4 ms·

Yes and no. Tesla did innovate, but frankly not as much as many people want to give them credit for. And a lot of the innovation happened before Musk even join

Yes and no. Tesla did innovate, but frankly not as much as many people want to give them credit for. And a lot of the innovation happened before Musk even joined, at least when it comes to basic EV tech, not talking about AutoPilot or whatever. Their real achievement was creating a market and interest. This new consumer and investor interest was also in large part to Musk throwing his ego around in public. A lot of other car makers had models in late stage development phases too, but didn't really see enough interest and a market need to bring those models forward to reach production. They were fat and happy, selling their fossil fuel models.

sundvor 5y ago
Your part about generating real interest in EVs is exactly what I had in mind when I wrote my reply. I have been following EVs for a couple of decades now; the way especially the Tesla Model S was launched was a breakthrough in shaping the perception of electric cars as something entirely different, and desirable. There were a number of years when a Tesla was the only good EV you could buy, and they forced the entire industry to take note and actually develop their own programs. (Fast forward to today, and it's sometimes pure comedy to see latecomers such as Mazda's first attempt being a complete "what?" with their first EV having under half the range of and being more expensive than a Model 3.) Sure, someone else could eventually have gotten there, but Musk and Tesla were the ones who did it - and I believe with a rather significant margin of time. There's a long list of things I don't like about personalities and design choices, but I feel it's ok to keep that separate from the above. (I don't own an EV. Still saving and waiting for the right time to upgrade from a 10 year old Subaru Outback ICEV bought new then.)

4 ms·

Yes and no. Tesla did innovate, but frankly not as much as many people want to give them credit for. And a lot of the innovation happened before Musk even join

by rndgermandude 5y ago

sundvor 5y ago
Your part about generating real interest in EVs is exactly what I had in mind when I wrote my reply. I have been following EVs for a couple of decades now; the way especially the Tesla Model S was launched was a breakthrough in shaping the perception of electric cars as something entirely different, and desirable. There were a number of years when a Tesla was the only good EV you could buy, and they forced the entire industry to take note and actually develop their own programs. (Fast forward to today, and it's sometimes pure comedy to see latecomers such as Mazda's first attempt being a complete "what?" with their first EV having under half the range of and being more expensive than a Model 3.) Sure, someone else could eventually have gotten there, but Musk and Tesla were the ones who did it - and I believe with a rather significant margin of time. There's a long list of things I don't like about personalities and design choices, but I feel it's ok to keep that separate from the above. (I don't own an EV. Still saving and waiting for the right time to upgrade from a 10 year old Subaru Outback ICEV bought new then.)