4 ms·

This may sound like a conspiracy theory, but I think that these journalists are downplaying tesla, to troll us and get is to rage and share these articles

Waterluvian 7y ago
I'm not sure if there's such thing as a tenured journalist but there ought to be. If my mortgage payment depended on view count I would definitely have a bias whether I meant it or not.
- radicalbyte 7y ago
  In the UK there sort of is. A disproportionate number of journalists come from the Upper and Upper Middle classes. They're sent to private school then study something fluffy (English, Politics, Psychology) and then go work for one of the big national papers. They don't need to work so can spend their time promoting their causes.
  - adrianN 7y ago
    Probably a big portion of HN's readers are at least upper middle class. That doesn't mean that they don't have to work. Median income is a lot lower than people think, as are median savings. Double or triple the median definitely puts you in the upper middle class, but it's still a for cry from not having to work.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    - pault 7y ago
      The British class system is different than in the US. Your class has much more to do with your family than your income.
  - pjc50 7y ago
    The peak example of this is Boris Johnson, who earns more as a Spectator "journalist" than as a Minister.
chvid 7y ago
Tesla? I thought they had gone bankrupt.
- beat 7y ago
  And if you read the media and don't look at the numbers, of course you'd think that. I ran the numbers a while back, for a similar discussion. They've grown faster than Amazon ever did, for a decade. It's kind of astounding. No, they're not profitable - and they shouldn't be. They're about a tenth the size of a major manufacturer like Toyota or GM now. If they want to play in that league, being profitable is fiscally irresponsible. They should be squeezing every cent they can out of investors and burning cash like they need it to keep warm, because that's fueling this astounding growth. Insisting that they be profitable or not take loans or stock sales to raise cash is a complete misunderstanding of how high growth companies work.
DanCarvajal 7y ago
I think the conspiracy is how much they've overplayed Tesla. Let's meet in the middle.
- runeb 7y ago
  Depends on where you live I guess. Here in Norway 25% of all new cars sold is a Tesla.
  - Certhas 7y ago
    That's an extreme outlier though. The vast majority of BEV vehicles sold are Chinese. And I am not sure it will last either. Volkswagen is planning to switch a factory that puts out 350.000 cars per year to 100% EV by middle of next year[1]. We'll soon find out what the relative difficulty of scaling from scratch vs switching at scale truly are. [1] https://www.zeit.de/wirtschaft/2019-07/automatisierung-volkswagen-vw-arbeitsplaetze-roboter-elektromobilitaet-werk-zwickau https://www.zeit.de/wirtschaft/2019-07/automatisierung-volks...
    - aaronblohowiak 7y ago
      Where are the batteries going to come from for that? I will bet you a thousand usd with 2:1 odds they do not produce 350,000 bev by July of 2021
      - Certhas 7y ago
        And why not? Remember that VW has ten times the R&D budget that Tesla has [2], and that they are committing to going heavily electric over the next years, and that the plans for this switch have been developing over many years already. Concretely they are building up joint ventures with all major manufacturers [1]. [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-volkswagen-electric-batteries/vw-to-deepen-alliances-with-battery-suppliers-for-electric-push-idUSKCN1U30I8 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-volkswagen-electric-batte... [2] https://i.imgur.com/AFzfS6i.png https://i.imgur.com/AFzfS6i.png Edit: BMW by comparison, does not seem to have a plan, has not worked towards a cultural shift towards EV, etc... Tesla might well eat their lunch for years to come...

Waterluvian 7y ago

I'm not sure if there's such thing as a tenured journalist but there ought to be. If my mortgage payment depended on view count I would definitely have a bias whether I meant it or not.

radicalbyte 7y ago
In the UK there sort of is. A disproportionate number of journalists come from the Upper and Upper Middle classes. They're sent to private school then study something fluffy (English, Politics, Psychology) and then go work for one of the big national papers. They don't need to work so can spend their time promoting their causes.
- adrianN 7y ago
  Probably a big portion of HN's readers are at least upper middle class. That doesn't mean that they don't have to work. Median income is a lot lower than people think, as are median savings. Double or triple the median definitely puts you in the upper middle class, but it's still a for cry from not having to work.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - pault 7y ago
    The British class system is different than in the US. Your class has much more to do with your family than your income.
- pjc50 7y ago
  The peak example of this is Boris Johnson, who earns more as a Spectator "journalist" than as a Minister.

chvid 7y ago

Tesla? I thought they had gone bankrupt.

beat 7y ago
And if you read the media and don't look at the numbers, of course you'd think that. I ran the numbers a while back, for a similar discussion. They've grown faster than Amazon ever did, for a decade. It's kind of astounding. No, they're not profitable - and they shouldn't be. They're about a tenth the size of a major manufacturer like Toyota or GM now. If they want to play in that league, being profitable is fiscally irresponsible. They should be squeezing every cent they can out of investors and burning cash like they need it to keep warm, because that's fueling this astounding growth. Insisting that they be profitable or not take loans or stock sales to raise cash is a complete misunderstanding of how high growth companies work.

DanCarvajal 7y ago

I think the conspiracy is how much they've overplayed Tesla. Let's meet in the middle.

runeb 7y ago
Depends on where you live I guess. Here in Norway 25% of all new cars sold is a Tesla.
- Certhas 7y ago
  That's an extreme outlier though. The vast majority of BEV vehicles sold are Chinese. And I am not sure it will last either. Volkswagen is planning to switch a factory that puts out 350.000 cars per year to 100% EV by middle of next year[1]. We'll soon find out what the relative difficulty of scaling from scratch vs switching at scale truly are. [1] https://www.zeit.de/wirtschaft/2019-07/automatisierung-volkswagen-vw-arbeitsplaetze-roboter-elektromobilitaet-werk-zwickau https://www.zeit.de/wirtschaft/2019-07/automatisierung-volks...
  - aaronblohowiak 7y ago
    Where are the batteries going to come from for that? I will bet you a thousand usd with 2:1 odds they do not produce 350,000 bev by July of 2021
    - Certhas 7y ago
      And why not? Remember that VW has ten times the R&D budget that Tesla has [2], and that they are committing to going heavily electric over the next years, and that the plans for this switch have been developing over many years already. Concretely they are building up joint ventures with all major manufacturers [1]. [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-volkswagen-electric-batteries/vw-to-deepen-alliances-with-battery-suppliers-for-electric-push-idUSKCN1U30I8 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-volkswagen-electric-batte... [2] https://i.imgur.com/AFzfS6i.png https://i.imgur.com/AFzfS6i.png Edit: BMW by comparison, does not seem to have a plan, has not worked towards a cultural shift towards EV, etc... Tesla might well eat their lunch for years to come...