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Why do some many people hate Tesla and want them to fail? Do they also want SpaceX to fail? Elon can be an asshat sometimes, and he oversells and is over-optim

Why do some many people hate Tesla and want them to fail? Do they also want SpaceX to fail? Elon can be an asshat sometimes, and he oversells and is over-optimistic. But even if the short sellers are right and Tesla will go bankrupt (which, btw, does not equal failure in many ways), why are so many people excited about that? Most tech giants of recent times have done things I would consider to have made the world a much worse place. Why is Tesla, which has done a lot for humanity and is a key advancement in tackling climate change, hated so much? Why not save your hate for companies damaging democracy or workers rights, which seem like more serious charges?

MegaButts 7y ago
Personally I dislike Tesla because I think Autopilot causes preventable deaths.
- KptMarchewa 7y ago
  Humans driving cars cause preventable deaths.
  - Angostura 7y ago
    It’s not a monetised feature, though.
    - jayd16 7y ago
      Driving a car is indeed a monetized feature of cars. He's saying even if a self driving car is more dangerous than a human, a human driven car is still dangerous and we all accept that. So its not about whether the deaths were preventable. We accept human driven cars therefore we accept preventable death. We're now forced to consider the fact that this is an argument about the fuzzy math of risk vs reward as we have crossed the threshold of preventable deaths long ago.
  - schuke 7y ago
    I guess OP means preventable by others who are knowledgeable of the preventability?
  - threeseed 7y ago
    What is the point of this comment ? Humans doing anything cause preventable deaths. That has nothing to do with whether or not a new, potentially life threatening technology should be on the market.
  - aquadrop 7y ago
    I think it's like saying "I don't like surgery, because mistakes during surgeries cause preventable deaths"
- bsaul 7y ago
  I don’t understand the downvotes. This was actually the same reason for me that changed my perception of the company and of musk, from something fantastic to something dangerous. When they went from saying « we’re aiming at self driving car in the future » to « our car are able to do it right now », leaving all kinds of ambiguity just for the sake of hyping the brand, they crossed the red line.
- jnwatson 7y ago
  Musk’s hubris is annoying, but how many lives did he save by not waiting until the autopilot was “ready”? It is probably in the dozens at this point.
  - MegaButts 7y ago
    I'm not sure why you think that. While this is a very dense document, it details a lot about the fatality statistics around Teslas and Autopilot. The short version is that Teslas are actually not very safe cars (relatively speaking), and Autopilot is probably much more dangerous than manual driving (although Tesla won't release the data, so we don't know for sure). https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ESnyJ4b7m96OCjs3GSQ6EGF7YOMuv0XV-ROXTYIazTs/htmlview# https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ESnyJ4b7m96OCjs3GSQ6...
    - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
      That's a list of all fatalities involving Teslas reported in the media, including ones caused by human Tesla drivers or the drivers of other vehicles involved in the collision, and speculation trying to associate that with a number of miles driven. Then they have "miles per death" numbers in the 150M-240M range, but the US average is less than 100M per death (typically stated as the inverse, deaths per 100M miles[1]), so according to your data they're apparently better than average, though collecting it through media reports this way is questionable anyway. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in_U.S._by_year https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in... I see a column for deaths attributed to autopilot, but it sums to 4 in the US, which is too small to be a good statistical sample even if we knew how many miles per death that was, but I don't see any data for miles driven on autopilot regardless.
      - MegaButts 7y ago
        The thing about comparisons is you need to compare like to like as much as possible. Demographics are an essential part of actuarial statistics. I think the best comparison is between Tesla and luxury vehicles, and here is an article showing Teslas are much more dangerous: https://medium.com/@MidwesternHedgi/teslas-driver-fatality-rate-is-more-than-triple-that-of-luxury-cars-and-likely-even-higher-433670ddde17 https://medium.com/@MidwesternHedgi/teslas-driver-fatality-r... I'm not sure if you noticed (I didn't the first time I saw that document), but there are multiple tabs and that's under the 'Resources' section. That said, the data is obviously incomplete. Only Tesla really knows. While it's obviously a guess, I think the most damning evidence is that Tesla isn't releasing their own data to the contrary, because I think Elon Musk of all people would be ecstatic to shutup the haters such as myself.
- hoseja 7y ago
  Do you dislike drunk-drivers and phone-drivers with the same passion and focus? Do you expect them to gradually become better and better at driving through natural evolution?
  - MegaButts 7y ago
    I hate drunk drivers way more than I hate Tesla. That stuff never shows up on HN though, whereas Tesla is on the front page all the time. Autopilot (and by extension Tesla) is also a lot more controversial than drunk driving, and by extension more interesting to discuss.
  - Maakuth 7y ago
    No car company implies that drunk driver would be safer than myself behind the wheel, and I should let her drive instead.
- Tepix 7y ago
  If we arrive at a working solution faster (i.e. something that prevents more deaths than it causes), it makes sense to speed up its development to get to that state faster. The question remains if we accept a death by software bug (i.e. human software developer error) in the same way we accept a death by human driving error.
  - notahacker 7y ago
    > The question remains if we accept a death by software bug (i.e. human software developer error) in the same way we accept a death by human driving error. The closest thing Hacker News has to consensus is "certainly not if it's Boeing, probably not if it's Uber but definitely if it's Tesla..."
narnianal 7y ago
Because they are involved in other car companies and they would lose something if Tesla beats the car companies they are involved with. For instance if you are a supplier and have super good relationships with Ford then you don't want Tesla to beat Ford. Who knows if you can have a similarly profitable and trustable relationship at Tesla.
- randomsearch 7y ago
  I agree it seems likely that other car companies are against Tesla. But why are geeks against Tesla? Why is there so much hate for them on Hacker News on Twitter, from tech people working for big tech companies? That's my question.
