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Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by keyle on Monday April 02, 2018 @06:46PM (#16740167)
I have no interest or involvment in Tesla. But from an outsider's perspective I can't help but notice that when you're this little company with no chance of making it, the press is very bulish about your company.

As soon as you become large, they look up at you and can't wait to see you fall, overly negative.

Who thought making cars was difficult? And mass production? And electrical cars, pushing the boundaries or batteries.

The light are still on in the factory, so the company's doing well.

Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by WheelsAtLarge on Monday April 02, 2018 @08:05PM (#16740646)
His big problem is over promise. Yes, he promises big but does not deliver. The press loves to play both sides. It reports the promises and the lack of delivery on his part too. The press couldn't care either way as long as it brings in readers.
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by heisenbergs on Monday April 02, 2018 @09:49PM (#16741247)
He only overpromises when it comes to timelines. Most other things he actually achieves. Elontime is a real thing though...
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by VVyattPrentice on Tuesday April 03, 2018 @01:47AM (#16742211)
FWIW a Martian year is 687 days.
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by dx034 on Tuesday April 03, 2018 @07:52AM (#16743761)
Unfortunately that's not their financial year. They still need to generate cash or find more investors.
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by sametmax on Tuesday April 03, 2018 @08:51AM (#16744125)
Oh come on ! The guy delivered the first practical electrical car and a freaking spaceship 10 time cheapers than the competition.

Show me somebody in this comment thread that remotely matches this.

Of course he messes it up and he is late. He is not creating a twitter clone.

Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by bpicolo on Tuesday April 03, 2018 @09:05AM (#16744241)
He still overpromises frequently, the model 3 is one example. His claims of how soon Tesla's vehicles will be self-driving ready is another.
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by unknown_apostle on Tuesday April 03, 2018 @07:09AM (#16743498)
I would say the big problem is financial. Tesla is not profitable and needs money. The thing which keeps the lights on is the willingness of investors to keep supporting high valuations of stock and bonds.
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by CharlesW on Monday April 02, 2018 @07:19PM (#16740363)
> But from an outsider's perspective I can't help but notice that when you're this little company with no chance of making it, the press is very bulish about your company. As soon as you become large, they look up at you and can't wait to see you fall, overly negative.

This isn't just a press bias, but a seemingly-universal human bias.

[1] https://undark.org/article/why-we-root-for-the-underdog/

Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by omarforgotpwd on Tuesday April 03, 2018 @02:51AM (#16742421)
People are so excited about Tesla that they may overlook the risks. It is responsible of the press to highlight the problems Tesla faces so people can make responsible financial decisions when buying Tesla bonds and stocks, and so Tesla is pressured to minimize these risks.
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by api on Monday April 02, 2018 @08:11PM (#16740684)
There seems to be a strong anti-Tesla campaign afoot. I'm not surprised given that the entire auto industry wants them to fail and a significant portion of the auto industry (and unions, etc.) want EVs to fail in general.

Tesla seems to be having some severe growing pains, but I have learned not to count Elon or any of his ventures out. Self-landing reusable rockets were impossible too according to pretty much the entire aerospace industry. If it comes down to it Tesla could still raise quite a bit of money almost overnight, albeit probably with more dilution than they would prefer. I have little doubt that they will eventually scale up. Question is how much blood they will have to spill in the form of liquidity and market cap before they get there.

Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by kryptiskt on Tuesday April 03, 2018 @04:25AM (#16742795)
> Self-landing reusable rockets were impossible too according to pretty much the entire aerospace industry.

Only if they have forgotten the DC-X, which I doubt they have done.

Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by Jesus_Jones on Tuesday April 03, 2018 @03:05PM (#16748027)
of course the dc-x was yet another different flight vehicle that wasn't given enough time to be successful. and it was a bit different in that there wasn't a separate capsule from the launch rocket. if musk had his passionate engineering self behind it he could have made it work.
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by ams6110 on Monday April 02, 2018 @08:32PM (#16740817)
> Self-landing reusable rockets were impossible too according to pretty much the entire aerospace industry.

I guess they didn't ask the people who designed and built the Apollo lunar landing modules in the 1960s?

Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by greenyoda on Tuesday April 03, 2018 @01:50AM (#16742223)
The lunar module was neither self-landing nor reusable.

The lunar module was navigated and landed by a human pilot (with computer assistance).

The descent stage stayed on the Moon, and wasn't reused (except as a launch platform for the ascent stage). The ascent stage also wasn't reused - after the astronauts exited from the ascent stage into the command module, the ascent stage was jettisoned to crash into the lunar surface (or sent into solar orbit). Only the command module returned to Earth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Lunar_Module

Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by acover on Monday April 02, 2018 @09:04PM (#16741017)
There is an implicit "on earth". Gravity wells being vastly different. If the earth was bigger then we wouldn't even be able to get to orbit.
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by dalanmiller on Monday April 02, 2018 @09:55PM (#16741277)
Wouldn't we just need to generate more velocity?
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by URSpider94 on Tuesday April 03, 2018 @01:37AM (#16742163)
Easier said than done. Rockets have to carry their own fuel, so they are heaviest at launch. If you’re in a deeper gravity well, then you need a longer burn to reach escape velocity, and then also more thrust at launch because you have to carry more fuel (which means still more fuel...)

It never becomes mathematically impossible to achieve escape, but it can become engineering-impossible, ie the propellant fraction becomes so high that it’s impossible to build a structure that can contain the propellant and maintain mechanical stability. Just for reference, modern rockets are 90+ percent propellant by mass.

For more, see https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/exped...

Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by cornellwright on Monday April 02, 2018 @10:49PM (#16741513)
The press loves controversy.
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by duhast on Monday April 02, 2018 @06:54PM (#16740213)
Tesla revenue in 2017 exceeded 12bln$. How is Tesla “little”?
Re:Tesla’s Musk Takes Charge of Model 3 Production as Proble... by amerine on Monday April 02, 2018 @07:07PM (#16740270)
You missed the OPs point entirely. He literally said that now Tesla is big they are rooting for its failure.