Tesla superfandom becomes toxic, negative for electric revolution [op-ed]
electrek.co
electrek.co
Depressing.
Elon might be right, just like he was right about his cpap machines instead of full ventilators.
He made some very specific, very incorrect predictions: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1240754657263144960
That being said, I got more sympathy when I learned how absolutely absurd Gavin Newsom's reopening conditions were - halt reopening of a county until "No more than one new COVID-19 case per 10,000 residents in the past 14 days" and "No COVID-19 deaths in the past 14 days".
It seems much more logical to base it on the R-number (number of people infected on average by each infected person), like we do here in Norway. The more the R-number goes down, the more things can be reopened.
The problem with basing it off R number is we can only estimate R0, which is why most reopening criteria are based around deaths and tests per capita.
The problem is: merely checking those measures for every business is going to be a lot of work.
However, new case counts and new deaths matter a lot. Even with, say, R=0.8, with a big outbreak, people will continue to get sick and die. It also means that if you underestimate the effect of opening up and wind up with R>1, you can start running into capacity problems, either contact tracing, testing, or hospital capacity. It's best to get case counts low and declining, and then start opening things up.
If you want to argue that manufacturing can be open safely fine, and it's also fine to sue the county to force their hand.
But coronavirus restrictions save lives (stuff like mask wearing) and tweeting crap like "FREE AMERICA NOW" is extremely unhelpful. We should be arguing about the exact way in which government intervention can be used to reduce the spread.
This personal opinion is not echoed by many people who feel that the government has overreached. They feel that if a person wants total government control of their safety, that person can move to a country like China.
Replace pandemic with war. What's the difference? Governments readily encroach on civil liberties during emergencies. And we know how advocates of the Patriot Act recognized it would be a powerful law, so they said it would be temporary. We all know how that turned out. It doesn't seem like it'll go away now.
I fear we'll play out something similar with lockdown. And what's really somewhat horrifying is that the mere mention of concerns surrounding lockdown is made out to be crazy, dangerous, inhumane, etc.
Imminent invasions also justify emergency powers, but not overseas wars.
My guess is that the pandemic will be completely under control before a year has passed.
That's what's behind a lot of the consternation over government responses. A lot of lives are at stake, and not just those which might be taken by COVID.
Obviously, it’s ridiculous for Musk to call someone who is a Tesla investor
and who wrote thousands of articles about Tesla’s positive impact on the world “anti-Tesla”
simply because he didn’t like a few of my articles during a time when the company was making
some very questionable moves. Musk even ended up reversing some of those moves later that year.
One should always tolerate different opinions, as Ian Bremmer put it.[2]
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyGqMZQAMio
[2]: https://twitter.com/ianbremmer/status/801590659291480068
Same with Jobs I guess.
Periodically, I remember that Tesla has not be profitable for more than a few quarters. And I end up wondering what is the end goal. I get that you can perpetually raise money as long as you find investors.
This might not be the right place to post this question: In the long run, what is the plan for making money at Tesla?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_energy_compani...
That's just marketing. If it were genuinely the company's mission then Tesla's chargers would be open to all EVs to use.
Other charging networks open their chargers to all EVs, including Tesla EVs. So why won't Tesla do the same?
Their strategy has been to sell increasingly cheaper/higher volume models and it's working. It's just that their production is still very small by car company standards so economies of scale are still limited.
Right now they just need to scale up production which is why Elon pushed so hard to reopen the factory.
I think that misses the point that Elon Musk is one of those bad people. He is the one spreading rumours that someone's a pedofile or that Tesla has a secret deal to go private, or that Coronavirus is nothing to be worried about. People didn't just happen to congregate around him, they're hanging out with their friend.
I think this might also be related to the difference between patriotism and nationalism. I've recently seen a bunch of memes about how patriotism is wanting your country to be the best it can possibly be, while nationalism is believing your country is best no matter what. The former is a drive to improve and to fix problems, while the latter means that any constructive criticism is taken as hostility. (I'm aware there are other definitions of these words, but this is the one that works for me in exploring this issue.)
A blind belief in the infallibility of the thing or person you support, will easily turn toxic. It's not a healthy kind of support.
People in positions of fame, notoriety, power, like Musk, have learned that playing the troll is good for them. They can troll with impunity and the result has turned out to be positive in an "Any publicity is good publicity" way. Journalists lap it up because it gives them something to write about and give their publications clicks for the daily outrage. Everyone gets to fuel the flames.
"We become what we behold. We shape our tools and then our tools shape us." -- Marshall McLuhan
I was having a conversation with a friend last night about how he thinks most people are largely aware of how news outlets are "fake"/"liars" and that is a good thing. And that that is the first step to having independent, accountable media.
While I don't disagree with the sentiment. If the new guard is using the same tools (high-speed internet, TV, video, Twitter) they are destined to reach a similar equilibrium.
While I agree with the majority of you comment and take on superfans in general, I think it's important to note that a large amount of those "superfans" for Sanders are actually astroturfing efforts.
I don't have sources handy, so take it with a grain of salt, but it seems pretty clear to me that on Twitter and Reddit those "superfans" are just trying to promote the idea that voters shouldn't vote for Biden as a way to remove their vote in the general.
Again, I agree with what you said here, just want to point out the astroturfing happening.
Also because you can see the same thing happen in other areas where people identify extremely strongly with something. In fact, the history of Christianity is filled with moments when Christians acted completely contrary to their teachings due to toxic identification with their brand. Although I guess in that case there were also politically motivated people pushing them in order to take advantage of it.
I don't know what they're saying this time around. I removed them from my life. They may have had a change of heart but I am far too angry at them. It's going to take the rest of my life to undo the damage. Possibly longer.
I can totally understand voting third party when the Republican Party is putting forward someone like Romney or McCain. They're not going to rock the boat. Trump is trying sink it, and what remains of the Republican Party is eager to go down with him.
Elon was like this before the superfans. They reflect his behavior, not the other way around.
> While we obviously don’t endorse this type of language, it then led to a good example of a Tesla superfan feeding misinformation to Elon Musk, corrupting his feedback loop.
This feels like pretty standard cult behaviour. It's never Elon's fault; it's the fault of those other misguided (though ultimately righteous) believers. You get similar stuff with dictatorships and religious cults; Netflix has a rather good documentary on the Rajneeshpuram cult which shows this in action.