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Sam Altman on Twitter: It's gross seeing so many root against Tesla

39 points by AndrewBissell 7y ago

Tomte 7y ago
Be the person on the side of the law and on the side of safety. Not the person hoping to make money from dishonest marketing and publicity stunts. Tesla has achieved way more than I would have expected, had someone told me about it beforehand. But it doesn't magically absolve them, just because the tech is cool.
- SEJeff 7y ago
  I guess from Elon's POV, safety is sort of relative. Their numbers[1] show autopilot as safer than human drivers, even though they don't have full autonomy yet. A lot of people consider 1 human death from a computer driving as unacceptable, but hundreds of thousands from human drivers as totally fine. [1] https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport
  - atomical 7y ago
    That's easy to say when most of the public isn't driving your cars. Scaling the company can bring a lot of problems that weren't foreseen.
  - BEEdwards 7y ago
    It's only a handful of deaths by automated cars now, but they've only been a thing for 10 years and in incridibly limited numbers. Robots are almost certainly better drivers, but at the numbers we have now we can't say for sure.
  - falcolas 7y ago
    Wasn't there some contention that within the same vehicle class (luxury sedan) Teslas were not as "safe" in comparison? I don't have numbers, but their comparison of a luxury sedan to all drivers has seemed disingenuous (to put it kindly, lying with numbers to put it less kindly).
  - Traster 7y ago
    Let's be clear: Their numbers are bollocks, and a serious reason why not only should we worry about their cars killing people, we should be worried about their callous indifference to lying about it. >In the 1st quarter, we registered one accident for every 2.87 million miles driven in which drivers had Autopilot engaged. For those driving without Autopilot, we registered one accident for every 1.76 million miles driven. By comparison, NHTSA’s most recent data shows that in the United States there is an automobile crash every 436,000 miles. Take from this 2 things: 1. Either Tesla drivers are 4x safer than the average driver or their stats aren't comparable with the industry standard measures (1.76m vs 0.43m) and they have no problem with misleadingly comparing the two. 2. Tesla is not interested in supplying a real metric for how likely you are to crash in a Tesla, but instead provide PR numbers (accident per million miles when Autopilot is overwhelmingly used only on the safest roads?)
    - SEJeff 7y ago
      I said "From Elon's POV", not "From my POV". Don't shoot the messenger :) I'm trying to explain what he thinks is reality, even if it is detached from what most of the rest of us think as reality. SpaceX's real goal is to send Elon back to mars to be with his real family.
      - unityByFreedom 7y ago
        > I said "From Elon's POV", not "From my POV" Elon's POV has access to a lot more data than we do. He could give more fine grained details about safety. He actively chooses not to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqvatzjHGyk&t=47m17s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqvatzjHGyk&t=47m17s
    - nishantvyas 7y ago
      Pre-cursor: 1. Don't assume anything 2. Don't take anything personally. Can you help understand what's wrong in that statement, "In the 1st quarter, we registered one accident for every 2.87 million miles driven in which drivers had Autopilot engaged. For those driving without Autopilot, we registered one accident for every 1.76 million miles driven. By comparison, NHTSA’s most recent data shows that in the United States there is an automobile crash every 436,000 miles." Answering your questions: 1. Either Tesla drivers are 4x safer than the average driver or their stats aren't comparable with the industry standard measures (1.76m vs 0.43m) and they have no problem with misleadingly comparing the two. -> Well, Tesla has one of the best NHTSA safety ratings.. so their driver might be actually be 4x safer... or at-least based on 1.76m vs 0.43m number... -> one can argue that oldest Tesla on road is 8-9 years and the total # teslas on road are less thus they have lower denominator for total miles driven by all teslas / total # tesla vehicles on the road, which help them get to 1.76M but that doesn't change the fact 1) it is 4x safer based on that number and 2) it has one of the best NHTSA safety ratings. 2. Tesla is not interested in supplying a real metric for how likely you are to crash in a Tesla, but instead provide PR numbers (accident per million miles when Autopilot is overwhelmingly used only on the safest roads?) -> first, Tesla used NHTSA metric here, which is "NHTSA’s most recent data shows that in the United States there is an automobile crash every 436,000 miles." -> Based on that metric, they provided 2 data points, 1) "we registered one accident for every 2.87 million miles driven in which drivers had Autopilot engaged." and 2) "For those driving without Autopilot, we registered one accident for every 1.76 million miles driven." -> that is the real metric on how likely a Tesla car (either autopilot or not) could run into accident... now for "supplying a real metric for how likely you are to crash in a Tesla" (emphasis on "you") would be difficult for any car provider... I'm strictly commenting for the statement you quoted and the 2 questions you posed. I'm not discussing anything like, how they have over-sold (an idea) of auto-pilot, if its truly safe, if its ready and so on.
