Every time I see a CyberTruck out in the wild, I feel like reality is broken.
The level of disaster of that rollout, combined with D.O.G.E. and "Mechahitler" Grok, has forever tarnished the Tesla brand. I suspect there is a sizable group of people who will never buy a product by that brand ever again (or at least as long as Musk is at the helm).
Every time I see a CyberTruck out in the wild, I am still just stunned by the crappy design — like a dumpster designed for anti-performance — the wheel positioning and size is all wrong, and the metalwork always looks cheap because the 'flat' surfaces are always wavy or rippled, and the seams don't match up properly.
I am definitely one of those people who used to look forward to buying a Tesla next time I change vehicles, but will never consider it now (and I'm big on electric vehicles).
That might be true in the US, but it doesn't appear to be so for Tesla in the rest of the world. For example, Tesla is the number 1 selling EV in Norway. They have also opened Tesla dealerships in India. Potentially, whatever damage they have done to themselves in the US, they might be able to offset that with good sales in other friendlier countries.
While they've hurt their image in the US, for now, that might change over time. 5 or 10 years from now, possibly aided by more success from SpaceX, Tesla's or Musk's image could recover.
Yes, when he said the Jews were intentionally importing substandard humans into western nations to undermine the US, I didn't need hand gestures to think he's a Nazi either.
When Musk purchased and rebranded Twitter as X he also unbanned a large number of accounts famed for Nazi and similar race based content.
He has famously thumbs-ed up significant chunks of such content and in the event mentioned here replied to an explicit statement (as outlined about) as being "the actual truth".
He is an unquestionable fan of Nazi like content, many will shrug it off as his grandfather was an actual Nazi fan (having to move from Canada(?) to South Africa because of such beliefs), and his uncle (IIRC, certainly a close family relative) was a senior member of the South African apartheid government.
If it wasn't, though, why wouldn't he apologize and unequivocally denounce nazi-ism after it happened instead of trolling, playing gotcha games to pwn the libs and doubling down? His jokes about the Holocaust and mocking critics made it worse. He loves reckless, performative provocation and to stir the pot.
Terrible branding for Tesla of him to singlehandedly permanently alienate the majority of his customer base.
Yeah I think it will probably go down as the biggest mistake Tesla has made.
They could have spent all the effort building EV delivery trucks with built in self driving which would help them collect even more data for FSD to tell them rollout robotaxis.
The board and shareholders had their chance to dump Musk a few weeks ago; they could have just turned down his ridiculous pay package and he would have left. They didn't so he'll be dragging them down for at least another decade.
Volkswagen was handed over to be run by a British military officer immediately following the war.
Tesla’s board decided after the war was lost to not only let the nazi sympathizer continue running the company, but to give him an egregiously disproportionate compensation package. The guy who single handedly pushed the biggest failure in the history of the company (cybertruck) is apparently the only one who can save the company.
I expect at some point they’ll be acquired for pennies on the dollar by a Chinese company or if Trump gets his way he’ll insist on a government takeover.
The weird thing I find with the Cybertruck is that I never see anyone using it for obviously truck-y things. For example, I've never seen a CT in the wild with the bed open.
You'd expect to see it hauling ladders or tools or towing horse boxes and so on, but nope. It makes me curious why. Is the truck overpriced for anyone who needs a truck to work? That seems unlikely, trucks are already north of 70,000 bucks. Are there no accessories like towing hitches? Seems unlikely. Is it just not a usefully sized bed? That would be a bizarre miss for a truck designer. I just dont understand it.
Honestly, you could say the same things about most trucks. They’re used more for posturing than as tools at this point. Though the CT does seem to be particularly unreliable based on its frequent recalls.
Irony is that, at least moving forward, you can see a child in front of a cyber truck before you crush them. But if you hit any anyone with those sharp edges...
US truck customers are getting smarter. The fleet trucks, for HVAC, plumbers, and appliance installation and repair, I see in my area are almost all vans now. Butch pickup trucks still have the gender affirming care market.
Shareholders must be the weakest most by-passable interest group in corporate america.
Would I stand by and allow my shares and future profits flounder while the head guy goes rogue? No blankin' way.
Regardless of personal preference for politics, no serious organization should ever want to come within one light year of DC politics. It can only use, besmirch, tarnish, degrade the organization's credibility and from there hit into money. Trump makes it exponentially worse.
”The end of credits hit many EV rivals harder. Overall U.S. EV sales fell more than 41% in November and Tesla's market share rose to 56.7% from 43.1%, the data showed.”