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hevi_jos 7y ago
>Why do some many people hate Tesla and want them to fail? It is nothing personal, it is business. There is an entire financial industry that live out of making bubbles the general public can buy(and they can sell to, expensive) and out of popping bubbles through sorting(buying cheap). When they pop bubbles, it means they can buy extremely cheap things that in normal circumstances their owners will never sell. The same happens with war, George Soros, himself a jew, helped the natzis against the jews in WWII as an adolescent. It was a wonderful time for Soros, the best in his entire life, in his own words. If you have a good house, you and your family live well you don't sell it undervalued. If they come after your family to kill them, you will be forced to seel it when lots of people sell(undervalued). It also helps that the owners of newspapers like the Washington Post or the NYT are actually the financial elite. Those guys can actually create the public opinion they can profit from. Today, having a free press is a luxury, probably has always been. Good information is not cheap. Like with Facebook, when you access cheap info most of the time it is subsidized by someone against the interest of the general public that consumes it. If those guys can make a profit destroying Tesla they will. Nothing personal. They will move on to their next target.
- atlasunshrugged 7y ago
  Can you provide a source on your comments about Soros? I've seen this mentioned a few times over the years but I had also heard that it was taken out of context or that he had misspoken and later retracted. Would like to see the primary source if you have it
  - thomasmeeks 7y ago
    Snopes has a great write up on it that points to primary sources, including a “60 Minutes” interview. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/george-soros-ss-nazi-germany/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/george-soros-ss-nazi-germa... The tl;dr is that such accusations are weird, false, propaganda about Soros.
    - notahacker 7y ago
      The TLDR version is there are many legitimate criticisms of Soros, but anyone using his wartime experiences as a kid forced to conceal his identity to avoid the holocaust to invoke "rapacious Jewish financier" tropes is exactly the sort of human excrement that would have cheerfully joined the SS themselves...
rightnow 7y ago
Same thing as people voting for Trump. They just like to watch the world burn.
thomersch_ 7y ago
For me it's because they do damage their workers' rights and their fans are so insufferable: The denial that they have quality issues, the repeated lies ("we are going to build a factory in weeks", while everyone knows that it will take years), the massive overvaluation. It's either you are on team Tesla and celebrating every of Elon's brainfarts or you are "big oil" that is trying to destroy them: Just look what happens when countries try to introduce standardised charing cables. I just wish they would be frank about what they can and cannot do. EDIT: And by the way about that pathetic "climate change" argument. Right, they are now selling Fiat their CO2 certificates thus enabling them to do wonderful green washing.
- randomsearch 7y ago
  So, you made me realise I'd been ambiguous here, sorry. I'll have to name companies to explain: Uber have undermined workers' rights in a systematic way, through the development of their concept of contract employees and the gig economy. I have heard plenty of stories about SpaceX (not Tesla, but I'll assume similar stories exist) not treating their employees well. So yes, they've hurt workers rights too, so I accept your point. It's different kind of issue though, because it's particular to one company and not systemic, which is what I originally meant to say. Disagree strongly about the climate change/greenwashing argument. I believe Tesla is a net positive in tackling climate change, which is what matters.
- adim86 7y ago
  To be honest it really disturbs why people hate Tesla so much. Citing your reason for them being over-optimistic or over-promising, how else do people change the world? I don't mean this message as an attack but something to think about. These guys are working on something No one has EVER done in the history of mankind and we require them to stick to timetables and if they don't the punishment is we wish them failure and celebrate it? If Tesla is to succeed all our lives will be better for it, why are their mistakes and obstacles celebrated? Why do we care if the company is overvalued? This is the same sentiment towards Apple when the iPhone first came out till it no longer could be ignored. Tesla is far from a perfect company, but their mission is true and the real question we should be asking ourselves rather than if we like Elon, or if the company is overvalued or if they over promise and under deliver. the real question is, Is this company really trying to fulfill its mission statement, If yes, would we want such a mission to succeed?
austhrow743 7y ago
SpaceX isn't a big name in consumer tech the same way Tesla or those tech giants you're thinking of are. It's less known and even less within the public conscious. Less seen so less talked about. People on a deep subconscious level understand that they're not in an environment where they belong. They've been robbed of their humanity and turned in to half cog half husk of a person. They've don't and can't live an authentic life but rather a simulation. They're a shark in a tank. They understand that the scientist, the academic, and above all the technologist is responsible for this. Large well known technology companies are therefore a good outlet of this disapproval. They're viewed as the enemy and the missteps they make that we consciously understand as negatives are amplified by our subconscious understanding that they're existentially damaging to us at their very core. People do hate the tech giants. Tesla though is largely unique in that it doesn't sell to the masses, at least not yet, so criticism aimed at it feels less hypocritical than that of a company whose products and services we use. That's why SpaceX doesn't get criticised pretty much at all, normal tech giants get criticised a bit, and Tesla gets dogpiled.
Barrin92 7y ago
>Why do some many people hate Tesla and want them to fail? Do they also want SpaceX to fail? For me personally the treatment of their workers, their anti-unionisation efforts, and their misleading advertisement of the autopilot, together with Musks extremely off-putting public behaviour. And no I don't want spaceX to fail. >Why not save your hate for companies damaging democracy or workers rights, which seem like more serious charges? I think many people, including myself at this point have similar opinions about Facebook et al. There are relatively few large tech companies left that I look at optimistically.
- canada_dry 7y ago