  - erobbins 7y ago
    Their numbers are slanted, to say the least. You can't compare freeway crashes with all crashes.
mimixco 7y ago
I think more people are concerned with his poor performance (in several companies), and poor human relations than just with shorting the stock.
ThJ 7y ago
Cool tech. Not so cool CEO.
Glyptodon 7y ago
I'm not "against" Tesla, but they basically epitomize the advent and promotion of "wealth virtue," where rich people buy a product or lifestyle that the vast majority could never afford and then act like poor people are ethically inferior accordingly.
- Traster 7y ago
  They're also a fantastic example of the silicon valley "Fake it 'till you make it" selling products for life-changing sums on money based on lies about their capabilities.
- leesec 7y ago
  Umm what. I own a Tesla and am middle classed and don't think people poorer than me are ethically inferior. This is a huge stretch.
  - Glyptodon 7y ago
    Most of the Tesla owners I've met fall into one of two categories: a) (this the majority) wealthy virtue signalers b) (this is the minority) upper-middle class/moderately wealthy tech/gadget lovers Buying a luxury car isn't a middle class purchase. Maybe you're some sort of angelic exception, I don't know.
    - taylodl 7y ago
      According to the Pew Research Center the household income of the middle class ranges between roughly $45K-$135K. If you're middle class and buying a Tesla then you're definitely on the upper end of that range. The overwhelming majority of the middle class cannot afford a Tesla.
nrook 7y ago
There are only two options here— either you can root against Tesla, or you can be indifferent to the death of Walter Huang. Tesla has been irresponsible with their rollout of self-driving technology, and someone has died as a result. There's nothing wrong with rooting for other entrants in the self-driving technology space, like Waymo, which aren't willing to grease their path to market dominance with the blood of innocents.
- leesec 7y ago
  You're ignoring lives saved and potential future lives saved.
  - Fins 7y ago
    Can you (or anyone, really) show that there were, or were not, any lives saved? That there were people killed is quite easy to show, but showing that there were crashes prevented... that does not even seem provable.
    - mlindner 7y ago
      Youtube is full of crashes prevented. Spending a few minutes on Google would show you otherwise. If you're not seeing it it's because you have refused to look. You already made up your opinion.
      - Fins 7y ago
        Right, right. And also I am shorting 27 thimgamajillions of Tesla stock, of course. You can't show (least of all on some fanboy Youtube video) that AutoPilot had prevented a crash, compared to a normal person just driving a car. A Tesla crashing into a firetruck -- that you can show. What you could show would be crash statistics over a significant population of similar cars, in similar conditions, driving on similar roads. These statistics don't seem to show any safety benefit to Tesla, but believers will believe.
- sabertoothed 7y ago
pdimitar 7y ago
I find it interesting how every Tesla car autopilot crash is widely reported yet all other car manufacturers' self-driving propositions are not better[0] compared to Tesla's and almost nobody is talking about that -- at least not in the news outlets I've been following. Media seems to really want to see Musk fail. That doesn't look like objective journalism to me. (Additionally, did somebody actually investigate Waymo's and Uber's self-driving car departments inner workings and if they report the accident counts truthfully?) [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-driving_car#Incidents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-driving_car#Incidents
- ilikehurdles 7y ago
  If other manufacturers released a public beta, opt-in version of an incomplete self-driving solution, I’d consider them dangerously irresponsible with human life. Tesla makes it part of their sales and marketing.
- ymolodtsov 7y ago
  Because no other car manufacturers sells consumer a car with something they claim to be “autopilot” creating a clear association with complete self-driving you can trust.
  - pdimitar 7y ago
    What association the customer makes and what is really happening are different things. If we are going to talk about deceptive marketing, Tesla is definitely not the first company I would attack.
