No, it's a good indicator that there are "Tesla Fanboys" out there, and they exist and some of them like any other fanboy are pretty fanatical and not all the time logical.
That makes no sense. Declaring that there are "Tesla fanboys" is not proof of their existence. Sure, I'll grant you they do exist, but they exist for a lot of different companies/products and are usually a much tinier base of people than the speaker believes, and almost certainly when someone accuses someone else of being a "fanboy" they're wrong and are just using that to try and discredit the other speaker instead of addressing their points.
In this particular case, the author didn't even cite any behavior that indicates being a fanboy, they're just claiming that anyone who points out that Tesla's car has more luxury options, can upgrade to the autopilot, has access to the supercharger network, has brand cachet, and will be more profitable at scale is a fanboy. All of these are legitimate things to say about Tesla and do not require some sort of blind devotion to Tesla in order to point out.
I once dared to make the comment that one day a Tesla battery pack would catch fire or explode and out of the woods they came with their pitchforks and downvotes explaining in length like why it can never happen and how safe are 18650's and the Tesla power bank, and the car, and how smooth Elon Musk's skin is.
About 3 weeks later just that thing happened, a Tesla caught fire due to the power pack malfunctioning, since then there were 2-3 more similar cases.
There are Tesla and more Elon Musk in general fanboys out there.
And I don't really understand why you are taking offense, no one made those claims here, no one even argued that there are no advantages to the Tesla.
However those advantages come at a cost, a Model 3 won't be a 30,000 car, it would be close to it after the rebate, you will have to pay extra for luxuries, as well as potentially access to the supercharger network.
And I'm not sure about the rest of your arguments, profitability is in question here, it's doubtful that the Model 3 will be as profitable, infact it won't be by design, the question would then be how many Model S/X's Tesla can sale because that would be the limiting factor in it's ability actually ship Model 3's as those partially fund it.
As for the brand strength, the brand is considerably more limited than what you think, sure on HN and in a few other circles it has a huge presence but if you think that in the middle of nowhere America, or the rest of the world Tesla has a brand presence you are going to be disappointed, most people do not know what Tesla is.
If you ask the average person to name car companies Tesla is about as likely to be named as Alpina, heck i would be that more people are aware of Aplina world wide than Tesla.
It's really hard to take you seriously when you say something like this. If someone's behavior really is remarkable, then there should be no need to exaggerate. If you exaggerate, it suggests that maybe your complaint isn't legitimate.
> it's doubtful that the Model 3 will be as profitable, infact it won't be by design
Why do you say that? People seem to be in agreement that GM can sell their car at a loss because they make up for it in the ability to sell other gas-guzzling cars. Tesla can't sell their cars at a loss because they don't have any way to make it up. The people who claim Tesla is losing money on their cars are doing so by including R&D costs as part of the cost of the car, which is nonsense. If Tesla sells 10k more cars, they didn't just lose a bunch of money, they made money on each car. Sure, if Tesla doesn't sell enough to recoup their R&D then they've taken a loss overall, but the idea is that they should sell enough cars to make a profit, which they can then plow back into R&D to make even better cars. And they can take a loss in the short term if it leads to profitability later, what they can't do is take a loss on each unit sold.
In fact, if I search for "tesla model 3 profitability" on DDG, the very first result is a Fox Business article from March saying that a goal of the Model 3 is to be profitable, something the other cars haven't been (I assume here that it means after taking R&D into account, as opposed to being a loss on each unit sold) - http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2016/03/31/tesla-counts-o....
> If you ask the average person to name car companies
If you ask the average consumer that cares about electric vehicles, they probably do know about Tesla. The average person doesn't really care much about that, beyond maybe thinking that a hybrid car is a good idea (or even thinking it's a bad idea because those usually compromise on power).
Edit: Corrected "Business Insider" to "Fox Business". Not sure why I mixed those two up.
>It's really hard to take you seriously when you say something like this. If someone's behavior really is remarkable, then there should be no need to exaggerate. If you exaggerate, it suggests that maybe your complaint isn't legitimate.
It's also hard to take them seriously, and you to some extent since you decided to take offense about an issue that no one in this thread even raised, usually the first sign of "irrationality" is taking offense when not only it wasn't directed at you, but also wasn't even given to anyone.
