The Drive attacks Fred Lambert, Electrek

[mspohr]

The Truth Behind Electrek's Shady Alliance with Tesla
Edward Niedermeyer seems to have a problem with Fred Lambert being too much of a cheerleader for Tesla. He cites some flimsy financial conflicts and aggressive behavior.
Meh?

 

[RedOctober]

The Truth Behind Electrek's Shady Alliance with Tesla
Edward Niedermeyer seems to have a problem with Fred Lambert being too much of a cheerleader for Tesla. He cites some flimsy financial conflicts and aggressive behavior.
Meh?

Not much to that story or the entire article won’t open.

 

[deonb]

Not much to that story or the entire article won’t open.

Wide-screen desktop monitor?

Scroll down. A lot.

 

[Electroman]

That troll is trying to create a wedge among Tesla supporters by coming up with a bogey that there is a huge section (of Tesla supporters) that don't like Electrek and Fred.

I say BS. Total BS. We are not fools here to fall for that divide & conquer nonsense.

 

[J X 3]

Seen a few truly clueless Tesla attack articles on The Drive, hard to be worse than them. They can't be bothered to get informed on Tesla and they spread fake nonsense.Then again, almost 100% of the press is not informed on EVs and Tesla.
That being said, Electrek are fanboys and fanboys are no better than trolls.
Journalism is not what these folks are doing, not The Drive, not Electrek.

 

[Yggdrasill]

In my view, Electrek is one of the most balanced and informative sites covering Tesla. And I’m certainly not going to say Electrek is without bias. It’s just that everyone else is also biased, and unlike Electrek, everyone else tends to get even the most basic of facts wrong

In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king.

 

[Electroman]

I don’t see anything biased in Electrek’s coverage. Sure they publish more Tesla news ahead than anyone else, but there is nothing nefarious about it.

But for Electrek and TMC there would be zero counter balance to the all the FUD and lies from the mainstream media.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

That troll is trying to create a wedge among Tesla supporters by coming up with a bogey that there is a huge section (of Tesla supporters) that don't like Electrek and Fred.

I say BS. Total BS. We are not fools here to fall for that divide & conquer nonsense.

It's not about a wedge, it's a bear trying to stop people listening to a bull.

 

[RedOctober]

Seen a few truly clueless Tesla attack articles on The Drive, hard to be worse than them. They can't be bothered to get informed on Tesla and they spread fake nonsense.Then again, almost 100% of the press is not informed on EVs and Tesla.
That being said, Electrek are fanboys and fanboys are no better than trolls.
Journalism is not what these folks are doing, not The Drive, not Electrek.

And here you are on a Tesla website.

 

[dhanson865]

Electrek is a mostly clickbait website. You know because 90% of the links in their articles go to other Electrek articles instead of linking to the source of the story.

The day they start putting their source near the top 1/3 of the article with a clear mention of the source and a URL that doesn't send me to another Electrek article I'll reconsider my opinion of that website.

 

[domenick]

And here you are on a Tesla website.

To be fair, he's probably not on TMC for journalism.

Anyway, I think The Drive has had pretty good Tesla articles, though I personally think the author of this piece has a deeply held bias against the company, which is pretty evident (again, IMO) if you read his tweets and articles.

That aside, I think he makes good points about Elektrek and its main editor. I mean, he (Fred) gets a lot of Tesla stories up quickly, but he can barely write anything positive about product from other manufacturers, and he rarely has any sort of criticism of Tesla. This latter part is important because Tesla, like any other human endeavor, is not perfect and a someone who purports to be a journalist should report on failings as well as successes. As a writer for another EV site, I believe we owe it to readers to give it to them straight. I realize we all have our own prejudices to some extent, but a good writer aims for accuracy and respects the reader's ability.

Tesla is quite adept at spinning news that's unfavorable, and Musk has publicly admitted a number of his failings over the years, so they don't need a so-called journalist to wash the bad away from news about them. In the end, I think this is harmful to Tesla and to EVs in general, the proliferation of which is part of Tesla's core mission.

There are good reasons why we as writers aren't supposed to own automotive stock or use our stories for personal benefit as in this case. Ethics still matter.

 

[RedOctober]

To be fair, he's probably not on TMC for journalism.

Anyway, I think The Drive has had pretty good Tesla articles, though I personally think the author of this piece has a deeply held bias against the company, which is pretty evident (again, IMO) if you read his tweets and articles.

That aside, I think he makes good points about Elektrek and its main editor. I mean, he (Fred) gets a lot of Tesla stories up quickly, but he can barely write anything positive about product from other manufacturers, and he rarely has any sort of criticism of Tesla. This latter part is important because Tesla, like any other human endeavor, is not perfect and a someone who purports to be a journalist should report on failings as well as successes. As a writer for another EV site, I believe we owe it to readers to give it to them straight. I realize we all have our own prejudices to some extent, but a good writer aims for accuracy and respects the reader's ability.

Tesla is quite adept at spinning news that's unfavorable, and Musk has publicly admitted a number of his failings over the years, so they don't need a so-called journalist to wash the bad away from news about them. In the end, I think this is harmful to Tesla and to EVs in general, the proliferation of which is part of Tesla's core mission.

There are good reasons why we as writers aren't supposed to own automotive stock or use our stories for personal benefit as in this case. Ethics still matter.