    - falcolas 7y ago
      They are, however, very relevant to this overall discussion.
- notfromhere 7y ago
  Because other car companies aren't pretending they have a L5 system ready for commercial deployment
resters 7y ago
I agree with Sam. It's just stupid that people are rooting for the failure of one of the most brilliant and ballsy entrepreneurs we've seen in many years. Those rooting against him deserve to stay in the dark ages.
- thrill 7y ago
  Stock valuation has nothing to do with whether you want a company to succeed or not.
grambrose 7y ago
Sam also said it was "gross" to see people saying I told you so after the WSJ Theranos article. Dude lives in a SV bubble. Investors don't like to see billion dollar losses, they are not choosing sides.
KorematsuFred 7y ago
It is little surprising Sam Altman say this. The whole notion of startups is that the entire world is rooting against you. The reason why Uber or Pinterest went to VCs and not the banks for loans is because Banks do not give loans to such risk businesses. That aversion to risk is essentially what makes startup success spectacular. It is not just Tesla that people are rooting against. People rooted against Ford Model 3, Google and Internet itself if you simply bother to look at news of those times. Paul Krugman, the patron saint of left liberals predicted that Internet would simply disappear. Also what you say is irrelevant. What matters is your portfolio. Are you making money off Puts or Calls ?
- BEEdwards 7y ago
  TBF about the Paul and his prediction of the internet, there are some who would argue it hasn't actually produced or improved anything.
  - leesec 7y ago
    Hackernews never fails to blow me away. I can't be the only one who thinks it is insane to say the Internet hasn't produced or improved anything.
    - ggm 7y ago
      Gross or net? Gross, huge upsides. Truly. Net? Not so clear. The socialised downsides now include hollowing out and killing mainstreet, the end of privacy, rampant porn and pornification of normal life, spam, and hacked elections.
      - KorematsuFred 7y ago
        BS !
        ggm 7y ago
        Such compelling argument!
superfrank 7y ago
The vast majority of people I see who are "rooting against Tesla" aren't against innovation, electric cars, or helping the planet. I feel like most people who are bullish on Tesla are really just bullish on Elon Musk. I don't see many people claiming electric cars are stupid (anymore) or that Tesla's aren't good products. Most of the criticism is that Elon is reckless as a CEO and has over promised what he can deliver at an affordable price which has put Tesla in a tough place financially.
ElijahLynn 7y ago
Truth.
eldavojohn 7y ago
Criticism against Tesla is not rooting against Tesla. Playing options as a result of a CEO shooting his mouth off doesn't make you against the environment or against green technology. In this case, it just makes you a realist. I'm an avid environmentalist. Elon Musk has lied so many times that I'm not rooting against him, I'm just afraid that his house of cards is going to come tumbling down and he will be another Solyndra where a good concept is ruined by a conman who has said that within a year you can make $30k/yr letting your tesla be a robotaxi and that in a year and three months there will be a million robotaxis on the road[0]. When criticism is valid, it's okay. We've seen Elon Musk lie about production time and time again. It's okay to distrust him. That's not "rooting against the environment." [0] https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2019/04/23/elon-musk-says-tesla-owners-could-make-30-000-robotaxi-network/3549652002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2019/04/23/elon-musk-say...
- CriticalCathed 7y ago
  Please list the lies and explain why they are lies.
  - nopriorarrests 7y ago
    I don't know if it technically counts as a lie, but on 31st of January he told investors that he expects profitability in Q1 2019. Instead Tesla delivered 700M loss. Before that, in 2017, he told investors - "“What people should absolutely have zero concern about, and I mean 0, is that Tesla will achieve a 10,000 unit production week by the end of next year. […] I think people should really not have any concerns that we won’t reach that outcome from a production rate.” Guess what, we are well into 2019, and they are producing around 5-6K M3 per week. This is not how you run multi-billion company.
  - sabertoothed 7y ago
    I am an Elon Musk supporter (if that makes any sense as a term) and shareholder in Tesla. But he lied when he said "funding secured" and when he accused the diving expert of being pedophile. That was unacceptable behaviour. And he deserves to be criticised for it. However, Elon Musk needs to be judged in shades of grey - not in black and white as it is so common.
Traster 7y ago
