Recent Comments:
Richard Viguerie: Blame a liberal for high energy prices {Autoblog Green}
Jul 8th 2008 5:26PM Our "cash starved" federal government takes about 30% of our income in taxes and state and local governments take another 10% or so. That's a total of about 40-45% of GDP.
The problem with our government is not that it gets too little money out of us - personally, I think it gets way too much - but that it doesn't spend what it gets effectively.
When you take a "windfall oil profits" tax out of oil companies, what you are really doing is discouraging exploration and production, which in the mid to long term is going to make things far worse.
Despite my political opposition to your site, by the way, I have really been enjoying AutoBlogGreen's much-needed Tesla roadster coverage. Now somebody over there, give Martin his car!
D
AutoblogGreen Q&A: Tesla Motors Chairman Elon Musk Part 2 - Transmission shifts {Autoblog Green}
Jun 26th 2008 10:31AM Thanks for the compliments!
Martin should be rehired in some capacity, if nothing else as the public face of the company.
I don't think Darrell Siry is the antichrist, I just think he's saying what he's been told to say, which isn't enough. My opinion - and I could be wrong - is that he just doesn't have the PR seasoning needed for him to push back to his employer and say that they just are not disclosing enough information to buyers and the public.
Wayne, Smith Electric Vehicles makes trucks. I looked them up and didn't see a single car on their very nice, stylish web site. I would expect their vehicles to be about as fun to drive as, well, other trucks -- which isn't much.
The point of Tesla is as the first electric car company whose products are fun to drive and own - as Martin says, not a "penalty box" like those $15k golf car style EVs we see.
That's exciting to people like me who really love cars and driving, but would like to see a fresh angle. Something cheaper to run than a regular car, with better performance and fresh ideas and design. That's amazingly cool, at least to me, and judging by the interest in this topic I think a lot of people agree.
I don't think Tesla is necessarily weak for not being GM. Many people automatically think a GM product is going to be a lousy car. Everyone who has driven a Tesla roadster thinks it's a great vehicle. As long as cars are eventually delivered, I think Tesla has a good shot at major success.
But it may take a lot more money than Tesla's announced IPO is going to make. How many people think WhiteStar will take under a billion dollars to develop, if it's based on an original vehicle as opposed to, say, a variant of a Mercedes sedan(*)? Isn't the IPO and possible federal grants only adding up to about $200-300 million?
I'm actually wondering if Tesla should just stick to the Roadster, as a practical matter. If they keep on refining the drivetrain, they can sell thousands of Roadsters at very little additional risk.
WhiteStar doesn't even seem possible at their present level of funding.
Am I missing something here?
D
(*) There was a rumor of Mercedes selling them engines; maybe Mercedes would sell them bodies in the future?
AutoblogGreen First Drive: 2009 Mercedes-Benz BLUETEC SUVs {Autoblog Green}
Jun 25th 2008 12:44PM Did I miss something?
What on earth is an "AdBlue"?
D
AutoblogGreen Q&A: Tesla Motors Chairman Elon Musk Part 2 - Transmission shifts {Autoblog Green}
Jun 25th 2008 11:35AM It's devilishly hard to find anyone to back a project with the kind of obstacles that faced Tesla from the start. Anytime you try to build something totally new, it costs twice as much as you think, and takes three times as long to build.
Everything from the early BART rapid transit system to the RED Camera has been way behind schedule and way over budget. Heck, even the iPhone took a massive engineering effort to ship on time.
When Martin ran into some teething troubles, Elon threw him off the bus, which I think was a big mistake. He should have realized that projects like this, unfortunate though it is, always cost more than you think, and there are always mistakes, no matter who you have in charge or how passionate they are about the product.
So I'd like to tell Elon to relax. My God, the story of the company is well known. Martin Eberhard and his two partners founded the company and created the concept.
Elon breathed life into it by giving it money. And although we all appreciate Tesla's founders, that role shouldn't be understated, either. I am sure the project ate through money like a house full of cockroaches. Elon had the patience, and the bucks, to see it through so far. I think that has to be treated as a big positive and a great thing he's done for the world of the electric car, even if we think his management is, well, not exactly appealing.
What I would like Elon to understand is that he has a vital role in the Tesla story and nothing will take that away from him. He doesn't need to have designed the car himself or created the concept or be a "founder" to have a great role to play.
And he should step back and think, well, why do Tesla's customers love Martin? Why are they upset at him for throwing him out?
And I say, because Martin was transparent. We could trust what he said. When he said there was a delay for some reason, well, that's why there was a delay. When you have someone like him on the team, he can sell buyers on a year or more of delays and they'll still stick.
Don't want to think about Martin? Consider Jim Jannard of RED Digital Cinema. Jim's company is creating a better camera than Sony, at 1/3 the price. In dealing with the complex engineering challenges, he's suffered from a seeming eternity of delays. He posts on his message board and says exactly why the delays came, and what he expects to do about them, and you know what? RED's customers worship Jim. Heck, Jim even says he doesn't know what he's doing and RED's customers eat it up.