  Like the saying goes: 'when someone shows you who they really are, believe them'. The whole Thai cave rescue really showed who Elon Musk is: an incorrigible sociopath who's shortcomings make it difficult to celebrate any success he has.
  - damon_c 7y ago
    Wait... I mean... he was kind of a jerk calling that guy a pedofile or whatever but, it was in the context of trying to save children wasn't it? Saving children is not normal sociopath territory?
    - snorkasaurus 7y ago
      It is when you push your own self serving bullshit solution on people who know better just so you can play the hero. Classic, even.
    - Fins 7y ago
      Well, yeah. Except it was the guy who got called a pedophile for his trouble who was rescuing children, while Musk prancing around like an incompetent buffoon.
  - vgoh1 7y ago
    We need to stop this culture of taking single sentences and vilifying people over them. People get tired, they get mad, temporarily confused, and can be good people 95% of the time, and a bit of a jerk other times. But the internet never forgets, so we as a people need to learn to forgive a bit more.
pasabagi 7y ago
For my part, it's just that Elon is the paramount example of what happens when the ROI plummets, and there's an amazing amount of investor cash floating around. You see it in history: the victorians built a ridiculously over-engineered, insanely extensive rail network. It didn't make any money, but at the time, there wasn't really anything else to invest in with a reasonable return rate. So everybody went in on the one thing that had the possibility of a massive pay-off. Recognize the unicorn-logic here? Tesla kind of takes all the decades of Toyota kicking ass, and gets the lesson completely wrong - the 'machine that builds the machine' is exactly what GM was doing. Toyota was good at building cars because they were far less automated than their american competitors. Then it works because electric cars are a great idea, batteries are massively subsidized by the phone industry, and incumbent car makers don't really have relevant expertise (since they're really good at building internal combustion engines, and a lot of the other stuff is a secondary concern). Also, because Tesla has an enormous amount of investor cash. So why does all this bother me? It's because of where the cash comes from. Tech companies don't really pay taxes, and they don't have (relative to revenue) employees. If you imagine how many jobs Microsoft Office has replaced, you get the picture. All this is fine in itself (minus the tax thing), but when the money just gets poured into these obvious money spouts, into a company that's pretty obviously only workable because it sits at the bottom of one of those money spouts, lead by a guy who's clearly not as smart as he thinks he is - well, it feels a bit like a great example of the waste and unfairness of the system itself.
- jonplackett 7y ago
  Would just like to point out that in the UK we're still massively benefitting from the Victorian's far-sighted investments. They made stuff to last 100s of years. Bridges, railways, sewers, the house I'm living in. Thanks Victorians.
- karambahh 7y ago
  Would you have sources about Toyota factories being less automated than their US competitors? I've been told in the past that the key factor in Toyota success is their relationship with their suppliers. A top notch supply chain with just in time processes bundled with reasonable proxy stocks? Would love to read about their automation level compared to US or EU companies
otalp 7y ago
Of the top of my head, these are a few things that if Tesla can get away with while having a huge fanbase and no repercussions, every future startup is going to try: 1) Tesla Had 3 Times as Many OSHA Violations as the 10 Largest US Plants Combined[1] 2) Elon Musk personally doxxing a market analyst who provided in-depth analysis of Tesla financials, by calling his boss and threatening to sue if he continued his side project of covering Tesla [2] 3) Committing blatant securities fraud by claiming he would sell Tesla to Saudi Arabian investors for $420 a share, and promising 'the short burn of the century' a few weeks before doing so. 4) Bailing out a failing Solar City run by Musk's family(cousins) with Tesla shareholder money on the promise of a product that turned out to be vaporware. [3] After the merger solar city sales are now approaching zero and it's becoming increasingly clear it was a bailout [4]. Multiple lawsuits are ongoing. 5) Claiming that Tesla cars bought today will appreciate in value to over $250,000, so it's actually an investment not a purchase.[5]. Generally making crazy statements about imminent "million robotaxis" while still not having a 'Summon' featured promised in a few weeks months ago because "parking lots are very hard"(recent tweet) For me at least, the transition was a slow one - from "What they're doing is hard, but I hope they succeed" to "They're probably going to fail, but at least they have good intentions" to "If they don't fail, the precedent set is staggering to what you can get away with". There's the famous James Comey saying of 'The Chickenshit Club' - prosecutors unwilling to take on corporations for fear that a loss or long case would damage their win ratio, leading to entities with a large legal team getting away with anything they want. Fundamentally the problem is consistently making statement that they know to be untrue under the guise of this being targets to be met. A generous person would of course call them "ambitious goal". But someone who has studied them closely would know it's an attempt to pump stock that has historically worked, but has recently started failing. When blatant market manipulations, hazardous working conditions, highly questionable accounting practices, false marketing claims, doxxing critics and lies are allowed to succeed, laws don't really exist and companies operate within their bounds only because they don't want to take the 0.1% risk that they'll actually be punished in a way that threatens their continued operations. If you believe in capitalism and regulated efficient markets, you will hope that a company that breaks the rules as often as Tesla doesn't go unpunished. But the SEC will never bring down a company who's stock is still high, as their primary goal is to protect shareholder value. To fully uncover the extent of their damage, they will have to fail first. [1] - https://www.thedrive.com/news/26727/tesla-had-3-times-as-many-osha-violations-as-the-10-largest-us-plants-combined https://www.thedrive.com/news/26727/tesla-had-3-times-as-man... [2] - https://www.marketwatch.com/story/elon-musk-allegedly-silences-one-of-his-short-selling-critics-by-calling-his-boss-2018-07-25 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/elon-musk-allegedly-silenc... [3] - https://mansionengineer.com/2018/08/10/elon-musk-tesla-and-the-solar-roof-tile-fraud/ https://mansionengineer.com/2018/08/10/elon-musk-tesla-and-t... [4] - https://i.imgur.com/iQUJkbE.jpg https://i.imgur.com/iQUJkbE.jpg [5] - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-16/musk-stands-by-tesla-appreciation-claim-called-really-dumb https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-16/musk-stan...