I think it's pretty toxic to disingenuously suggest that anyone who has a problem with Tesla is just shorting the stock. It's like coming out and "It's gross seeing so many root against Uber" back when Uber was the subject of a new sexual harassment expose every other week. Sometimes companies with interesting tech behave unethically.
brianpgordon 7y ago
> Be the person on the side of the climate Elon Musk is not on the side of the climate, he's on the side of Elon Musk. His forays into tunneling put the lie to his pro-climate claims awhile ago. He has a bizarre hatred for public transport, which is the real solution to reducing transportation emissions in cities. He would rather everyone take a tunnel (in their Tesla, of course) than countenance the possibility real, effective public transport, and he's actively seeked to divert public funding away from public transport to his privately-owned Boring Co. Meanwhile, moving an entire car around for each person is absurdly inefficient, even if it's electric. It still has to be charged up, and that electricity is not certain to be renewable. In fact, in the US, your electric car is not likely to be significantly more green than a very efficient gasoline vehicle: http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Shades-of-Green-Full-Report.pdf http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Sh... Of course, that's what the SolarCity acquisition is about, right? Except there is still no solar roof, and Gigafactory 2 is turning into a major scandal - that whole acquisition seems now to been disastrously ill-advised in retrospect, and it's hard not to notice that it was hugely profitable for Musk. I am on the side of climate. I do not think this requires mindlessly recapitalizing Elon Musk's ventures over and over. He's not the only one working on clean energy. Other people can carry the torch if his hubris and reckless behavior catch up to him and he goes bankrupt.
apeace 7y ago
I'm seeing a trend that opinions must now involve name-calling, picking sides, and attacks on the reader's self-identity. Altman doesn't just share an opinion here, he calls those who disagree with him "gross" and suggest that there are only two types of people ("be the person... not the person...") I wish we lived in the kind of world where the Tweet said this: "I'm disappointed that so many root against Tesla. I support them because it's good for the climate and I believe in innovation. That's more important than making money on puts." Is it necessary to call people gross? Just read the other comments in this thread, there are plenty of rational reasons to short TSLA which don't make people gross.
AndrewBissell 7y ago
Maybe a mod can explain why a direct link (with no attached commentary) to a Sam Altman twitter post about a prominent Silicon Valley company is flagged?
- dragonwriter 7y ago
  HN is primarily community moderated, and there are plenty of reasons why it might reasonably be flagged. That Altman tweeted it doesn't make inherently make it on topic or appropriate for HN.
- whamlastxmas 7y ago
  Because everyone here hates on Elon endlessly and hate anything supporting him
  - AndrewBissell 7y ago
    The results for searches like "Tesla" and "Elon Musk" cast a lot of doubt on your claim. The top-ranked HN link for "Autopilot" is still the NHTSA study which purported to demonstrate a 40% reduction in driving incidents and has since been thoroughly debunked.
RivieraKid 7y ago
I root for innovation, technology and electric vehicles. But I find the CEO repulsive because he's narcissistic, dishonest and can be downright cruel to other people. This is not apparent, I came to this realization slowly, I initially felt mildly positive about him. Also, I don't like the general cultishness and stupidity of some Tesla fans.
Gaussian 7y ago
Being 'against' Tesla isn't being against the environment and innovation. The vector of personal transportation is pointed in the right direction here with or without Tesla. They have moved things forward, no doubt. But Tesla and these larger issues can and should be separated.
hairytrog 7y ago
Musk is a lot like Trump. Boisterous, tends to exaggerate, accidentally lies a lot. It's their manner. They don't focus on technical accuracy etc. They're focused on the feeling - the vision - the faith. That's what it takes to do the most difficult things. Realism tends to crush really difficult projects.
cjhopman 7y ago
I agree. It's also why I can't understand people who root against Theranos. I, for one, am on the side of health.
- pwinnski 7y ago
  You have perfectly and beautiful illustrated why the linked tweet is nonsense. That said, even as a Tesla skeptic, I don't think Tesla is a fraud on the level of Theranos. That won't hinder my up-voting!
GoodJokes 7y ago
Lol he is a capitalist. Obviously we aren’t solving climate change with unfettered capitalism. It’s gross swing Sam Altman thinking he needs to defend a billionaire. Talk about having your priorities out of order

