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."
Other wise they might have known - https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/sep/30/elon-musks-big-battery-for-south-australia-already-half-complete
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.
If there's one thing that has become very clear it is that Musk is not good at estimating how long something will take. At the same time, when he says it will happen, it does generally happen. The really good example of this is SpaceX. The Falcon 9 took far longer to get off the ground and be really reliable than he predicted, but once it did, it became an absolute monster in the industry. More than a third of all rocket launches worldwide this year are SpaceX launches http://www.popularmechanics.com/space/rockets/a27290/one-chart-spacex-dominate-rocket-launches/ and the projections suggest that will be more than half next year, even without the Falcon Heavy (which is another example of this since it has taken much longer but will eventually go). The real issue with Tesla is that if things go slowly enough then the other car companies will essentially out-compete him; but by his own description he's essentially ok with that, since the primary point of Tesla was help deal with global warming.
To be relevant to this maybe you could compare Musks claims with CNNs news and provide some proof they are less trustworthy in general?
If people followed and but their cash on CNN and its claims prior to the election, they'd have lost big time.
Anyway, I digress....but these are some of the outrageous things they've said in the recent past. Remember, they claim to be, "The most trusted name in News."
1: They on June 6th reported that Comey was going to contradict President Trumpâ(TM)s claim that he wasnâ(TM)t under FBI investigation in his Senate testimony, a report which obviously was going to make Trump look like a liar. They had to retract these claims.
2: CNN.com Headline: From early May, âoeRape and domestic violence could be pre-existing conditions.â CNN argued that the American Health Care Act (AHCA) could make sexual assault a pre-existing condition, preventing women who survive rape from getting health care.
3: Claim reported as something worth listening to, while referring to WikiLeaks: "Remember, itâ(TM)s illegal to possess these stolen documents. Itâ(TM)s different for the media. So everything you learn about this, youâ(TM)re learning from us,â Cuomo said on television.
Need more? I have 11 crazy ones for you...
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.
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.
Beat me to it. Looks like it's going to be done well ahead of schedule. But hey, facts havenever stopped anyone before when trying to find reasons to bash Musk.
Facts like the fact that Musk never said he had approval from New York City - that he actually said, "verbal govt approval". Which he did - the government he was speaking of was the federal government (DOT, asked about it: "We have had promising conversations to date, are committed to transformative infrastructure projects, and believe our greatest solutions have often come from the ingenuity and drive of the private sector,""). But hey, let's leave that part out and pretend that Musk was just making things up.
Facts like, for example, that Model 3's production schedule had been moved forward to July (was originally supposed to start at the end of this year), with Musk stating at the time that the reason for the July deadline was because he knew some suppliers would inevitably fail to meet their deadline and he had to have a way to hold their feet to the fire with real penalties for failing to deliver. Of course, they actually did make the July deadline.
The Wall Street Journal will gripe about the fact that there are missing features in the (over-the-air-upgraded) software stack and that there's some manual labour / part changes in manufacture because automated assembly line isn't yet complete. Really, WSJ? Gee we all thought that the line was fully ready to produce tens of thousands of vehicles per month, but the schedule was only to produce a couple hundred for giggles. And of course, every Tesla short will whine about how there are customers acting as "beta", ignoring the fact that none of the above comes as any surprise to anyone with a deposit, particularly the earliest ones, and that they're thrilled to have the chance to get their vehicles early. I know one who, after having the car for just two weeks, already put down a deposit on a second one.
But hey, I guess someone has to try to recoup some of their losses in their ill-advised short position in TSLA.
"If there was an antonym to 'Elon Musk', it would be 'Richard Branson'."