Having owned a Ford EV Ranger in the bad old days, out of respect I have to give Chelsea's opinion some real thought. She like me wishes for mass penetration in the EV market instantly. That being said I believe that GM should have come out with the Cadillac EREV FIRST to develop the battery tech then stepped down to a Volt like vehicle with a tiny 1-liter or less range extender. The problem is until 2015 (at least) the damn battery is too expensive to ramp this the way I would have liked it. I would have loved a 60-70 mile range Volt. That would be a game changer. Then a 120 mile plus vehicle for those of us that do not suffer from range rage.
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Sure- though I had to chuckle at the ironic timing of making a post that included that point only to find such nice comments waiting as soon as I hit “submit”.
In short, the first four pages of this thread generally reflect why I don’t come here more often. The pages since have made this the best experience I’ve ever had here, and illustrate why I prefer to work more on the consumer-oriented side of the industry and movement. Unfortunately, even after I’ve jumped into the conversation, my prior experience here tended to look more like those first four pages.
I’m here, aren’t I?
No kidding!
But it’s not a “nice to me” thing at all- there are lots of forums where folks aren't nice to me. I’m all for debating ideas and opinions and disagreeing about different things. As others have noted, I try to be a pretty straight shooter, I have an irreverent and sarcastic streak (as anyone who follows me on Twitter knows!) and can certainly give as good as I get. I love engaging on the actual topic of EVs and everything related to that.What gets old is the assignment of motivations and biases without talking to me about it, and often even after I’ve explained. It’s not thin skin, and there’s no hurt feelings. But having to repeatedly go down the “I’m not anti-Tesla” or “I’m not permanently corrupted by having consumed GM’s kool-aid 20 years ago just because I don’t think the Volt sucks” paths gets...tiring. As does spending 4x as long on posts here being so incredibly careful about every single word choice to try to keep criticisms of whatever I say on the actual content and not the semantics. For whatever reason I've had to do more of it in this forum (in the threads or by PM) than any other, and after a while I choose to spend the energy in other ways.
Sometimes...other times I don’t come across it until way after the fact. But- and I know it’s a novel idea
- someone could just ask me what I meant or to clarify something before the chelsea bashing starts. Part of the reason I didn’t know about the article or quote is because not a single person mentioned it to me, via any communications channel (which could be because the article itself didn't get as much attention as the others on the topic, or the quote didn't rub others as wrong). Anyone simply sending me an email or tweet or whatever along the lines of “wtf was up with that quote?” (see? you don't even have to be nice to me! :wink: ) would have gotten you all some clarification a whole lot sooner. And I’m not exactly hard to find...
Actually, that’s just it- I don’t think there is a “perfect” EV, esp at this stage, just as there’s no single gas car for everyone. There are things I like and don't like about each, though think that as a first generation it's really a pretty good bunch. And I actually prefer the ups and downs rather than expectations that I love everything Tesla does just because it’s Tesla, or hate GM’s choices merely because it’s GM. I think most of these companies have made good choices- either for that company and/or in the larger picture - and all have made mistakes. And there are some subjects (like charging) where I see both in the same path. I like the details. But I am also interested in the big picture of getting EVs on the road, and can see where a choice that may be right for an individual company may not help that bigger picture, or where individual companies- or the community - compromising helps that picture. It’s entirely that company’s right to make each choice, but I see it from both points of view.
I believe this forum is the way it is--and almost every topic here goes off the deep end at some point--is because folks who pay upwards of $80K for a car have a tendency to expect perfection (more so than folks who pay $25K anyway) and so they get much more critical much faster. In the Prius forum you can always say, "Well, its why the Prius isn't $50K". It's hard to use similar logic when talking about a Tesla.
bonnie
I play a nice person on twitter.
I'd say we also have a number of people who mistake 'constant criticism' for 'critical thinking', starting from a place of assuming bad intent. (I literally shrugged as I typed that, as in 'but whatcha gonna do?.)
I will counter the $80k argument with the fact that this forum seems to have changed substantially from the days when it was largely Roadster owners and EV enthusiasts. Certainly the Roadster owners paid a high price and many are careful NOT to post issues or problems because they know it could cause this current forum audience to go off on a tangent. (Get that mirror away from me. Now!)
I actually see the 'go off the deep end' as a sign that EVs/Tesla are starting to attract a different market, the market they NEED to attract to be successful. And that's a positive thing.
That's how I see this forum too, and there are a number of pretty legitimate reasons for it. We all took a gamble with early deposits and put a lot of faith in Tesla that our investment would be returned. We've waited, many of us, more than 3 1/2 years for a car. We've seen a lot of other companies go "toes up" in the past few years due to the bad economy. Tesla is pretty quiet about their plans and inner workings on lot of issues that we'd love to know more about (production schedule, causes of delays, plans for Canadian Sigs, etc). Some surprise charges we dont' want and didn't anticipate (the maintenance fee, the 60kWh supercharger thing).