gopher2 7y ago
For me it's mostly that I don't like overly-promotional liars. And the "saving the world" schtick wears thin. Hate would be a strong word though.
- sergiosgc 7y ago
  Every CEO is a salesman. Anyone who believes every word of a salesman is a fool. I'd not paint it as Trump-style, bona fide lying. It's just inflating promises, or being overly optimistic. Par for the course.
swarnie_ 7y ago
Tesla - Ok cars but build quality is meh. SpaceX - Love what they're doing. Online fans of the two - insufferable cultists.
Lazare 7y ago
> Why do some many people hate Tesla and want them to fail? My feeling is that the overwhelming majority of Tesla critics do not hate Tesla, and do not want Tesla to fail. Rather, they see Tesla as a small, unimportant, poorly run company that gets far more press (positive and negative) than it deserves, and who respond by needling Tesla super-fans. The super fans, in turn, react by treating this as shocking, but it's not really. Tesla critics are treating Tesla like a normal company, and most companies are not particularly well-liked. Nobody cares if Amalgamated Widgets rises and falls except it's investors and competitors. > Do they also want SpaceX to fail? No. But also, Tesla critics, I believe, view SpaceX as a VERY different company. Tesla is just another car company making just another car. SpaceX is something else entirely. If your mental model is "Tesla is like SpaceX", this probably feels weird to you, and the way Tesla gets covered in the press - as if it was merely a car company! - must be maddening. If your mental model is "Tesla is like Saab", this seems pretty obvious. > Most tech giants of recent times have done things I would consider to have made the world a much worse place. I would never dream of calling Tesla a "tech giant". It's a car company, it's not making very good cars, it's not making them very well, it's not making very many of them, and it's not making a lot of money off them. I am incredibly tired of hearing about Tesla. Even if it wins, the Tesla end-game is to be another big successful car company, and I don't care about big successful car companies.
- FrojoS 7y ago
  Tesla has advanced the advent of BEV by something like 10y. There are multiple statements by old car CEOs who admit that Tesla forced their hand to finally take electric cars seriously. So no, Tesla is not unimportant. At all.
  - sangnoir 7y ago
    Dieselgate did more in forcing companies to take electric cars than Tesl ever did.
    - ZeroGravitas 7y ago
      It's obviously hard to debate counterfactuals but I disagree. I think having a publicly successful alternative available made the impact of deiselgate much worse (for EV alternatives/better for the planet). Just like Nuclear can get away with being "better than coal" but in the face of plummeting wind, solar and storage costs its drawbacks get looked at with new eyes. Or in some parallel dimension where deiselgate led to trillions being wasted on hydrogen fuel celled vehicles which never replaced ICE.
navigatesol 7y ago
Building a handful of electric cars while milking investors is not doing a lot for humanity.
blaser-waffle 7y ago
> Why do some many people hate Tesla and want them to fail? Do they also want SpaceX to fail? Aside from the obvious fanboy vs anti-fanboy thing, all of the other players in these spheres tend to be huge companies and government contractors, who can afford large and aggressive marketing budgets. This will almost certainly include some sort of online forum monitoring and consensus building.
AtlasBarfed 7y ago
1) Elon is a nerd. The media loves to do stories on darling nerds transforming the world and then tearing them down with classic American anti-intellectualism and clickbait links at every stage of the Hype Cycle. 2) Oil and big auto hate them. A small company made the technological offerings of car companies and are threatening oil to become obsolete? And the car companies have been whining about CAFE and the inability to make EVs for three decades now. 3) Stock speculators and shorters producing volatility and doing bets. 4) Americans are attached to cars, so all the "car guys" hate Teslas. ESPECIALLY since they smoke ICEs off the line. Go read jalopnik, Tesla is pursuing their two precious bastions of masculinity: the roar of an engine, and whether or not you actually drive a car yourself
ZeroGravitas 7y ago
One factor I think is "the Copenhagen interpretation of ethics" which means if you point out that there are people starving on the planet, and you don't immediately give up your entire wealth to do something about it then you are judged as worse than people doing their best to not focus on bad stuff outside of their immediate vision. https://blog.jaibot.com/the-copenhagen-interpretation-of-ethics/ https://blog.jaibot.com/the-copenhagen-interpretation-of-eth... Tesla/Musk obviously fall into this trap with climate change. Also the parallels in some attacks with what gets used for people like Al Gore makes me think that pointing out a problem that people have staked their political capital on being a hoax, provokes a certain reaction too.
randomsearch 7y ago
That question became much bigger than expected. It was an honest question from a point of ignorance, so maybe that’s why. I got some interesting insight. One trend I noticed in the replies is that answers are tending away from the goal of car driving being part of daily life and trying to make that electric. Those who did touch on this, were of the opinion that Tesla was not doing anything new or essential in that area. Instead, most criticism was targeted towards the negatives of Tesla without regards to the positive. Tesla driving the advent of electric-powered personal transportation was barely touched upon. Overall, I’m of the opinion that the technical advances Tesla has made, the influence on the market and public thinking, outweighs the negatives. One explanation I came up with myself for the hatred is the overriding positive optimism of Musk. I do think that his marketing is partially bluster and partially the way he sees the world. The latter perhaps is what people hate. And nerds are somehow predisposed, understandably, to be sceptical. There’s a direct conflict there. If you’ve spent years working for Facebook or others, then it would be hard to accept that a much better way of spending your time is possible. Easier to think all tech companies are bad, than the idea that you’ve made the wrong choice. Especially when earning well. I have no axe to grind for Musk. He’s said enough things to lose my respect. I think being on Twitter is unhealthy for him and he’s crossed many lines. I also think Tesla is net positive, and I still think the hatred of this community is irrational. I think everyone feeling that way about Tesla should take time out and imagine trying to explain how a world without Tesla would have been better.

