This one actually blew my mind at the time. Tesla had a wait list ten miles long and an obviously superior product (safety, speed, comfort, space, the whole electric thing, etc.). Sometimes, a business isn’t as complicated as people make it.

Completely agree. A Tesla is one of those rare products were going back to the previous state of technology feels like moving to a Third World country. Sans the adventure and possibility for self realization, that is.

Of course they did for many years, supported only by government incentives.

Even if that had been true, the claim the Tesla loses money on every car they sell implies that they would do better not producing cars at all. This is the kind of story you cling to when you desperately want to believe something.

(The bigger question is: Why did these people want to believe that Tesla is a failure? I think the potential answers to that can teach us a lot about psychology, incentive structures, social media and what Nietzsche called The Use And Abuse Of History.)

investors aren't dumb - the economies of scale hasn't happened yet at that time, but would eventually. The gov't incentives and subsidies are just icing, not the core, of the investment thesis in tesla investors.

I'm simply addressing the factual assertion in your post. People believed it as it was true.