I have he Fred does question Tesla on many topics and there are always articles for other products. The majority of his articles are Tesla based but I think that’s his bread and butter. The Tesla bashers will attack him for it but I just take it for what it is.

 

[Reciprocity]

The Drive seems to be bent out of shape because Electrek has more traffic then the TheDrive and that probably wasnt always the case. Much of that is because of Fred himself and the work he has done. Fred has earned it with a mountain of good work. Clearly people like the way he goes about his business or they wouldn't traffic the site in greater and greater numbers.

Fred Lambert is a shill for Renewable Energy and EVs, for which Tesla is one of the best in both Categories. So what. Fred vs thousands of shills trying to destroy Tesla. Im fine with Fred and his efforts and any benefits he gets. Again, he is has earned them.

I will put it this way. I have heard and read Fred say bad things about Tesla. There are a lot of journalists on CNBC, Bloomberg and others that I have never written or uttered one good word about Tesla. Who has more credibility?

 

[TexasEV]

It’s a pro-EV blog in general and pro-Tesla specifically, because if it wasn’t for Tesla the only EVs would be compliance cars and weirdmobiles. It’s not a newspaper, it’s a blog. It’s not supposed to be objective.

 

[J X 3]

And here you are on a Tesla website.

What does that statement say about your ability to reason?
No matter how low my expectations, people keep surprising me.

 

[mkspeedr]

So dumb...

Surprise an EV web site that is extremely favorable towards Tesla. Shocker!!!

The Drive is just mad because they still believe ICE cars have a future.

PS for the record I am sure Electrek only sounds biased to Tesla because Tesla currently does not have any competition.

 

[commasign]

Electrek is definitely more of a blog than a pure news site. A lot of what they write doesn’t pass as journalism in terms of source checking, attribution, etc. That said, they’re doing a really good job of scouring the forums, Reddit, and the web for Tesla related “breaking news”. This is great for Tesla fans who don’t have time to keep up with all the daily Tesla developments. And as others have noted, there’s nothing wrong with having a news/blog site that is pro-EV and pro-Tesla given that there’s so much anti-EV and anti-Tesla everywhere else. If you don’t like Electrek, don’t read it. If Electrek says something factually incorrect, call them out.

 

[bonnie]

Electrek is a mostly clickbait website. You know because 90% of the links in their articles go to other Electrek articles instead of linking to the source of the story.

The day they start putting their source near the top 1/3 of the article with a clear mention of the source and a URL that doesn't send me to another Electrek article I'll reconsider my opinion of that website.

That aside, I think he makes good points about Elektrek and its main editor. I mean, he (Fred) gets a lot of Tesla stories up quickly, but he can barely write anything positive about product from other manufacturers, and he rarely has any sort of criticism of Tesla. This latter part is important because Tesla, like any other human endeavor, is not perfect and a someone who purports to be a journalist should report on failings as well as successes. As a writer for another EV site, I believe we owe it to readers to give it to them straight. I realize we all have our own prejudices to some extent, but a good writer aims for accuracy and respects the reader's ability.

Tesla is quite adept at spinning news that's unfavorable, and Musk has publicly admitted a number of his failings over the years, so they don't need a so-called journalist to wash the bad away from news about them. In the end, I think this is harmful to Tesla and to EVs in general, the proliferation of which is part of Tesla's core mission.

There are good reasons why we as writers aren't supposed to own automotive stock or use our stories for personal benefit as in this case. Ethics still matter.

I agree w both of you.

I have my own reasons I steer clear of the site, but no need to rehash here.

 

[Mo City]

The article is trash. "Shady Alliance"? Seriously?

Electrek is clearly pro-Tesla and there is nothing wrong with that. It's a blog and has every right to be biased and opinionated. The title and the article are complete jokes.

Fred is indeed flaky and often very defensive, but you have to admit Electrek is the best single source to stay current with all news Tesla. Fred clearly wants to paint Elon and the company in a positive light and I have no problem with that. There is plenty of negative stuff elsewhere to balance his coverage.

The Drive has also had very informative articles on Tesla but this hit piece reeks of jealousy. I don't give a care what Fred's background is. What matters to me is what he writes. Most of his articles on the company are short, concise and worth the 60-90 seconds it takes to read them. He serves a niche very well and The Drive shames itself by attacking him personally.

If Tesla fails, will Electrek also fail because they bet their entire success on the company? Probably, but who gives a care? Is Electrek "fan media" instead of "true journalism"? Maybe. But again, who gives a care? As long as Fred continues to churn out short, readable Tesla news every day, I'm good with it.

 

[PeterK]

My take: Neidermeyer has always had a chip on his shoulder against Tesla, and he’s jealous of Electrek’s and Fred’s success. This article is a way to knock both in one shot.

Like many others here, I go to Electrek from time to time, or follow a link from another story, to find out mostly what’s happening with or being said about Tesla. It’s a blog, not a newspaper, and does a good job filtering through and picking up on stuff being said on various forums. Electrek and Fred are EV enthusiasts, and at this point Tesla is the bulk of EV activity, unfortunately. There would be more coverage of other brands if they had much going on in the market to write about.

Come to think of it, I haven’t seen Neidermeyer on Bloomberg (opinion piece or video interview) in months now... can’t say I miss him.