So EV sales are down, less so for Tesla than other makers, but someone needed a catchy headline? I mean, I have absolutely no love for Tesla, but am I wrong in thinking that this is a little click-baity?
The article isn’t focused on Tesla’s market share, it’s focused on the mix of standard and premium product offerings they’ve rolled out lately and the effect that has had on absolute unit sales (and margins).
As it is they still can’t sell as many cars as they used to, which stands in contrast to Elon’s pay package.
This number makes no sense. In the space of one month Tesla's market share increased by over 30%? On overall declining sales, including for Tesla?
Nothing about that makes sense.
> According to an Experian Automotive report on electric vehicles, out of the 292.3 million cars and trucks on the road in the U.S. in 2024, approximately 4,092,200 (1.4%) of those were electric cars.
So 43% would be 1.76M. Going to 57% would be 2.33M, i.e. nearly 600K sales. Except:
> Demand for Standard versions was expected to support sales in November, but the company's total sales fell nearly 23% to 39,800 vehicles from 51,513 a year earlier and were the lowest since January 2022, according to the data from Cox, which tracks sales across the industry.
Whatever "math" is happening in this article is fundamentally broken.
Unless they mean "the market sale of EVs in November", in which case 39,800 of 70,000 is Tesla, up from... 31,000?
So Tesla's monthly sales drops to a 4 year low, down 23%, but somehow 8,800 vehicles is enough to increase market share by 30%+? I have no idea what mashup of numbers is happening here.
You seem to be dancing around the context of Tesla sales being down in an environment where all EV sales are down. It's easy to connect the dots to the missing subsidies for the reason for the decline but Tesla is declining less than other EVs.
Except for a Rivian, other car OEM's are selling gasoline vehicles instead of their EVs. Now that EVs are a mature business, it's just a part of every car OEM's product line.
That's an illuminating headline compared to the bubble I exist in. Living in the eastside suburbs of Seattle, it's common to see three or four Teslas whizz by one after another.
I'm still shocked they have any sales at all. You couldn't pay me to drive around in one of Musk's Hitler-mobiles. There is no way I would pay money for one of his cars or support him in any way.
They are a relative steal compared to previous prices. If I was going to buy a used EV as a commuter vehicle, I buy an even cheaper one to minimize risk from parts and repair costs. I don't know if it's deserved but I see a lot of Tesla service horror stories.
Every time I see a CyberTruck out in the wild, I feel like reality is broken.
The level of disaster of that rollout, combined with D.O.G.E. and "Mechahitler" Grok, has forever tarnished the Tesla brand. I suspect there is a sizable group of people who will never buy a product by that brand ever again (or at least as long as Musk is at the helm).
Yup
Every time I see a CyberTruck out in the wild, I am still just stunned by the crappy design — like a dumpster designed for anti-performance — the wheel positioning and size is all wrong, and the metalwork always looks cheap because the 'flat' surfaces are always wavy or rippled, and the seams don't match up properly.
I am definitely one of those people who used to look forward to buying a Tesla next time I change vehicles, but will never consider it now (and I'm big on electric vehicles).
That might be true in the US, but it doesn't appear to be so for Tesla in the rest of the world. For example, Tesla is the number 1 selling EV in Norway. They have also opened Tesla dealerships in India. Potentially, whatever damage they have done to themselves in the US, they might be able to offset that with good sales in other friendlier countries.
While they've hurt their image in the US, for now, that might change over time. 5 or 10 years from now, possibly aided by more success from SpaceX, Tesla's or Musk's image could recover.
I notice you skipped mentioning the CEO doing nazi salutes.
I love how they claim it wasn't a nazi salute... that was absolutely a nazi salute. Nobody can watch that and say that it wasn't.
I saw it live (before all the commentary) and didn’t think it was a nazi salute :/
Here's a video[1] of it to jog anyone's memory who saw and might not remember it.
[1] https://reddit.com/r/gifs/comments/1i7w4nz
I gave him some benefit of the doubt at first that he might just have a weird 'my heart goes out to you' gesture. But footage was found of him doing an actual one of those https://www.reddit.com/r/centrist/comments/1i8ajx0/video_of_...
Completely different.
What do you think now?
You didn't think this [1] was a Nazi salute?
1: https://i.imgur.com/MF2aEM3.gif
What about after, when he explained it away by making "I did not 'Nazi' that coming" jokes on Twitter?
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But now you know it was one. His platform pushes nazi propaganda as well, often amplified by Musk himself.