So, to some degree we're justified in our overreactions. At the same time the pattern of rumor, overreaction, snowballing of the overreaction....then George B makes one post and 99% of the overreaction settles down. Or, in this case, Chelsea makes a couple posts and suddenly everyone has faith.
I think this forum will settle into a more comfortable, less reactive state once the production deliveries start on a more routine basis, but for now we're all on edge a bit.
I don't know which difference you'd see between 'constant criticism' and 'critical thinking'. Neither would be "bad" in my understanding. If anything, the former would indicate some stubbornness?
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Like others, I don't see you as anti-Tesla in general. I know you are fond of the Roadster except for its price. It's terms like "dysfunctional culture" which I'd perceive as "bashing", though in this case one can see where you were coming from. Another one, from the top of my head, was "con man" or "con artist".
Fine- but then you can't accuse me of using the term wrt Tesla. It's certainly not how I've ever thought of anyone there, so I have no idea what you think you're remembering.
From my point of view, I'll take that as "certainly" not upholding such a thought.
BTW, I don't think any significant number of people here think the Volt "sucks". And I don't remember anyone saying "sucks" or similar. Personally, I just don't see it as a long-term solution, however, other than "pure" EVs, it is better than anything else.
gg_got_a_tesla
Model S: VIN 65513, Model 3: VIN 1913
Chelsea, are you at liberty to expand on the "dysfunctional" bit about Tesla, the company? Without taking names and such, what sort of problems are you referring to?
We have all seen issues around hiring fast enough, training, process automation etc. in dealing with customer communications and vehicle deliveries; are these the teething pains that are you talking about? Or, something more fundamental?
We have all seen issues around hiring fast enough, training, process automation etc. in dealing with customer communications and vehicle deliveries; are these the teething pains that are you talking about? Or, something more fundamental?
I don't think it's the range, directly. The problem is that range depends on battery size and so does performance. Solve the price problem and then solve either the density or discharge rate problem and you'll up the performance enough to sell to Americans.
Zzzz...
Member
Not necessarily what Chelsea had in mind, but from what I heard, TM really tough company to work for, at least in engineering. With most on the floor are not full time employees but working under contract. With frequent terminations. Very flat management structure encourage taking responsibility, but provide little reward for accomplishments. Basically you work under pressure being unsure if you'll get terminated, or you'll get your contract prolonged again. On top of that add below industry average compensations in most departments.
This is not necessarily a bad thing and might not apply to whole company, just engineering/development. I say it could be not a bad thing because that style probably promote "work hard" efficiency while keeps costs under control. So might not be bad for investors and the company grows, but not best for employees. Remember Elon remark, 70 work hours a week is a good week? He said something like that, IIRC.
The only problem is the cost.
Lesser performance of 40kWh and 60kWh packs of Model S is more of a marketing/positioning choice rather then restriction dictated by engineering. And in fact you can see that 40kWh pack provide more then a half of the power of 85kWh version.
If drivetrain+battery of EV could have been produced for same price as ICE one, ice would become obsolete almost overnight regardless of other things, like charging time and infrastructure etc... But we are nowhere near that point.
That one again (Glassdoor). Smear Campaign Central.
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"Zzzz...", is that were you got your info? Glassdoor is generally known, across companies, as an internet place where (though among other things) disgruntled ex-employess of all companies vent off their anger by bashing their former (or sometimes current) employer.
JRP3
Hyperactive Member
Even so Tesla comes off with a pretty good rating over all considering you're going to get responses from mostly pissed off people.
NigelM
Recovering Member
There's a separate prior thread discussing working at Tesla over here: Working-for-Tesla-Motors
Also one or two other comments in this thread: What-is-Tesla-Motors-biggest-flaw-challenge
Haha, when I was reviewing that second thread I found my own comment from March:
Also one or two other comments in this thread: What-is-Tesla-Motors-biggest-flaw-challenge
Haha, when I was reviewing that second thread I found my own comment from March:
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Zzzz...
Member
I was actually reading current and former Tesla Motors employees reviews/discussions on different sites. Looks like the one you have linked was one of them. But there was few, 3 or 4, and one of them required registration.
It was insightful, at least to me. And you will get some real info about inner workings. But it was clear that at least one guy who commented never worked for Tesla and were present there just to bring down company(shorter? general hater?). And looked like TM was watching those sites, trying to figure out who current employes were, asking them what department they are from etc.
So while you have to read comments with a grain of salt, those are opinions of people who really worked for TM. And not all were negative. Chelsea opinion about TM dysfunctional corporate culture, provided circumstances, I believe would fall along lines of former TM employees.
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