39 points by AndrewBissell 7y ago

Be the person on the side of the law and on the side of safety. Not the person hoping to make money from dishonest marketing and publicity stunts. Tesla has achieved way more than I would have expected, had someone told me about it beforehand. But it doesn't magically absolve them, just because the tech is cool.

SEJeff 7y ago
I guess from Elon's POV, safety is sort of relative. Their numbers[1] show autopilot as safer than human drivers, even though they don't have full autonomy yet. A lot of people consider 1 human death from a computer driving as unacceptable, but hundreds of thousands from human drivers as totally fine. [1] https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport
- atomical 7y ago
  That's easy to say when most of the public isn't driving your cars. Scaling the company can bring a lot of problems that weren't foreseen.
- BEEdwards 7y ago
  It's only a handful of deaths by automated cars now, but they've only been a thing for 10 years and in incridibly limited numbers. Robots are almost certainly better drivers, but at the numbers we have now we can't say for sure.
- falcolas 7y ago
  Wasn't there some contention that within the same vehicle class (luxury sedan) Teslas were not as "safe" in comparison? I don't have numbers, but their comparison of a luxury sedan to all drivers has seemed disingenuous (to put it kindly, lying with numbers to put it less kindly).
- Traster 7y ago
  Let's be clear: Their numbers are bollocks, and a serious reason why not only should we worry about their cars killing people, we should be worried about their callous indifference to lying about it. >In the 1st quarter, we registered one accident for every 2.87 million miles driven in which drivers had Autopilot engaged. For those driving without Autopilot, we registered one accident for every 1.76 million miles driven. By comparison, NHTSA’s most recent data shows that in the United States there is an automobile crash every 436,000 miles. Take from this 2 things: 1. Either Tesla drivers are 4x safer than the average driver or their stats aren't comparable with the industry standard measures (1.76m vs 0.43m) and they have no problem with misleadingly comparing the two. 2. Tesla is not interested in supplying a real metric for how likely you are to crash in a Tesla, but instead provide PR numbers (accident per million miles when Autopilot is overwhelmingly used only on the safest roads?)
  - SEJeff 7y ago
    I said "From Elon's POV", not "From my POV". Don't shoot the messenger :) I'm trying to explain what he thinks is reality, even if it is detached from what most of the rest of us think as reality. SpaceX's real goal is to send Elon back to mars to be with his real family.
    - unityByFreedom 7y ago
      > I said "From Elon's POV", not "From my POV" Elon's POV has access to a lot more data than we do. He could give more fine grained details about safety. He actively chooses not to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqvatzjHGyk&t=47m17s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqvatzjHGyk&t=47m17s
  - nishantvyas 7y ago
    Pre-cursor: 1. Don't assume anything 2. Don't take anything personally. Can you help understand what's wrong in that statement, "In the 1st quarter, we registered one accident for every 2.87 million miles driven in which drivers had Autopilot engaged. For those driving without Autopilot, we registered one accident for every 1.76 million miles driven. By comparison, NHTSA’s most recent data shows that in the United States there is an automobile crash every 436,000 miles." Answering your questions: 1. Either Tesla drivers are 4x safer than the average driver or their stats aren't comparable with the industry standard measures (1.76m vs 0.43m) and they have no problem with misleadingly comparing the two. -> Well, Tesla has one of the best NHTSA safety ratings.. so their driver might be actually be 4x safer... or at-least based on 1.76m vs 0.43m number... -> one can argue that oldest Tesla on road is 8-9 years and the total # teslas on road are less thus they have lower denominator for total miles driven by all teslas / total # tesla vehicles on the road, which help them get to 1.76M but that doesn't change the fact 1) it is 4x safer based on that number and 2) it has one of the best NHTSA safety ratings. 2. Tesla is not interested in supplying a real metric for how likely you are to crash in a Tesla, but instead provide PR numbers (accident per million miles when Autopilot is overwhelmingly used only on the safest roads?) -> first, Tesla used NHTSA metric here, which is "NHTSA’s most recent data shows that in the United States there is an automobile crash every 436,000 miles." -> Based on that metric, they provided 2 data points, 1) "we registered one accident for every 2.87 million miles driven in which drivers had Autopilot engaged." and 2) "For those driving without Autopilot, we registered one accident for every 1.76 million miles driven." -> that is the real metric on how likely a Tesla car (either autopilot or not) could run into accident... now for "supplying a real metric for how likely you are to crash in a Tesla" (emphasis on "you") would be difficult for any car provider... I'm strictly commenting for the statement you quoted and the 2 questions you posed. I'm not discussing anything like, how they have over-sold (an idea) of auto-pilot, if its truly safe, if its ready and so on.
- erobbins 7y ago
  Their numbers are slanted, to say the least. You can't compare freeway crashes with all crashes.

