Elon Evil Emperor of Transportation
Posted by freedomforall 2 years, 5 months ago to Philosophy
Excerpt:
"An interesting item in the news the other day got almost no attention.
The thing that got attention in the news was the news that a “ . . .problem with Tesla servers on Friday once again left hundreds of drivers unable to enter and operate their electric cars.”
No analysis of the implications was offered.
Ergo, it’s well to consider them.
For the past 120 years or so – since the first cars began rolling under their own power – it was taken as a given that the people who owned them controlled them. The keys were a physical symbol of ownership because he who held the keys controlled the car. Parents would threaten to withhold the keys from their teenaged drivers, if their grades slipped, for instance.
But once you were no longer a kid, if you held the keys then the car was yours. You used to see dangling-suggestively keys in car ad copy; the implication being – this could be yours (and by implication, no one else’s).
Not anymore.
Not if it’s one of Elon’s electric cars. Because Elon holds the keys – and you never will, no matter that you’re not a teenager, you paid for the car and Elon isn’t your father. But he is your overlord. He and his fellow managers intend to lord it over all of us – and electric cars are the perfect vehicle for that.
They have two plugs – one physical, the other virtual.
You use the physical plug to charge the thing up.
They use the virtual plug to determine how much and how fast you’re allowed to charge up – and (cue Emperor Palpatine voice) many other things, besides."
"An interesting item in the news the other day got almost no attention.
The thing that got attention in the news was the news that a “ . . .problem with Tesla servers on Friday once again left hundreds of drivers unable to enter and operate their electric cars.”
No analysis of the implications was offered.
Ergo, it’s well to consider them.
For the past 120 years or so – since the first cars began rolling under their own power – it was taken as a given that the people who owned them controlled them. The keys were a physical symbol of ownership because he who held the keys controlled the car. Parents would threaten to withhold the keys from their teenaged drivers, if their grades slipped, for instance.
But once you were no longer a kid, if you held the keys then the car was yours. You used to see dangling-suggestively keys in car ad copy; the implication being – this could be yours (and by implication, no one else’s).
Not anymore.
Not if it’s one of Elon’s electric cars. Because Elon holds the keys – and you never will, no matter that you’re not a teenager, you paid for the car and Elon isn’t your father. But he is your overlord. He and his fellow managers intend to lord it over all of us – and electric cars are the perfect vehicle for that.
They have two plugs – one physical, the other virtual.
You use the physical plug to charge the thing up.
They use the virtual plug to determine how much and how fast you’re allowed to charge up – and (cue Emperor Palpatine voice) many other things, besides."
" Oooh ... this person has dangerous political beliefs. He must be stopped! Click"
Of course I'm just being facetious ... right?
One of the credible claims by the Tesla team is that they intend to provide performance upgrades remotely, so the owner doesn't have to drag themselves and their vehicle into a dealership. Judging from what friends who own the vehicles say, they've been excited with the idea that they can get range improvements and safety upgrades, which they can only get by owning a Tesla. With other vehicles, what you buy is the best you're ever going to get.
The problem with being on the bleeding edge of technology is that sometimes things don't work the way they were intended. My dad bought a 1939 Buick after WW II, because it had an "altitude adjustment" carburetor, and he was planning on moving the family across country, knowing he would be driving over the mountains. Surprise! the carburetor didn't work as advertised, and he spent much of the move under the hood of that Buick, cussing a blue streak.
Could the government abuse its reach and micromanage our lives? I'm sure they would like to, which is why I still don't have "smart" meters or thermostats. There's already a healthy industry of alternative chipsets for modern vehicles, and I'm sure one will grow for the Tesla vehicles.
What I'm finding is that Elon Musk has become the new Trump for media pundits, with sinister motive attributed to every element of his technology empire. However, he is not a government pawn, but a thorn under its backside, much like Howard Hughes used to be, so I'm reading government motives for the sudden hostility from the media directed at him, which is one reason I don't imagine he'd be too cooperative with government interference in his auto business.
"His" auto business is based upon payments from all taxpayers making "his" products competitive against products that have no such payments.
May the looting SOB move to Mars ASAP.
(Elon could change my mind by using his stolen loot to set up a Gulch of Liberty and free markets, a la, Ragnar Danneskjold. I'm not holding my breath.)
It would be better to let a real free market pick the winners, but given our current government's efforts to "spread the wealth" I credit Musk for being more willing to roll the dice with his personal wealth. His SpaceX competition, as in the ULA, risks nothing, expecting the taxpayer to pick up the whole tab.
We would still be a British colony if the Founders had accepted that.
I learned a long time ago, bureaucrats and conniving industrialists always plant the seeds of their own defeat. They get involved in so many rules and regulations that you can always find a self destruct mechanism they inadvertently planted. Like the man says, once you live by telling lies, you can never know when one of them will bite you.
the very optimistic range is 273 miles at that price. The long range (optimistically 334 miles) is $53,690.
These include the insane 'delivery fee' of $1,200.
I got a new convertible top on my car for less than that idiotic fee.
Then you still have to add state and local sales taxes.
(The scumbags at Tesla advertise lower prices by taking a
'gas savings' reduction.)
I agree, it is criminal to steal from the average taxpayer to
discount the price for someone who can afford $50,000 or
more for unreliable transportation.
did not know this!!!!
NO SANE person would allow someone else to control their Liberty and Freedom
Makes me wonder if some future business will start up to take vehicles off grid and off computer. The way I see it all the basic ingredients to make a car go hasn't changed since my 1969 GTX, but all the snoop and poop crap added can be taken off or modified to set it free.
Edit add: AND to make matters worse all they would put on the waiting room TV was CNN! By the time I left I could puke on the dealership floor!
CNN Op-Ed: “Nothing More Frightening Than an Angry White Man”
https://www.summit.news/2021/11/22/cnn-publishes-op-ed-nothing-more-frightening-than-an-angry-white-man/
(Sorry but the Gulch doesn't recognize the above link as a link.)
As for the employees, they have been 'just following orders' for years. Ban them from ever working in any capacity in media or 'journalism.'
This is not pointed at you - I rightfully don't know and don't want to know YOUR medical information, but so many are willing to 1) share their info and 2) accept whatever the state has in store for them. And then indignantly state that "No sane person would allow someone else to control their Liberty and Freedom."
Worrying about this is less important, than freedom in the driverless era, but it is a very irritating trend, with no consumer value.
Just to the rice paddies before dawn and back after dark.
Commies go home (to District of Communism, New Pek-ork, Commicago, and Commifornia.)
That way, if you run the trains fast enough, choo choos can get everyone to shifts that start at 6 and 7 and 8 and 9 and repeat the process all day long! Chug! Chug! Chug! Woo-woo-woo!
Just keep kids from playing in the choo choo streets.
It's a world only Senile Sleepy Joe can imagine.
By the time all of Joe's no more motorcars choo choo dream costing trillion$ and trillion$ reaches full fruition, his starving deplorables shall be asking, "What is this soup kitchen Soylent Green?"
Myself, I just have to avoid running them over when they cut me off in traffic. I don't know whether it is just the mindset of the self-important/self-entitled people who purchase those kinds of things or what but I haven't been impressed with the ones which have nearly involved me in an accident of their creation...
The tube amplifiers we build are very simple in comparison to most technology today and customers still surprise me occasionally.
I don't have the ability to do updates to our products via the net, but I can understand the appeal.
(I was in IT in a previous career.)