When I watched a very short clip juxtaposed next to a clip of a nazi salute, then it looked like one to me.
But when I watched it in context, it looked like a man putting a hand on his heart and then proffering his thanks to the audience.
My belief is that it was most likely not a nazi salute and is not relevant evidence in the important task of assessing Musk's political stances.
Looked like a man putting a hand on his heart and then saluting the fuhrer.
Yes, when he said the Jews were intentionally importing substandard humans into western nations to undermine the US, I didn't need hand gestures to think he's a Nazi either.
Yes this is much stronger and relevant evidence
I don't follow Musk's utterances. Is this a joke or something Musk has actually said?
Musk responded "you have said the actual truth" to a tweet saying this.
Though he apologised:
>"I'm sorry for that tweet or post," Musk said Wednesday. "It was foolish of me."
That apology is for posting it, not for believing it.
When Musk purchased and rebranded Twitter as X he also unbanned a large number of accounts famed for Nazi and similar race based content.
He has famously thumbs-ed up significant chunks of such content and in the event mentioned here replied to an explicit statement (as outlined about) as being "the actual truth".
See, eg: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-67446800
He is an unquestionable fan of Nazi like content, many will shrug it off as his grandfather was an actual Nazi fan (having to move from Canada(?) to South Africa because of such beliefs), and his uncle (IIRC, certainly a close family relative) was a senior member of the South African apartheid government.
I watched the whole thing live, that was a Sieg Heil snap and all, and it fits with his edgelord persona.
Your belief is incorrect
If it wasn't, though, why wouldn't he apologize and unequivocally denounce nazi-ism after it happened instead of trolling, playing gotcha games to pwn the libs and doubling down? His jokes about the Holocaust and mocking critics made it worse. He loves reckless, performative provocation and to stir the pot.
Terrible branding for Tesla of him to singlehandedly permanently alienate the majority of his customer base.
Did he joke about the holocaust? I googled and there were some jokes about nazis but I didn't see a holocaust one.
Incredible this comment is 4 hours old and not flagged. Hacker news is dead.
Yeah I think it will probably go down as the biggest mistake Tesla has made.
They could have spent all the effort building EV delivery trucks with built in self driving which would help them collect even more data for FSD to tell them rollout robotaxis.
Camera only is still a bigger mistake because without LiDAR, the EV delivery trucks with built in self driving will not work.
Eventually, they’ll be fine. Wolkswagen was established by the German nazi regime and it has been fine for a long time in spite of its past.
Great example, but I'm no so sure.
The board and shareholders had their chance to dump Musk a few weeks ago; they could have just turned down his ridiculous pay package and he would have left. They didn't so he'll be dragging them down for at least another decade.
Volkswagen was handed over to be run by a British military officer immediately following the war.
Tesla’s board decided after the war was lost to not only let the nazi sympathizer continue running the company, but to give him an egregiously disproportionate compensation package. The guy who single handedly pushed the biggest failure in the history of the company (cybertruck) is apparently the only one who can save the company.
I expect at some point they’ll be acquired for pennies on the dollar by a Chinese company or if Trump gets his way he’ll insist on a government takeover.
He’ll probably let Jared Kushner have a go.
The weird thing I find with the Cybertruck is that I never see anyone using it for obviously truck-y things. For example, I've never seen a CT in the wild with the bed open.
You'd expect to see it hauling ladders or tools or towing horse boxes and so on, but nope. It makes me curious why. Is the truck overpriced for anyone who needs a truck to work? That seems unlikely, trucks are already north of 70,000 bucks. Are there no accessories like towing hitches? Seems unlikely. Is it just not a usefully sized bed? That would be a bizarre miss for a truck designer. I just dont understand it.
As a truck, is the CT any good, or no?
Trucks are virtually nonexistent where I live. People who want to transport stuff mostly use VW Crafters or pull a trailer with their regular car.
Honestly, you could say the same things about most trucks. They’re used more for posturing than as tools at this point. Though the CT does seem to be particularly unreliable based on its frequent recalls.
Irony is that, at least moving forward, you can see a child in front of a cyber truck before you crush them. But if you hit any anyone with those sharp edges...
US truck customers are getting smarter. The fleet trucks, for HVAC, plumbers, and appliance installation and repair, I see in my area are almost all vans now. Butch pickup trucks still have the gender affirming care market.
Shareholders must be the weakest most by-passable interest group in corporate america.
