5 ms·

When this first came out a few days back I said this had the chance to be a much bigger problem than the NY Times piece: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=54

When this first came out a few days back I said this had the chance to be a much bigger problem than the NY Times piece: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5482963 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5482963 Ok, now I got "how smart am I" out of the way. Tesla can have stumbles as a product and we can forgive them because they're blazing a trail and early adopters understand that comes with the territory. I for one did not care too much about the NY Times article. It was such an extreme use case (traveling all that distance in freezing cold) that would solve itself within 18 - 36 months. It would not have impacted my buying decision. The response from Elon gave me more pause. "Wow, there's such a defensive attack response from this company. What happens to me if I buy one and it's a lemon? It can happen. Do I feel like they'd be supportive or blame me for everything that went wrong?" More troubling than it needed to be. This now takes them into entirely new territory. This goes to the one feature that's critical to the success: credibility and trust. Carandriver says it best when they basically say "Why are they pulling these shenanigans? They don't need to. It's an awesome car" What really matters is if I were in the market for a new car in the next 12 months up until pre NYTimes Tesla would have been my top choice. Post NYTimes I would have asked a lot more questions if I was going through the buying process. Now I would not buy a Tesla for at least 12 months as I want more proof points around what exactly is the culture of this company. Elon will publicly apologize for this within 30 days is my best guess.

rz2k 14y ago
It sounds like the problem is "the cause". If Tesla is successful, it will be because they focused on making a good car rather than relying on the cause to attract buyers. Yet there is this large cheering section that want the car to succeed, but probably aren't considering buying the car. Take a look at some of the Reddit threads about the expected profits, and you highly see upvoted comments talking about the NY Times debacle as though it is something that Tesla "won". I can't know whether Elon Musk is actually caught up in the cause of electric cars, but it increasingly passes for a explanation of strange decisions.
cube13 14y ago
>This now takes them into entirely new territory. This goes to the one feature that's critical to the success: credibility and trust. Carandriver says it best when they basically say "Why are they pulling these shenanigans? They don't need to. It's an awesome car" I think this shows that Tesla just doesn't get the market they're aiming for. With their prices(around $60,000 MSRP for the Model S, and $90,000 for the Roadster), they're looking at car enthusiasts and rich people. They're looking at an informed audience that will see through(or are capable of paying people to see through) the marketing to the direct impact on their bottom line. They're informed customers, and don't need this kind of marketing. The key points here was that they've gotten a bank to issue loans on the cars. That's all they needed to announce, not the terms or the nebulous "Total cost of ownership" calculation.
larrys 14y ago
"Elon will publicly apologize for this within 30 days" If we can assume he knows nothing about this ad then we can assume he will fire the people (and/or agency) involved in this advertising black eye.
- jusben1369 14y ago
  Well with Elon's personality type you know nothing would go out like this without his knowledge. But we don't have to guess - he was in the video personally announcing the $500 lease plan.

rz2k 14y ago

It sounds like the problem is "the cause". If Tesla is successful, it will be because they focused on making a good car rather than relying on the cause to attract buyers. Yet there is this large cheering section that want the car to succeed, but probably aren't considering buying the car. Take a look at some of the Reddit threads about the expected profits, and you highly see upvoted comments talking about the NY Times debacle as though it is something that Tesla "won". I can't know whether Elon Musk is actually caught up in the cause of electric cars, but it increasingly passes for a explanation of strange decisions.

cube13 14y ago

>This now takes them into entirely new territory. This goes to the one feature that's critical to the success: credibility and trust. Carandriver says it best when they basically say "Why are they pulling these shenanigans? They don't need to. It's an awesome car" I think this shows that Tesla just doesn't get the market they're aiming for. With their prices(around $60,000 MSRP for the Model S, and $90,000 for the Roadster), they're looking at car enthusiasts and rich people. They're looking at an informed audience that will see through(or are capable of paying people to see through) the marketing to the direct impact on their bottom line. They're informed customers, and don't need this kind of marketing. The key points here was that they've gotten a bank to issue loans on the cars. That's all they needed to announce, not the terms or the nebulous "Total cost of ownership" calculation.

larrys 14y ago

"Elon will publicly apologize for this within 30 days" If we can assume he knows nothing about this ad then we can assume he will fire the people (and/or agency) involved in this advertising black eye.

jusben1369 14y ago
Well with Elon's personality type you know nothing would go out like this without his knowledge. But we don't have to guess - he was in the video personally announcing the $500 lease plan.