mimixco 7y ago

I think more people are concerned with his poor performance (in several companies), and poor human relations than just with shorting the stock.

ThJ 7y ago

Cool tech. Not so cool CEO.

Glyptodon 7y ago

I'm not "against" Tesla, but they basically epitomize the advent and promotion of "wealth virtue," where rich people buy a product or lifestyle that the vast majority could never afford and then act like poor people are ethically inferior accordingly.

Traster 7y ago
They're also a fantastic example of the silicon valley "Fake it 'till you make it" selling products for life-changing sums on money based on lies about their capabilities.
leesec 7y ago
Umm what. I own a Tesla and am middle classed and don't think people poorer than me are ethically inferior. This is a huge stretch.
- Glyptodon 7y ago
  Most of the Tesla owners I've met fall into one of two categories: a) (this the majority) wealthy virtue signalers b) (this is the minority) upper-middle class/moderately wealthy tech/gadget lovers Buying a luxury car isn't a middle class purchase. Maybe you're some sort of angelic exception, I don't know.
  - taylodl 7y ago
    According to the Pew Research Center the household income of the middle class ranges between roughly $45K-$135K. If you're middle class and buying a Tesla then you're definitely on the upper end of that range. The overwhelming majority of the middle class cannot afford a Tesla.

nrook 7y ago

There are only two options here— either you can root against Tesla, or you can be indifferent to the death of Walter Huang. Tesla has been irresponsible with their rollout of self-driving technology, and someone has died as a result. There's nothing wrong with rooting for other entrants in the self-driving technology space, like Waymo, which aren't willing to grease their path to market dominance with the blood of innocents.

leesec 7y ago
You're ignoring lives saved and potential future lives saved.
- Fins 7y ago
  Can you (or anyone, really) show that there were, or were not, any lives saved? That there were people killed is quite easy to show, but showing that there were crashes prevented... that does not even seem provable.
  - mlindner 7y ago
    Youtube is full of crashes prevented. Spending a few minutes on Google would show you otherwise. If you're not seeing it it's because you have refused to look. You already made up your opinion.
    - Fins 7y ago
      Right, right. And also I am shorting 27 thimgamajillions of Tesla stock, of course. You can't show (least of all on some fanboy Youtube video) that AutoPilot had prevented a crash, compared to a normal person just driving a car. A Tesla crashing into a firetruck -- that you can show. What you could show would be crash statistics over a significant population of similar cars, in similar conditions, driving on similar roads. These statistics don't seem to show any safety benefit to Tesla, but believers will believe.
sabertoothed 7y ago

pdimitar 7y ago

I find it interesting how every Tesla car autopilot crash is widely reported yet all other car manufacturers' self-driving propositions are not better[0] compared to Tesla's and almost nobody is talking about that -- at least not in the news outlets I've been following. Media seems to really want to see Musk fail. That doesn't look like objective journalism to me. (Additionally, did somebody actually investigate Waymo's and Uber's self-driving car departments inner workings and if they report the accident counts truthfully?) [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-driving_car#Incidents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-driving_car#Incidents

ilikehurdles 7y ago
If other manufacturers released a public beta, opt-in version of an incomplete self-driving solution, I’d consider them dangerously irresponsible with human life. Tesla makes it part of their sales and marketing.
ymolodtsov 7y ago
Because no other car manufacturers sells consumer a car with something they claim to be “autopilot” creating a clear association with complete self-driving you can trust.
- pdimitar 7y ago
  What association the customer makes and what is really happening are different things. If we are going to talk about deceptive marketing, Tesla is definitely not the first company I would attack.
  - falcolas 7y ago
    They are, however, very relevant to this overall discussion.
notfromhere 7y ago
Because other car companies aren't pretending they have a L5 system ready for commercial deployment

resters 7y ago

I agree with Sam. It's just stupid that people are rooting for the failure of one of the most brilliant and ballsy entrepreneurs we've seen in many years. Those rooting against him deserve to stay in the dark ages.