Would I stand by and allow my shares and future profits flounder while the head guy goes rogue? No blankin' way.
Regardless of personal preference for politics, no serious organization should ever want to come within one light year of DC politics. It can only use, besmirch, tarnish, degrade the organization's credibility and from there hit into money. Trump makes it exponentially worse.
> the rest of its lineup is older models with minor refreshes.
minor refreshes = removing critical controls like turn signal and drive select stalks.
Who would want to go from several dedicated tactile controls in model s/x to no stalks and few controls?
I'm very happy with the new design. I miss the buttons when I drive a car with stalks.
From TFA:
”The end of credits hit many EV rivals harder. Overall U.S. EV sales fell more than 41% in November and Tesla's market share rose to 56.7% from 43.1%, the data showed.”
So EV sales are down, less so for Tesla than other makers, but someone needed a catchy headline? I mean, I have absolutely no love for Tesla, but am I wrong in thinking that this is a little click-baity?
The article isn’t focused on Tesla’s market share, it’s focused on the mix of standard and premium product offerings they’ve rolled out lately and the effect that has had on absolute unit sales (and margins).
As it is they still can’t sell as many cars as they used to, which stands in contrast to Elon’s pay package.
Given that, the title seems accurate to me.
This number makes no sense. In the space of one month Tesla's market share increased by over 30%? On overall declining sales, including for Tesla?
Nothing about that makes sense.
> According to an Experian Automotive report on electric vehicles, out of the 292.3 million cars and trucks on the road in the U.S. in 2024, approximately 4,092,200 (1.4%) of those were electric cars.
So 43% would be 1.76M. Going to 57% would be 2.33M, i.e. nearly 600K sales. Except:
> Demand for Standard versions was expected to support sales in November, but the company's total sales fell nearly 23% to 39,800 vehicles from 51,513 a year earlier and were the lowest since January 2022, according to the data from Cox, which tracks sales across the industry.
Whatever "math" is happening in this article is fundamentally broken.
Unless they mean "the market sale of EVs in November", in which case 39,800 of 70,000 is Tesla, up from... 31,000?
So Tesla's monthly sales drops to a 4 year low, down 23%, but somehow 8,800 vehicles is enough to increase market share by 30%+? I have no idea what mashup of numbers is happening here.
> Whatever "math" is happening in this article is fundamentally broken.
No. They're talking about sales and market share in November.
The short version is Tesla is selling fewer cars these days.
But their competitors are selling even fewer, right?
Tesla's competitors are car makers. Toyota's doing better than ever.
You seem to be dancing around the context of Tesla sales being down in an environment where all EV sales are down. It's easy to connect the dots to the missing subsidies for the reason for the decline but Tesla is declining less than other EVs.
There's no dancing around any issue. North America is the third largest EV market. Tesla's sales are down everywhere, even in a market it leads in.
Tesla used to claim it would sell 20 million vehicles per year:
https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/tesla-...
Now Tesla's much revised goal is to have sold 20 million in total by 2035:
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/05/business/elon-musk-tesla-...
China and Europe are the two biggest EV markets. Those EV markets are growing but Tesla's sales have declined there too:
https://eu-evs.com/marketShare/ALL/Groups/Line/All-time-by-Q...
Tesla carries a large amount of needless, self-inflicted brand damage. Swasticars don't sell well.
Toyota, meanwhile, has been setting sales records this year:
https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/toyota...
Except for a Rivian, other car OEM's are selling gasoline vehicles instead of their EVs. Now that EVs are a mature business, it's just a part of every car OEM's product line.
If Tesla fires Musk I'll buy one of their cars that day
Even if they fire him he'll still have a huge amount of ownership in the company...
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Run of the mill frankly.
That's an illuminating headline compared to the bubble I exist in. Living in the eastside suburbs of Seattle, it's common to see three or four Teslas whizz by one after another.
And they've all been bought last month?
Haha no, but it did give me an impression of them being enduringly popular and continuing to sell well.
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I'm still shocked they have any sales at all. You couldn't pay me to drive around in one of Musk's Hitler-mobiles. There is no way I would pay money for one of his cars or support him in any way.
Used Model 3s are a steal though
They are a relative steal compared to previous prices. If I was going to buy a used EV as a commuter vehicle, I buy an even cheaper one to minimize risk from parts and repair costs. I don't know if it's deserved but I see a lot of Tesla service horror stories.
What shocks me even more is that TSLA is still about 10% up YoY. What path to (hyper-)profitability are investors seeing?
Musk is shilling the robots.
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