>Why do you say that?...
Because even Elon Musk said so, they are banking on the Model S and X to push the Model 3.
Overall the profitability of the Model 3 is still questionable, they are using very expensive materials and platform even for the base model, they are betting on state based rebates to keep it close to 30K (which is risky since those rebates can disappear) and their overall profit margins would be relying on the people that buy the premium modules and upgrades for the model 3, as well as of course buying the very expensive Model S and X's especially the higher end models of those like the P100D.
That's where the money is some Core i3/5s are effectively Xeons (or the otherway around depending on how you want to look at it) but Intel sells them for as low as under 100$ while their Xeon counterparts go for 3-5 times the price, what Tesla is doing is effectively binning and selling very minor upgrades at very high relative costs (e.g. using Intel again akin to the 6700 vs 6700K same CPU 50$ difference (300 vs 350$) for an unlocked multiplier which is effectively a microcode patch) which may or may not work for cars.
>If you ask the average consumer that cares about electric vehicles, they probably do know about Tesla.
This is an utterly irrelevant question to ask if you want to make a change in the world, even Elon Musk made this same argument, the point of the cars like the Bolt isn't to sell them to people who want to buy an electric car specifically but to anyone who wants to buy a car in general.
This is why range and price point are so important, if you are able to bring an electric car to a range equivalent to a gas car (without refueling) under the 30,000 price point you have yourself the ability to push for real change in the automotive industry and more important a real environmental change both locally and globally.
The whole idea is to make the fact that a car is electric so irrelevant that it would be akin to asking if a car has power steering in this day and age. So pretty much when we get to the point of:
>The average person doesn't really care much about that
Is when we "win".
You're being awfully defensive about this. Yes, I don't like seeing people throw the "fanboy" word around. It's always meant as an insult, and nearly always used with the intention of dismissing someone's argument without actually countering the points made (usually because they can't). I don't get why you keep trying to accuse me of taking offense at something not directed at me, as if that's even relevant to the discussion. Did I even ever say I was offended? I don't think so.
> and their overall profit margins would be relying on the people that buy the premium modules and upgrades for the model 3
Isn't that true for all cars? If the optional features didn't improve profit margins, dealerships wouldn't be pushing them.
> This is an utterly irrelevant question to ask if you want to make a change in the world, even Elon Musk made this same argument, the point of the cars like the Bolt isn't to sell them to people who want to buy an electric car specifically but to anyone who wants to buy a car in general.
One of Elon Musk's goals was to push other car manufacturers into making electric vehicles. The fact that a widely-recognized brand like GM is coming out with the Bolt is exactly what Elon Musk wanted to happen.
I'm not being defensive at all =) And you were offended, and defensive, you somehow brought an entire argument about why "doing X isn't fanboyism" when no one talked about it, the only thing anyone said is that saying that there are "Tesla Fanboys" doesn't intrinsically mean that some one is biased against Tesla.
Ironically this entire argument is a litmus test for their existence.
>Citation please? I'm not seeing this anywhere.
Every talk he made about the Model 3, including his plans, eventually the Model 3 may become profitable, but if you think they'll beat the profitability of the large car companies you are really off the beat.
Did you read the article, they expect profitability before the Model 3 arrives, then it would dip until the Model 3 production kicks into full gear, this is almost utter contrast to your original claims of the Model 3 being highly profitable.
The Model 3 won't lose money, but they expect the profits to come from the add-ons, and the larger profit margins to come from the more expensive Model S and X's this is in Musk's bloody "Plan".
>One of Elon Musk's goals was to push other car manufacturers into making electric vehicles. The fact that a widely-recognized brand like GM is coming out with the Bolt is exactly what Elon Musk wanted to happen.
Which is exactly what I said. The Future of Electric cars isn't Tesla, it might pave the road there, or help push some companies along, but it would be out paced by the giants once the EV scene kicks into full gear, that is OK.
I would still rather own a Tesla because I find it the cooler however living in London considering one costs about as my yearly pre-tax wage (The P90D) and the fact I won't be able to park it anywhere kinda make it impossible.
If Tesla is really lucky it would have the same impact that Apple had on mobile phones, maybe it would come to a point where everyone thinks about Tesla when they think about a "cool car", but still the majority of the world would be driving something else, EV but something else.