thrill 7y ago
Stock valuation has nothing to do with whether you want a company to succeed or not.

grambrose 7y ago

Sam also said it was "gross" to see people saying I told you so after the WSJ Theranos article. Dude lives in a SV bubble. Investors don't like to see billion dollar losses, they are not choosing sides.

KorematsuFred 7y ago

It is little surprising Sam Altman say this. The whole notion of startups is that the entire world is rooting against you. The reason why Uber or Pinterest went to VCs and not the banks for loans is because Banks do not give loans to such risk businesses. That aversion to risk is essentially what makes startup success spectacular. It is not just Tesla that people are rooting against. People rooted against Ford Model 3, Google and Internet itself if you simply bother to look at news of those times. Paul Krugman, the patron saint of left liberals predicted that Internet would simply disappear. Also what you say is irrelevant. What matters is your portfolio. Are you making money off Puts or Calls ?

BEEdwards 7y ago
TBF about the Paul and his prediction of the internet, there are some who would argue it hasn't actually produced or improved anything.
- leesec 7y ago
  Hackernews never fails to blow me away. I can't be the only one who thinks it is insane to say the Internet hasn't produced or improved anything.
  - ggm 7y ago
    Gross or net? Gross, huge upsides. Truly. Net? Not so clear. The socialised downsides now include hollowing out and killing mainstreet, the end of privacy, rampant porn and pornification of normal life, spam, and hacked elections.
    - KorematsuFred 7y ago
      BS !
      - ggm 7y ago
        Such compelling argument!

superfrank 7y ago

The vast majority of people I see who are "rooting against Tesla" aren't against innovation, electric cars, or helping the planet. I feel like most people who are bullish on Tesla are really just bullish on Elon Musk. I don't see many people claiming electric cars are stupid (anymore) or that Tesla's aren't good products. Most of the criticism is that Elon is reckless as a CEO and has over promised what he can deliver at an affordable price which has put Tesla in a tough place financially.

ElijahLynn 7y ago

Truth.

eldavojohn 7y ago

Criticism against Tesla is not rooting against Tesla. Playing options as a result of a CEO shooting his mouth off doesn't make you against the environment or against green technology. In this case, it just makes you a realist. I'm an avid environmentalist. Elon Musk has lied so many times that I'm not rooting against him, I'm just afraid that his house of cards is going to come tumbling down and he will be another Solyndra where a good concept is ruined by a conman who has said that within a year you can make $30k/yr letting your tesla be a robotaxi and that in a year and three months there will be a million robotaxis on the road[0]. When criticism is valid, it's okay. We've seen Elon Musk lie about production time and time again. It's okay to distrust him. That's not "rooting against the environment." [0] https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2019/04/23/elon-musk-says-tesla-owners-could-make-30-000-robotaxi-network/3549652002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2019/04/23/elon-musk-say...

CriticalCathed 7y ago
Please list the lies and explain why they are lies.
- nopriorarrests 7y ago
  I don't know if it technically counts as a lie, but on 31st of January he told investors that he expects profitability in Q1 2019. Instead Tesla delivered 700M loss. Before that, in 2017, he told investors - "“What people should absolutely have zero concern about, and I mean 0, is that Tesla will achieve a 10,000 unit production week by the end of next year. […] I think people should really not have any concerns that we won’t reach that outcome from a production rate.” Guess what, we are well into 2019, and they are producing around 5-6K M3 per week. This is not how you run multi-billion company.
- sabertoothed 7y ago
  I am an Elon Musk supporter (if that makes any sense as a term) and shareholder in Tesla. But he lied when he said "funding secured" and when he accused the diving expert of being pedophile. That was unacceptable behaviour. And he deserves to be criticised for it. However, Elon Musk needs to be judged in shades of grey - not in black and white as it is so common.