MegaButts 7y ago

Personally I dislike Tesla because I think Autopilot causes preventable deaths.

KptMarchewa 7y ago
Humans driving cars cause preventable deaths.
- Angostura 7y ago
  It’s not a monetised feature, though.
  - jayd16 7y ago
    Driving a car is indeed a monetized feature of cars. He's saying even if a self driving car is more dangerous than a human, a human driven car is still dangerous and we all accept that. So its not about whether the deaths were preventable. We accept human driven cars therefore we accept preventable death. We're now forced to consider the fact that this is an argument about the fuzzy math of risk vs reward as we have crossed the threshold of preventable deaths long ago.
- schuke 7y ago
  I guess OP means preventable by others who are knowledgeable of the preventability?
- threeseed 7y ago
  What is the point of this comment ? Humans doing anything cause preventable deaths. That has nothing to do with whether or not a new, potentially life threatening technology should be on the market.
- aquadrop 7y ago
  I think it's like saying "I don't like surgery, because mistakes during surgeries cause preventable deaths"
bsaul 7y ago
I don’t understand the downvotes. This was actually the same reason for me that changed my perception of the company and of musk, from something fantastic to something dangerous. When they went from saying « we’re aiming at self driving car in the future » to « our car are able to do it right now », leaving all kinds of ambiguity just for the sake of hyping the brand, they crossed the red line.
jnwatson 7y ago
Musk’s hubris is annoying, but how many lives did he save by not waiting until the autopilot was “ready”? It is probably in the dozens at this point.
- MegaButts 7y ago
  I'm not sure why you think that. While this is a very dense document, it details a lot about the fatality statistics around Teslas and Autopilot. The short version is that Teslas are actually not very safe cars (relatively speaking), and Autopilot is probably much more dangerous than manual driving (although Tesla won't release the data, so we don't know for sure). https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ESnyJ4b7m96OCjs3GSQ6EGF7YOMuv0XV-ROXTYIazTs/htmlview# https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ESnyJ4b7m96OCjs3GSQ6...
  - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
    That's a list of all fatalities involving Teslas reported in the media, including ones caused by human Tesla drivers or the drivers of other vehicles involved in the collision, and speculation trying to associate that with a number of miles driven. Then they have "miles per death" numbers in the 150M-240M range, but the US average is less than 100M per death (typically stated as the inverse, deaths per 100M miles[1]), so according to your data they're apparently better than average, though collecting it through media reports this way is questionable anyway. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in_U.S._by_year https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in... I see a column for deaths attributed to autopilot, but it sums to 4 in the US, which is too small to be a good statistical sample even if we knew how many miles per death that was, but I don't see any data for miles driven on autopilot regardless.
    - MegaButts 7y ago
      The thing about comparisons is you need to compare like to like as much as possible. Demographics are an essential part of actuarial statistics. I think the best comparison is between Tesla and luxury vehicles, and here is an article showing Teslas are much more dangerous: https://medium.com/@MidwesternHedgi/teslas-driver-fatality-rate-is-more-than-triple-that-of-luxury-cars-and-likely-even-higher-433670ddde17 https://medium.com/@MidwesternHedgi/teslas-driver-fatality-r... I'm not sure if you noticed (I didn't the first time I saw that document), but there are multiple tabs and that's under the 'Resources' section. That said, the data is obviously incomplete. Only Tesla really knows. While it's obviously a guess, I think the most damning evidence is that Tesla isn't releasing their own data to the contrary, because I think Elon Musk of all people would be ecstatic to shutup the haters such as myself.
hoseja 7y ago
Do you dislike drunk-drivers and phone-drivers with the same passion and focus? Do you expect them to gradually become better and better at driving through natural evolution?
- MegaButts 7y ago
  I hate drunk drivers way more than I hate Tesla. That stuff never shows up on HN though, whereas Tesla is on the front page all the time. Autopilot (and by extension Tesla) is also a lot more controversial than drunk driving, and by extension more interesting to discuss.
- Maakuth 7y ago
  No car company implies that drunk driver would be safer than myself behind the wheel, and I should let her drive instead.
Tepix 7y ago
If we arrive at a working solution faster (i.e. something that prevents more deaths than it causes), it makes sense to speed up its development to get to that state faster. The question remains if we accept a death by software bug (i.e. human software developer error) in the same way we accept a death by human driving error.
- notahacker 7y ago
  > The question remains if we accept a death by software bug (i.e. human software developer error) in the same way we accept a death by human driving error. The closest thing Hacker News has to consensus is "certainly not if it's Boeing, probably not if it's Uber but definitely if it's Tesla..."

narnianal 7y ago

Because they are involved in other car companies and they would lose something if Tesla beats the car companies they are involved with. For instance if you are a supplier and have super good relationships with Ford then you don't want Tesla to beat Ford. Who knows if you can have a similarly profitable and trustable relationship at Tesla.

randomsearch 7y ago
I agree it seems likely that other car companies are against Tesla. But why are geeks against Tesla? Why is there so much hate for them on Hacker News on Twitter, from tech people working for big tech companies? That's my question.
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hevi_jos 7y ago