But Elon, when you say delays are because of special leather upholstery or special paint jobs that take an extra hour or two to set up at the paint shop, people stop believing you. If you were honest, and told people why their cars were delayed, and said where everything was in the process, Tesla owners would respect you again instead of feeling suspicious and wary.
In the last couple of years I have closely followed three revolutionary products: iPhone, the RED Camera and the Tesla Roadster. All of them are great ideas. Each of them have faced production problems and obstacles. RED had to do a critical redesign of the lens mount when problems where spotted in the field, and they retrofitted all of the initial run of cameras with the new mount at no charge. That seems almost precisely analogous to Tesla's transmission problems.
But RED didn't fire its founder or its engineers - Jim knew he had an exceptional team. Instead, they fixed the problem and moved on. I think that's what should have been done at Tesla too.
Hope that was an interesting perspective.
D
Tesla #16 on the way {The Jason Calacanis Weblog}
Jun 21st 2008 9:31PM I think few contest winners could afford the tax on the Tesla. If I won it I would drive it for a few thousand miles and sadly sell it on eBay. An auction format would be perfect for this vehicle.
I'd be surprised if I wouldn't at least double the original cost for an actual, shipped vehicle since the waiting list appears to be way over a year.
D
A low cost guide to making music with your Mac, part two {The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)}
Jun 3rd 2008 12:39PM Being able to buy Protools, the theoretically best, industry standard system used by legendary artists and musicians seems like the straightforward best possible decision.
Saying that it's "overkill" might make it seem attractive - you can buy "overkill" starting at $225 and doesn't that sound pretty darn good?
The prospective Protools user should understand that service and support are mind-bendingly expensive, updates are issued in such a paranoid way you feel like they are James Bond villains cackling at you in their Goldfingeresque offices, and the software itself looks and feels like something out of the 1980s.
A look at their support site will show you that these people are seriously paranoid folks who loathe their customers and consider them thieves even if grudgingly proven innocent, this time.
Protools, at least when I used it, felt like software decades out of date, never ran particularly well, and overall seemed like a product that was empathetically not worth buying unless you really, really, really need to be compatible with someone else's Protools system.
Buying a $1,599-odd Protools LE system was the absolute worst purchasing and installation experience I have had with any company, at any price point. If there is any possible way you can avoid this company and its mediocre at best products, do it.
If you want the gory details, visit my review of Protools (link below since this site doesn't like tags) and the grim ordeal of trying to get it working.
http://www.epinions.com/content_186947178116
D
HP exec cuts birthday cake with MacBook Air {Engadget}
Jun 1st 2008 3:00PM This is one place where a sealed battery and drop-down ports come in really handy ... there are so few real holes in the device that it might have wound up just fine after its admittedly bizarre use.
D
Larry Sonsini joins Tesla board to provide guidance on future direction {Autoblog Green}
May 14th 2008 11:21AM She's already an "unperson" on the Tesla site but Google Cache has the information.
She appears to be a management consultant who deals with raising capital for startup companies. Maybe now that they are transitioning towards an IPO they need someone with different expertise.
Although I would think they'd be a lot better off selling the company if they had more than four cars on the road ...
D
Tesla Saga continues: When is production car #2 not? {Autoblog Green}
May 13th 2008 11:48AM I think most honest observers of this saga will agree that Martin has been treated very shabbily in being pushed out of the company he founded, and seeing Elon Musk's overall lack of integrity. If you check the Jay Leno's garage video, for example, you will see him say that it charges in three hours off a regular outlet - it actually requires its own special electric service to charge in that time. You will also see him struggling to imply, without out and out lying, that his company has actually made more than one production car. The way he watches his car like a jealous hawk is particularly amusing.
So Martin has plenty to be upset about since I know that he loves the company he founded and would not like to see it go downhill, or be associated with untruths.
However, if Buyer #3 accepted what was technically a pre-production prototype vehicle, then the sequence still seems to be intact - pre-production prototypes first, P1 second and Martin's car next. Martin's car still has the collector value of being serial number 2 and second in the production sequence.
In all honesty, for collector value I don't think you could beat Martin's car, since this is the car personally owned and specified by the guy who had more input into its design than any other person. I think Martin has more than enough fans for his car to have more than adequate resale value, and in any event somehow I doubt that Martin plans to sell any time soon.
I believe all the first 100 or so Tesla owners put down the entire purchase price of the car to reserve a place, and so payment should not be a problem either way.
What's more curious is #4 - is this another pre-production car, or is that finally going to be P003?
D
First Tesla store opens in Santa Monica, now we just need some cars {Autoblog Green}
May 2nd 2008 5:59PM I somehow doubt that the market for the ThinkCity in any way overlaps the Tesla Roadster. People who want performance will get the Tesla and people who want something slug-like will get the Think.
Think has a top speed of roughly 60mph and a range of approximately 105 miles. This means it's considerably less practical in everyday use than the Tesla (although it's probably better for grocery shopping trips).
As far as the opening party is concerned, I'm a little confused - the objects in the pictures closely resemble cars, but I thought all the cars presently produced were in transit.
Are they some of the pre-production models?
D