Traster 7y ago

I think it's pretty toxic to disingenuously suggest that anyone who has a problem with Tesla is just shorting the stock. It's like coming out and "It's gross seeing so many root against Uber" back when Uber was the subject of a new sexual harassment expose every other week. Sometimes companies with interesting tech behave unethically.

brianpgordon 7y ago

> Be the person on the side of the climate Elon Musk is not on the side of the climate, he's on the side of Elon Musk. His forays into tunneling put the lie to his pro-climate claims awhile ago. He has a bizarre hatred for public transport, which is the real solution to reducing transportation emissions in cities. He would rather everyone take a tunnel (in their Tesla, of course) than countenance the possibility real, effective public transport, and he's actively seeked to divert public funding away from public transport to his privately-owned Boring Co. Meanwhile, moving an entire car around for each person is absurdly inefficient, even if it's electric. It still has to be charged up, and that electricity is not certain to be renewable. In fact, in the US, your electric car is not likely to be significantly more green than a very efficient gasoline vehicle: http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Shades-of-Green-Full-Report.pdf http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Sh... Of course, that's what the SolarCity acquisition is about, right? Except there is still no solar roof, and Gigafactory 2 is turning into a major scandal - that whole acquisition seems now to been disastrously ill-advised in retrospect, and it's hard not to notice that it was hugely profitable for Musk. I am on the side of climate. I do not think this requires mindlessly recapitalizing Elon Musk's ventures over and over. He's not the only one working on clean energy. Other people can carry the torch if his hubris and reckless behavior catch up to him and he goes bankrupt.

apeace 7y ago

I'm seeing a trend that opinions must now involve name-calling, picking sides, and attacks on the reader's self-identity. Altman doesn't just share an opinion here, he calls those who disagree with him "gross" and suggest that there are only two types of people ("be the person... not the person...") I wish we lived in the kind of world where the Tweet said this: "I'm disappointed that so many root against Tesla. I support them because it's good for the climate and I believe in innovation. That's more important than making money on puts." Is it necessary to call people gross? Just read the other comments in this thread, there are plenty of rational reasons to short TSLA which don't make people gross.

AndrewBissell 7y ago

Maybe a mod can explain why a direct link (with no attached commentary) to a Sam Altman twitter post about a prominent Silicon Valley company is flagged?

dragonwriter 7y ago
HN is primarily community moderated, and there are plenty of reasons why it might reasonably be flagged. That Altman tweeted it doesn't make inherently make it on topic or appropriate for HN.
whamlastxmas 7y ago
Because everyone here hates on Elon endlessly and hate anything supporting him
- AndrewBissell 7y ago
  The results for searches like "Tesla" and "Elon Musk" cast a lot of doubt on your claim. The top-ranked HN link for "Autopilot" is still the NHTSA study which purported to demonstrate a 40% reduction in driving incidents and has since been thoroughly debunked.

RivieraKid 7y ago

I root for innovation, technology and electric vehicles. But I find the CEO repulsive because he's narcissistic, dishonest and can be downright cruel to other people. This is not apparent, I came to this realization slowly, I initially felt mildly positive about him. Also, I don't like the general cultishness and stupidity of some Tesla fans.

Gaussian 7y ago

Being 'against' Tesla isn't being against the environment and innovation. The vector of personal transportation is pointed in the right direction here with or without Tesla. They have moved things forward, no doubt. But Tesla and these larger issues can and should be separated.

hairytrog 7y ago

Musk is a lot like Trump. Boisterous, tends to exaggerate, accidentally lies a lot. It's their manner. They don't focus on technical accuracy etc. They're focused on the feeling - the vision - the faith. That's what it takes to do the most difficult things. Realism tends to crush really difficult projects.

cjhopman 7y ago

I agree. It's also why I can't understand people who root against Theranos. I, for one, am on the side of health.

pwinnski 7y ago
You have perfectly and beautiful illustrated why the linked tweet is nonsense. That said, even as a Tesla skeptic, I don't think Tesla is a fraud on the level of Theranos. That won't hinder my up-voting!

GoodJokes 7y ago

Lol he is a capitalist. Obviously we aren’t solving climate change with unfettered capitalism. It’s gross swing Sam Altman thinking he needs to defend a billionaire. Talk about having your priorities out of order