No matter how many times you claim I'm offended, that doesn't actually mean I was offended. Why do you keep making that claim?
> the only thing anyone said is that saying that there are "Tesla Fanboys" doesn't intrinsically mean that some one is biased against Tesla.
Implying that anyone who brings up those legitimate points is a tesla "fanboy" does in fact imply that you're biased against Tesla. That was my original point. The author didn't say "There exist Tesla 'fanboys'", instead the author very strongly implied that anyone trying to defend Tesla is a fanboy (and thus should be dismissed). You'll notice that after making that list of arguments in favor of Tesla, the author then proceeded to address none of them. After all, why should he, when anyone who makes those arguments is obviously a "fanboy"?
And no, I'm not offended. Why would I be? I'm not a Tesla "fanboy". What I am is annoyed. This kind of behavior is a pet peeve of mine (as are most attempts to dismiss an argument by evading it instead of addressing the points), and I bring it up because most people don't, or even leap to defend this behavior by claiming "but there are fanboys!", even though that argument relies on a logical fallacy (the existence of fanboys that defend the company does not mean that anyone who defends the company is a fanboy).
> Every talk he made about the Model 3
Again, give me a citation. I've searched and found the exact opposite of what you're saying, and linked it. You need to give me an authoritative link, just claiming this repeatedly is meaningless.
> Did you read the article, they expect profitability before the Model 3 arrives, then it would dip until the Model 3 production kicks into full gear, this is almost utter contrast to your original claims of the Model 3 being highly profitable.
Yes I did read the article. And first off, I never claimed it would be "highly profitable", please don't put words in my mouth. And secondly, you apparently either don't understand the article or don't understand my argument. Tesla's going to have a dip because of capital expenditures. These aren't per-unit costs. I said Tesla cannot sell cars at a per-unit loss (which is what I've seen a lot of people claiming over the past year), because they don't have any other way to make it up. But GM can sell the Bolt at a per-unit cost (whether they actually are is irrelevant, I'm not sure we'll know that unless GM tells us) because selling the Bolt allows them to sell more profitable gas-guzzling cars and still meet fuel-economy standards, which is something the article itself even admitted.
> if you think they'll beat the profitability of the large car companies you are really off the beat
Literally nobody has made this argument. I do not appreciate being made into a straw man.
>No matter how many times you claim I'm offended, that doesn't actually mean I was offended. Why do you keep making that claim?
Because you've kicked off something that wasn't even discussed.
>Implying that anyone who brings up those legitimate points is a tesla "fanboy" does in fact imply that you're biased against Tesla.
No one was implying anything, no one was saying anything negative or positive about Tesla.
> Every talk he made about the Model 3
I'm pretty sure you can use Google and hear him talk when he says that the Model 3 couldn't happen without the Model S ;)
Like the launch event where he said that the people who buy the Model S effectively are paying the way forwards for the Model 3.
I'm also pretty sure when you know that Model 3 owners have to pay for everything including access to the Supercharger network it's not the same as the Model S.
>Yes I did read the article. And first off, I never claimed it would be "highly profitable"
>Literally nobody has made this argument. I do not appreciate being made into a straw man.
You claimed it would be more profitable than the traditional car companies at scale.
"Tesla's car has more luxury options, can upgrade to the autopilot, has access to the supercharger network, has brand cachet, and will be more profitable at scale is a fanboy"
> Because you've kicked off something that wasn't even discussed.
How do you think things get discussed? Because someone brings them up. Congratulations for pointing out the origin of literally every discussion ever made.
> I'm pretty sure you can use Google
Seriously, give me a link or shut up. When I ask for a citation, you can't just tell me to Google for it. That's not a citation, and I've already explained that when I search I find many articles that contradict your claim and none in support.
> You claimed it would be more profitable than the traditional car companies at scale.
No, not "than the traditional car companies". More profitable than it is at launch. And this argument comes straight from the article, it's not actually my argument, I only rephrased it for brevity:
> And when its battery factory is running at scale, it should be able to produce batteries at a lower price, bumping up its profitability.
Dogma, you come across as one of those people that become fixated on a particular company or person being a failure no matter what happens. You don't ever supply information on the questions the other person asks. Saying "use google" usually don't get anywhere.