>Why do some many people hate Tesla and want them to fail? It is nothing personal, it is business. There is an entire financial industry that live out of making bubbles the general public can buy(and they can sell to, expensive) and out of popping bubbles through sorting(buying cheap). When they pop bubbles, it means they can buy extremely cheap things that in normal circumstances their owners will never sell. The same happens with war, George Soros, himself a jew, helped the natzis against the jews in WWII as an adolescent. It was a wonderful time for Soros, the best in his entire life, in his own words. If you have a good house, you and your family live well you don't sell it undervalued. If they come after your family to kill them, you will be forced to seel it when lots of people sell(undervalued). It also helps that the owners of newspapers like the Washington Post or the NYT are actually the financial elite. Those guys can actually create the public opinion they can profit from. Today, having a free press is a luxury, probably has always been. Good information is not cheap. Like with Facebook, when you access cheap info most of the time it is subsidized by someone against the interest of the general public that consumes it. If those guys can make a profit destroying Tesla they will. Nothing personal. They will move on to their next target.

atlasunshrugged 7y ago
Can you provide a source on your comments about Soros? I've seen this mentioned a few times over the years but I had also heard that it was taken out of context or that he had misspoken and later retracted. Would like to see the primary source if you have it
- thomasmeeks 7y ago
  Snopes has a great write up on it that points to primary sources, including a “60 Minutes” interview. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/george-soros-ss-nazi-germany/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/george-soros-ss-nazi-germa... The tl;dr is that such accusations are weird, false, propaganda about Soros.
  - notahacker 7y ago
    The TLDR version is there are many legitimate criticisms of Soros, but anyone using his wartime experiences as a kid forced to conceal his identity to avoid the holocaust to invoke "rapacious Jewish financier" tropes is exactly the sort of human excrement that would have cheerfully joined the SS themselves...

rightnow 7y ago

Same thing as people voting for Trump. They just like to watch the world burn.

thomersch_ 7y ago

For me it's because they do damage their workers' rights and their fans are so insufferable: The denial that they have quality issues, the repeated lies ("we are going to build a factory in weeks", while everyone knows that it will take years), the massive overvaluation. It's either you are on team Tesla and celebrating every of Elon's brainfarts or you are "big oil" that is trying to destroy them: Just look what happens when countries try to introduce standardised charing cables. I just wish they would be frank about what they can and cannot do. EDIT: And by the way about that pathetic "climate change" argument. Right, they are now selling Fiat their CO2 certificates thus enabling them to do wonderful green washing.

randomsearch 7y ago
So, you made me realise I'd been ambiguous here, sorry. I'll have to name companies to explain: Uber have undermined workers' rights in a systematic way, through the development of their concept of contract employees and the gig economy. I have heard plenty of stories about SpaceX (not Tesla, but I'll assume similar stories exist) not treating their employees well. So yes, they've hurt workers rights too, so I accept your point. It's different kind of issue though, because it's particular to one company and not systemic, which is what I originally meant to say. Disagree strongly about the climate change/greenwashing argument. I believe Tesla is a net positive in tackling climate change, which is what matters.
adim86 7y ago
To be honest it really disturbs why people hate Tesla so much. Citing your reason for them being over-optimistic or over-promising, how else do people change the world? I don't mean this message as an attack but something to think about. These guys are working on something No one has EVER done in the history of mankind and we require them to stick to timetables and if they don't the punishment is we wish them failure and celebrate it? If Tesla is to succeed all our lives will be better for it, why are their mistakes and obstacles celebrated? Why do we care if the company is overvalued? This is the same sentiment towards Apple when the iPhone first came out till it no longer could be ignored. Tesla is far from a perfect company, but their mission is true and the real question we should be asking ourselves rather than if we like Elon, or if the company is overvalued or if they over promise and under deliver. the real question is, Is this company really trying to fulfill its mission statement, If yes, would we want such a mission to succeed?

austhrow743 7y ago

SpaceX isn't a big name in consumer tech the same way Tesla or those tech giants you're thinking of are. It's less known and even less within the public conscious. Less seen so less talked about. People on a deep subconscious level understand that they're not in an environment where they belong. They've been robbed of their humanity and turned in to half cog half husk of a person. They've don't and can't live an authentic life but rather a simulation. They're a shark in a tank. They understand that the scientist, the academic, and above all the technologist is responsible for this. Large well known technology companies are therefore a good outlet of this disapproval. They're viewed as the enemy and the missteps they make that we consciously understand as negatives are amplified by our subconscious understanding that they're existentially damaging to us at their very core. People do hate the tech giants. Tesla though is largely unique in that it doesn't sell to the masses, at least not yet, so criticism aimed at it feels less hypocritical than that of a company whose products and services we use. That's why SpaceX doesn't get criticised pretty much at all, normal tech giants get criticised a bit, and Tesla gets dogpiled.

Barrin92 7y ago

>Why do some many people hate Tesla and want them to fail? Do they also want SpaceX to fail? For me personally the treatment of their workers, their anti-unionisation efforts, and their misleading advertisement of the autopilot, together with Musks extremely off-putting public behaviour. And no I don't want spaceX to fail. >Why not save your hate for companies damaging democracy or workers rights, which seem like more serious charges? I think many people, including myself at this point have similar opinions about Facebook et al. There are relatively few large tech companies left that I look at optimistically.

canada_dry 7y ago
Like the saying goes: 'when someone shows you who they really are, believe them'. The whole Thai cave rescue really showed who Elon Musk is: an incorrigible sociopath who's shortcomings make it difficult to celebrate any success he has.
- damon_c 7y ago
  Wait... I mean... he was kind of a jerk calling that guy a pedofile or whatever but, it was in the context of trying to save children wasn't it? Saving children is not normal sociopath territory?
  - snorkasaurus 7y ago
    It is when you push your own self serving bullshit solution on people who know better just so you can play the hero. Classic, even.
  - Fins 7y ago
    Well, yeah. Except it was the guy who got called a pedophile for his trouble who was rescuing children, while Musk prancing around like an incompetent buffoon.
- vgoh1 7y ago
  We need to stop this culture of taking single sentences and vilifying people over them. People get tired, they get mad, temporarily confused, and can be good people 95% of the time, and a bit of a jerk other times. But the internet never forgets, so we as a people need to learn to forgive a bit more.

