elon Musk makes good stuff and just talks up his businesses a bit. As you would expect.
Musk 1, CNN 0.
I've always wondered how many people would be driving electric cars if it wasn't for the state/Fed subsidies (rebates)
Our tax policy includes rebates and incentives to encourage people to do things. For example, giving to charity.
Policy makers were hoping people would do things like switch to driving electric cars. They set up the tax rebates accordingly.
Tesla customers getting a tax rebate on Tesla electric cars? That's the system working as intended. The government wanted to encourage the switch to electric cars, and it's working.
Note that the incentives are really just accelerating a process that would have happened on its own. If BEVs were significantly less expensive than ICE vehicles, people would choose to buy them even without tax incentives. The tax incentives are intended to jump-start this, and help BEVs get over the initial hump.
Selling lots of cars helps enable economies of scale; economies of scale help cars cost less; cars costing less helps sell more cars. It's hard to get the cycle going when your initial low-quantity sales are expensive cars.
Also note that when government picks winners and losers, government tends to do a stupid job. Consider the Obama administration loans to Solyndra... a total debacle. But if government is going to interfere with the free market, IMHO the BEV tax credit is one of the best things they could do. Customers are still spending their own money, so they won't be buying lousy cars even with the BEV tax credit; it should help good products get established with little risk of Solyndra-style debacles. And in the specific case of Tesla I think it's clear that it worked out well.
or other benefits like Leaf's free charging.
Nissan provided that to encourage customers to buy their brand of BEV. Nothing wrong with that.
I see people driving $100k Teslas, and they're not doing it to be green. It's the new status symbol of wealth (used to be BMW/Benz).
It's true that Tesla has grabbed most of the "large luxury car" sales in markets where they are competing. However I don't think that it is just, or mostly, that rich people want to show off their wealth. Tesla makes cars that are safe, reliable, and fun to drive; and for rich people the cost doesn't seem too high, so why not buy one?
Plus I've read a lot of discussion of Teslas online, and I've repeatedly seen comments like "Well, I think the Tesla interiors are cheap. My BMWs and Mercedes are much nicer, let alone my Bentley. I sold the Tesla and bought a Jaguar." (I just made that up but it's similar to real things I have read.) It sure doesn't seem to me like really rich people think a Tesla is a mark of status.
lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely
I've always wondered how many people would be driving electric cars if it wasn't for the state/Fed subsidies (rebates) or other benefits like Leaf's free charging.
I've always wondered how many people would be driving ICE cars if they had to pay to remove the CO2 that they are pumping into the atmosphere.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
A month behind a highly accelerated schedule. Ooh, shudder. My teapot can hardly handle this tempest.
"If there was an antonym to 'Elon Musk', it would be 'Richard Branson'."
If there's anything pundits, so-called experts, and know-nothing journalists should know by now it is to underestimate Elon Musk is a losing proposition. Everything these scoffers said could not be done---ever, has been done by Musk.
How about a moderation of -1 pedantic.
Today? No change in USA numbers. Where's the production of Electric Cars that could supply the need? When will the cost of Electric Cars reach the cost of Used cars in the USA? Where's the range to permit the driving range of an ICE Used car? When's the cost of a battery recharge going to match the cost of an ICE Used car's fillup? When are electric charging stations going to be able to handle the numbers and flows of ICE Used cars. Where are all the petro fueled electric plants necessary for electric cars going to be built? When are necessary electric plants going to be built? "Rome wasn't built in a day" but so many people seem to think a switch to Electric/Renewable/Magical can be accomplished by the end of the year. It will take decades -- just like the ICE cars displacing the animal drawn "cars" and "trucks" of the past.
A month behind is a month behind.
If you called your boss and said you would be in early tomorrow, but then not show up or call for the next month, guess what your employment status will be?
A lie is a lie.
Yeah, they rounded a bit. 200/1500=.1333
Seriously, just how much koolaide have you drank? He promised x, he failed to deliver x. That's a simple fact, not a distortion of the truth.