This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
One of the things that has continuously confounded me about Musk's veneration by the modern American fascist is that one of the main accomplishments they hail him as a genius for are "his" advancements in electric cars.
Which are necessitated by Global Warming.
Which they do not believe in.
We all know what’s going to happen, Elon just going to get a “government contract”, where he can make it so that teslas will be the main vehicle manufacturer for government.
Fuck. What if Elon is just gonna start making weapons? Didn't he flaunt a flamethrower for his lame company years ago?
Boring*
I believe this is the part where we get sued for not buying his cars.
Nobody at Tesla headquarters voted to alienate their customer base. No board meeting decided to turn their electric car company into a political lightning rod.
This is technically not true. The board keeps Elon Musk on as CEO of Tesla, and they granted him the biggest bonus package ever, while he was already very controversial and clearly was losing his mind, because they thought he would be able to make them money.
You're right, that's not just technically untrue. The board voted with their wallet, by giving him even more money than ever, so he could continue doing what he is doing. The people on the board wouldn't give a shit if only Nazis buy their cars, as long as there's enough of them to keep buying.
Well joke's on them though, because it seems Musk has found a way to tap US citizens directly, so he probably doesn't even care much about Tesla anymore now that it is failing.
It is mental that a man worth billions in mostly electric car companyv shares is courting people who would run their cars on coal if they could.
A man who has made his billions on being essentially a corporate welfare queen.
its not the death of the electric car. Its the death of a bad one.
All cars are bad. Combustion or not.
I would like a Chinese EV, but the capitalists are enforcing protectionism.
I would too, but you have to understand why the USA is blocking these cars from coming in. The cost of these cheap EVs are not based off of supply and demand. Its not even this cheap because of effectiveness or efficiencies. Its from the CCP subsidies. The CCP wants to dump on the competition in efforts to kill off anyone making a car, then start jacking up the price after they have market share.
My dude the US subsidizes the shit out of its electric car industry. When someone brings up "supply and demand" and just tries to pretend that the economy is exactly what they learned in their econ101 class.
They are doing the tarrifs on Chinese EVS because (1) they can't compete on price and (2) the Chinese EVS are just a superior product.
You're right on China though. They are just doing exactly what the US has done for decades. It's just that the US doesn't like having to actually compete with another country. So instead of actually making better and cheaper cars they instead just decide to tell the American people "nah, looks like you're just being a shit Tesla"
The US loves to say "free market" but notice how they don't allow a free market to force their industry to actually innovate and compete.
China is not "cheating" by subsidizing it's industry. That's literally just standard shit every government does. Thats just an excuse. America is subsidizing it's EVs too. They just have worse EVs.
Will he really need customers much longer? I mean it seems like he can just have any government agency replace their fleet with his trash in the name of "efficiency".
About a week ago I saw a brand new model Y (still had the 90 day temporary plate) sporting one of those "bought before elon..." stickers.
Elon has always been a terrible person, but he was once focused on things that society actually needed, like electrifying transportation to avoid climate collapse.
He seems to have gone sharply downhill into total insanity by taking ketamine while locking himself in a rightwing echo chamber. It’s the perfect storm of dissociating from reality.
Potential ketamine addiction aside, he's just gravitated toward where he sees more money and unfluence for himself. He wanted the prestige of being a leader in tech, so he used his influence and money to build SpaceX. Then he bullied his way into the ownership of Tesla, desperately wanting to appear as a genius to libertarian and liberal minds alike, but he's never been any less of an authoritarian. When Trump rose to power the first time, he sat and watched and along with the rest of the Silicon Valley Moguls, he began to move himself into positions of influence with populist politicians, borrowing the evangelical right's playbooks and throwing himself into the spotlight no matter the reason. He pivoted off his falsified image as some kind of American self-starter into MAGA rhetoric.
Musk doesn't have lofty ideals or any real focus on the betterment of society. I don't think he ever did. He just wanted to be a real life Tony Stark and command the influence that came with it. Now he doesn't need to, because he's got Trump in his back pocket and is mostly untouchable by any normal means.
Elon has always been a terrible person
The problem with Elon is he's been provably an idiot for the past 25 years.
The first thing I ever heard about Musky is that back in 2000-ish he wanted PayPal to take their infra, throw out all the Linux/BSD in use, and move everything to Windows NT.
Anyone who was even remotely IT adjacent in that era can come along and tell you how utterly moronic that idea is.
Anytime I've ever heard him blather on about some stupid shit that doesn't exist except in his delusions or talk about, well, ANYTHING technical or specialized all I was ever able to think of is that he got lucky that Thiel didn't drain all of his blood and leave his corpse in a ditch.
Knowing how badly Tesla has managed their supply chain, it's possible they paid for it in 2016.
A more concise headline is "Nobody wants a Swastikar"
What?
Revenue [increased] 2% to $25.71 billion
Yes. Only 25.7 billion dollars. It's practically dead.
Q4 2024 was before all the overt nazi shit.
But I agree that calling it dead is premature.
Remember 2015? A Tesla parked in your driveway told your neighbours that you valued innovation, that you possessed an environmental conscience, that you had a stake in the future of the planet. The cars weren't perfect, but they meant something. They represented hope - for clean energy, EVs, and a world beyond fossil fuels.
This was me years go. I knew climate change was real and an imminent threat. I wanted to vote with my wallet for a cleaner future. I also wanted to strike a blow against the National Automotive Dealers Association for their regressive practices that hurt consumers and drive prices for cars higher for everyone. Buying a Tesla did those things. I charge the car on sunlight from my house. I don't have to support the petroleum industry's damage to environment and people around the world. I was proud to be doing something rather than just talking about needs for changes against climate change.
Musk doesn't get any of my money from this car. I don't pay for any of the Tesla monthly services. I'm don't want to be seen driving with a Tesla logo on the car. I'm ashamed that my good intentions funded a fascist.
Tesla might have to go on welfare... by having the US government buy thousands upon thousands of Teslas. 🤮