pasabagi 7y ago

For my part, it's just that Elon is the paramount example of what happens when the ROI plummets, and there's an amazing amount of investor cash floating around. You see it in history: the victorians built a ridiculously over-engineered, insanely extensive rail network. It didn't make any money, but at the time, there wasn't really anything else to invest in with a reasonable return rate. So everybody went in on the one thing that had the possibility of a massive pay-off. Recognize the unicorn-logic here? Tesla kind of takes all the decades of Toyota kicking ass, and gets the lesson completely wrong - the 'machine that builds the machine' is exactly what GM was doing. Toyota was good at building cars because they were far less automated than their american competitors. Then it works because electric cars are a great idea, batteries are massively subsidized by the phone industry, and incumbent car makers don't really have relevant expertise (since they're really good at building internal combustion engines, and a lot of the other stuff is a secondary concern). Also, because Tesla has an enormous amount of investor cash. So why does all this bother me? It's because of where the cash comes from. Tech companies don't really pay taxes, and they don't have (relative to revenue) employees. If you imagine how many jobs Microsoft Office has replaced, you get the picture. All this is fine in itself (minus the tax thing), but when the money just gets poured into these obvious money spouts, into a company that's pretty obviously only workable because it sits at the bottom of one of those money spouts, lead by a guy who's clearly not as smart as he thinks he is - well, it feels a bit like a great example of the waste and unfairness of the system itself.

jonplackett 7y ago
Would just like to point out that in the UK we're still massively benefitting from the Victorian's far-sighted investments. They made stuff to last 100s of years. Bridges, railways, sewers, the house I'm living in. Thanks Victorians.
karambahh 7y ago
Would you have sources about Toyota factories being less automated than their US competitors? I've been told in the past that the key factor in Toyota success is their relationship with their suppliers. A top notch supply chain with just in time processes bundled with reasonable proxy stocks? Would love to read about their automation level compared to US or EU companies

otalp 7y ago

Of the top of my head, these are a few things that if Tesla can get away with while having a huge fanbase and no repercussions, every future startup is going to try: 1) Tesla Had 3 Times as Many OSHA Violations as the 10 Largest US Plants Combined[1] 2) Elon Musk personally doxxing a market analyst who provided in-depth analysis of Tesla financials, by calling his boss and threatening to sue if he continued his side project of covering Tesla [2] 3) Committing blatant securities fraud by claiming he would sell Tesla to Saudi Arabian investors for $420 a share, and promising 'the short burn of the century' a few weeks before doing so. 4) Bailing out a failing Solar City run by Musk's family(cousins) with Tesla shareholder money on the promise of a product that turned out to be vaporware. [3] After the merger solar city sales are now approaching zero and it's becoming increasingly clear it was a bailout [4]. Multiple lawsuits are ongoing. 5) Claiming that Tesla cars bought today will appreciate in value to over $250,000, so it's actually an investment not a purchase.[5]. Generally making crazy statements about imminent "million robotaxis" while still not having a 'Summon' featured promised in a few weeks months ago because "parking lots are very hard"(recent tweet) For me at least, the transition was a slow one - from "What they're doing is hard, but I hope they succeed" to "They're probably going to fail, but at least they have good intentions" to "If they don't fail, the precedent set is staggering to what you can get away with". There's the famous James Comey saying of 'The Chickenshit Club' - prosecutors unwilling to take on corporations for fear that a loss or long case would damage their win ratio, leading to entities with a large legal team getting away with anything they want. Fundamentally the problem is consistently making statement that they know to be untrue under the guise of this being targets to be met. A generous person would of course call them "ambitious goal". But someone who has studied them closely would know it's an attempt to pump stock that has historically worked, but has recently started failing. When blatant market manipulations, hazardous working conditions, highly questionable accounting practices, false marketing claims, doxxing critics and lies are allowed to succeed, laws don't really exist and companies operate within their bounds only because they don't want to take the 0.1% risk that they'll actually be punished in a way that threatens their continued operations. If you believe in capitalism and regulated efficient markets, you will hope that a company that breaks the rules as often as Tesla doesn't go unpunished. But the SEC will never bring down a company who's stock is still high, as their primary goal is to protect shareholder value. To fully uncover the extent of their damage, they will have to fail first. [1] - https://www.thedrive.com/news/26727/tesla-had-3-times-as-many-osha-violations-as-the-10-largest-us-plants-combined https://www.thedrive.com/news/26727/tesla-had-3-times-as-man... [2] - https://www.marketwatch.com/story/elon-musk-allegedly-silences-one-of-his-short-selling-critics-by-calling-his-boss-2018-07-25 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/elon-musk-allegedly-silenc... [3] - https://mansionengineer.com/2018/08/10/elon-musk-tesla-and-the-solar-roof-tile-fraud/ https://mansionengineer.com/2018/08/10/elon-musk-tesla-and-t... [4] - https://i.imgur.com/iQUJkbE.jpg https://i.imgur.com/iQUJkbE.jpg [5] - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-16/musk-stands-by-tesla-appreciation-claim-called-really-dumb https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-16/musk-stan...

gopher2 7y ago

For me it's mostly that I don't like overly-promotional liars. And the "saving the world" schtick wears thin. Hate would be a strong word though.

sergiosgc 7y ago
Every CEO is a salesman. Anyone who believes every word of a salesman is a fool. I'd not paint it as Trump-style, bona fide lying. It's just inflating promises, or being overly optimistic. Par for the course.

swarnie_ 7y ago

Tesla - Ok cars but build quality is meh. SpaceX - Love what they're doing. Online fans of the two - insufferable cultists.

