[thewildginger]

At what point is saying "it's two years away, trust me!" Not just naive optimism but false advertising or market manipulation? He publicly said this for like four years, and then he walks it all back.

I just don't get it. Any other little person does this and they would be big time side by investors and shareholders, and yet people want to trip all over each other talking about how awesome he is.

Reminds me of another cult of personality.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_life_of_Joseph_Smith#T...

[xorcist]

After those two years have passed, probably. But the claim was actually stronger than that. It was that it should earn back the money it cost by running an autonomous taxi service during night and office hours. That specific claim was a scam from day one. That was not even on the research stage, and probably never will be.

[Qwertious]

>That specific claim was a scam from day one.

Also that would require lending your vehicle out to random strangers all the time, so you couldn't keep anything valuable/fragile in the car and you'd need to clean it rather frequently.

Even on the face of it, it's more like owning a taxi than a car that makes you money.

[me_me_me]

> it was that it should earn back the money it cost by running an autonomous taxi service during night and office hours

This was the exact moment i woke up from musk's spell.

Why would corporation create a money printing machine and sold it for pennies out of the goodness of their hearts?

His bullshit is no longer working on me and empty claims are clear as day.

Now that he is lacking new revolutionary ideas his bullshit is harder to hide behind next great thing he is 'working' on.

[mikpanko]

Not defending Musk, but investors and shareholders don’t abandon him because he has delivered huge returns to them through Tesla stock. He is always too optimistic (maybe intentionally) about the timelines, but ends up generating money in the end.

Plus, he is super rich and people want to be close to big money - could lead to many benefits through networking and opportunities.

[highwaylights]

Does he end up generating money in the end though? The only way to say that definitively is if Tesla were at some point in the future to shut up shop and return a balance to the shareholders many multiples of what they bought the stock for.

Until that happens the plates are still spinning and could go either way.

[sonicanatidae]

It is another rabid cult of personality and his fanbois defend anything he does.

He reminds me of another self-centered, self-entitled, hypocritical lying sack of human debris.

[ryanklee]

Everyone will eventually agree on this point, except for alt right weirdos.

[mlrtime]

Which is equally balanced with the anti-fanbois that don't have a Tesla but still flock to any thread about Musk to voice their opinions.

Look, I don't have a Tesla, never owned one. I don't use Twitter. I think Musk has major flaws. There is definitely a growing trend of anti-Musk vs Musk fanboi flame wars. This thread seems to be no better.

[layer8]

It was always false advertising.

[valval]

It never actually has to be a lie. Making predictions years into the future is impossible if variables are changing. He can make a perfectly truthful estimate of when the product will be ready as of today’s information, and then the information changes.

It’s up to you as a consumer to either discredit the optimism or buy into it.

[eVeechu7]

It's not he's still bullshitting that's remarkable, it's that people are still listening.

[ralfd]

On the other hand: Because he is always wrong with his timelines it cant be security fraud because everyone knows (and ridicules him/memes it) that his timelines are wrong.

[lll-o-lll]

Or, you know, fraud.

Reminds me of different cult of personality.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theranos

[stevage]

Reminds me more of Trump to be honest.

[mrtksn]

It's more about the consumer's satisfaction IMHO. For one reason or another, it appears that the Tesla customers are happy with their purchase.

There is a cult mentality and the cult members are happy with what they got, even if it's not exactly as advertised however it's not just about the cult mentality but it's about the overall experience of the product.

I think if Elizabeth Holmes delivered slick blood testing machines that work no different than those on the market(large amount if blood instead of a drop), but had better workflow and user experience, Theranos could have been a success like Tesla.

She tried to imitate Steve Jobs, had she imitated Elon Musk she would have been fine. She should have had the Siemens machines modified to work with modern GUI, developed some automation for drawing large quantities of blood in a pod at the mall and integrate all that with the healthcare and keep repeating that in 2 years just a drop of blood would ne enough.

The only difference between Musk and Holmes was that Musk actually delivered something that had some redeeming properties.

[matthewdgreen]

The cars are nice and fun to drive. The charging network is ubiquitous and works perfectly. The highway-based "autopilot" isn't revolutionary, compared to other similar products, but works competently and makes long drives easier. The FSD Beta is a hot steaming pile of garbage that will kill people given the slightest opportunity.

[nova22033]

It's more about the consumer's satisfaction IMHO.

You could say this about Chrome, Apple's walled garden..and a bunch of things

[robertlagrant]

> I think if Elizabeth Holmes delivered slick blood testing machines that work no different than those on the market(large amount if blood instead of a drop), but had better workflow and user experience, Theranos could have been a success like Tesla.

I wouldn't have said that Tesla just imitated existing car companies. Can you elaborate?

[treme]

yeah he over promised on FSD, but still delivered on reusable rockets, and more or less nudged all other manufacturers to producing eletric cars at minimum, a few years earlier than they intended to.

He also exposed twitter's political bias & collusion with US security agencies, and exposed that the company can run with 80% less staff.

[saiya-jin]

This then is a fine example that past performance is absolutely no indication of future one, despite our emotions screaming at us that its the case. We just don't like uncertainty or lack of trust environment by default, so subconsciously prefer replacing it with more comforting bad truth/lie rather than accepting the other choice.

[cma]

> but still delivered on reusable rockets

The Space Shuttle from the 80s was reusable too. Falcon 9 isn't fully reusable (upper stage) and now Starship drops some new ring into the sea.

> More or less nudged all other manufacturers to producing eletric cars at minimum

Didn't he instead let them delay making electric cars by transacting with them for their ZEV credits?

I think the SpaceX stuff is still impressive, but he didn't deliver on his big statements. Dragon was supposed to land on Mars years ago for instance. The Space Shuttle wasn't economical, but Starship went back to lots of elements of its design.