Lazare 7y ago

> Why do some many people hate Tesla and want them to fail? My feeling is that the overwhelming majority of Tesla critics do not hate Tesla, and do not want Tesla to fail. Rather, they see Tesla as a small, unimportant, poorly run company that gets far more press (positive and negative) than it deserves, and who respond by needling Tesla super-fans. The super fans, in turn, react by treating this as shocking, but it's not really. Tesla critics are treating Tesla like a normal company, and most companies are not particularly well-liked. Nobody cares if Amalgamated Widgets rises and falls except it's investors and competitors. > Do they also want SpaceX to fail? No. But also, Tesla critics, I believe, view SpaceX as a VERY different company. Tesla is just another car company making just another car. SpaceX is something else entirely. If your mental model is "Tesla is like SpaceX", this probably feels weird to you, and the way Tesla gets covered in the press - as if it was merely a car company! - must be maddening. If your mental model is "Tesla is like Saab", this seems pretty obvious. > Most tech giants of recent times have done things I would consider to have made the world a much worse place. I would never dream of calling Tesla a "tech giant". It's a car company, it's not making very good cars, it's not making them very well, it's not making very many of them, and it's not making a lot of money off them. I am incredibly tired of hearing about Tesla. Even if it wins, the Tesla end-game is to be another big successful car company, and I don't care about big successful car companies.

FrojoS 7y ago
Tesla has advanced the advent of BEV by something like 10y. There are multiple statements by old car CEOs who admit that Tesla forced their hand to finally take electric cars seriously. So no, Tesla is not unimportant. At all.
- sangnoir 7y ago
  Dieselgate did more in forcing companies to take electric cars than Tesl ever did.
  - ZeroGravitas 7y ago
    It's obviously hard to debate counterfactuals but I disagree. I think having a publicly successful alternative available made the impact of deiselgate much worse (for EV alternatives/better for the planet). Just like Nuclear can get away with being "better than coal" but in the face of plummeting wind, solar and storage costs its drawbacks get looked at with new eyes. Or in some parallel dimension where deiselgate led to trillions being wasted on hydrogen fuel celled vehicles which never replaced ICE.

navigatesol 7y ago

Building a handful of electric cars while milking investors is not doing a lot for humanity.

blaser-waffle 7y ago

> Why do some many people hate Tesla and want them to fail? Do they also want SpaceX to fail? Aside from the obvious fanboy vs anti-fanboy thing, all of the other players in these spheres tend to be huge companies and government contractors, who can afford large and aggressive marketing budgets. This will almost certainly include some sort of online forum monitoring and consensus building.

AtlasBarfed 7y ago

1) Elon is a nerd. The media loves to do stories on darling nerds transforming the world and then tearing them down with classic American anti-intellectualism and clickbait links at every stage of the Hype Cycle. 2) Oil and big auto hate them. A small company made the technological offerings of car companies and are threatening oil to become obsolete? And the car companies have been whining about CAFE and the inability to make EVs for three decades now. 3) Stock speculators and shorters producing volatility and doing bets. 4) Americans are attached to cars, so all the "car guys" hate Teslas. ESPECIALLY since they smoke ICEs off the line. Go read jalopnik, Tesla is pursuing their two precious bastions of masculinity: the roar of an engine, and whether or not you actually drive a car yourself

ZeroGravitas 7y ago

One factor I think is "the Copenhagen interpretation of ethics" which means if you point out that there are people starving on the planet, and you don't immediately give up your entire wealth to do something about it then you are judged as worse than people doing their best to not focus on bad stuff outside of their immediate vision. https://blog.jaibot.com/the-copenhagen-interpretation-of-ethics/ https://blog.jaibot.com/the-copenhagen-interpretation-of-eth... Tesla/Musk obviously fall into this trap with climate change. Also the parallels in some attacks with what gets used for people like Al Gore makes me think that pointing out a problem that people have staked their political capital on being a hoax, provokes a certain reaction too.

randomsearch 7y ago

That question became much bigger than expected. It was an honest question from a point of ignorance, so maybe that’s why. I got some interesting insight. One trend I noticed in the replies is that answers are tending away from the goal of car driving being part of daily life and trying to make that electric. Those who did touch on this, were of the opinion that Tesla was not doing anything new or essential in that area. Instead, most criticism was targeted towards the negatives of Tesla without regards to the positive. Tesla driving the advent of electric-powered personal transportation was barely touched upon. Overall, I’m of the opinion that the technical advances Tesla has made, the influence on the market and public thinking, outweighs the negatives. One explanation I came up with myself for the hatred is the overriding positive optimism of Musk. I do think that his marketing is partially bluster and partially the way he sees the world. The latter perhaps is what people hate. And nerds are somehow predisposed, understandably, to be sceptical. There’s a direct conflict there. If you’ve spent years working for Facebook or others, then it would be hard to accept that a much better way of spending your time is possible. Easier to think all tech companies are bad, than the idea that you’ve made the wrong choice. Especially when earning well. I have no axe to grind for Musk. He’s said enough things to lose my respect. I think being on Twitter is unhealthy for him and he’s crossed many lines. I also think Tesla is net positive, and I still think the hatred of this community is irrational. I think everyone feeling that way about Tesla should take time out and imagine trying to explain how a world without Tesla would have been better.