Elon Musk: If You Don't Make It at Tesla, You Go Work at Apple

[Dmunjal]

Steve, just like Thasan already explained you: we are simply NOT there yet. Technology is not there. Some folks believe they can use Solar energy on their homes and charge those cars: it's foolish, expensive and time consuming. People talk about things they know nothing about. At best a solar panel will only produce like 250Wh. These cars have batteries rated at 90kWh+! (do the math: you will need 4 panels per kW or 180panels to charge the behemoth in one hour, or 360 panels to charge it in 30mins. you will also need a roof with an area of more than 600 sq. meters!!!)The sun shines according to where you are for like I don't know, 5hrs. How do you expect to charge your car at night???? Steve, the car giants are not naïve. I believe the answer will come in some sort of hydrogen fuel cell technology that is clean and will replace oil. On the other hand one can make a small and light (very light) electric car that will move in the cities and charge in your garage. This is possible. But a large sedan that is heavy and needs 500bhp this is a mistake. I predict decent solutions will once again come from VW/Mercedes/BMW/Audi. These companies have the cash and the will to make this happen.

This isn't how solar is supposed to work. The point is to reduce your electricity bill to zero, not use solar for a full day's use. Of course, you have to use the grid in the evening to charge your EV but the solar generation during the day makes enough to cover the difference.

Most utilities have a time-of-use plan which charges more during the day and less at night. This works in your favor and it allows an arbitrage of electricity used during a full day.

Tesla recently announced the PowerWall to augment solar which allows even more savings because you can charge the battery at night on the low rates and discharge it during the day. Or even capture the excess solar energy during the day and discharge at night.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/a...lar-batteries-for-homes-and-small-businesses/

The whole point is to move electricity generation from a centralized utility to one that is distributed in every home.

My electricity bill is zero every month and I have two EVs.

As far as BMW and Mercedes are concerned, the biggest issue they're going to have is their dealer network. Most dealers make 70% of their profit in the service centers and EVs require very little maintenance. This is going to upset their dealers and they will resist pushing EVs over ICE cars which are their bread and butter.

Maybe this is why they've been focused on hybrids instead of full EVs.

 

[thirteen1031]

Lol, thanks for the laugh, I kinda needed it tonight.

[shrug] I assume you took this as funny because you don't think it's the high road; whether or not you like Cook as head of Apple, he does strike me as a gentleman. Example: Jobs snapped back at customers that they were holding their phone wrong when they couldn't get good reception on it. Cook didn't say any such thing to customers when they complained of phones bending.

Making no reply about such things is often seen as "the high road." People talk trash about you (justified or not), you refuse to respond to it. But maybe I've missed Apple's tart retort to such things over the last four years (excepting, of course, "Can't innovate anymore, my ass!")? Which is why you found my remark funny. Send me a few links, I'd be delighted to know that Apple has been responding in kind to this sort of trash talk.

 

[felt.]

MACRUMORS the place where all personal opinions must be non offensive and politically correct. Vomit inducing.

 

[dotnet]

And by that extension making an iPhone is child's play.

Not at all. By extension, making an iPhone isn't rocket science, it's much harder!

 

[diogenis]

This isn't how solar is supposed to work. The point is to reduce your electricity bill to zero, not use solar for a full day's use. Of course, you have to use the grid in the evening to charge your EV but the solar generation during the day makes enough to cover the difference.

Most utilities have a time-of-use plan which charges more during the day and less at night. This works in your favor and it allows an arbitrage of electricity used during a full day.

Tesla recently announced the PowerWall to augment solar which allows even more savings because you can charge the battery at night on the low rates and discharge it during the day. Or even capture the excess solar energy during the day and discharge at night.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/a...lar-batteries-for-homes-and-small-businesses/

The whole point is to move electricity generation from a centralized utility to one that is distributed in every home.

My electricity bill is zero every month and I have two EVs.

As far as BMW and Mercedes are concerned, the biggest issue they're going to have is their dealer network. Most dealers make 70% of their profit in the service centers and EVs require very little maintenance. This is going to upset their dealers and they will resist pushing EVs over ICE cars which are their bread and butter.

Maybe this is why they've been focused on hybrids instead of full EVs.

Since when are we discussing here the need to eliminate our electricity monthly bills? This is all about Teslas and their obsolete battery tech.
You are completely wrong, as in you don't know what you are talking about.
The biggest mistake we will ever do to the environment is moving electricity gen. locally. Including EVs.
You guys believe energy is produced out of thin air. Well it's not.

 

[billy the fish]

A company is literally valued by its share price times its number of shares. I'm not trying to make a statement about doing good. Yeah, I think Tesla helps the world more than Apple does. I wasn't saying anything about that.

Jeez Louise, when I say valued, I am in no way on about money... Example.. My s6 is.better than your iPhone.. No its not. The reason why.. Apple has more cash than Samsung.. You seen how it works.. Balance sheets are irrelevant in the debates about quality of tech products..

 

[diogenis]

Tesla recently announced the PowerWall to augment solar which allows even more savings because you can charge the battery at night on the low rates and discharge it during the day. Or even capture the excess solar energy during the day and discharge at night

This is actually an even bigger scam than its vehicles. They sell you their battery pack (the box) but they won't sell you the inverter unit. Can you imagine why? Because all the actual hitech is happening in the inverter, or how do you guys think, you gonna attach this unit to your live power network in your home? Can you tell me how?

 

[Dmunjal]

Since when are we discussing here the need to eliminate our electricity monthly bills? This is all about Teslas and their obsolete battery tech.
You are completely wrong, as in you don't know what you are talking about.
The biggest mistake we will ever do to the environment is moving electricity gen. locally. Including EVs.
You guys believe energy is produced out of thin air. Well it's not.

Have you done it? How do you know I'm wrong?

I've already done it. I've got solar on my roof and a Tesla and a Leaf. My electricity bill is zero are I use zero gasoline. Even the electricity I use in the evening is delivered primarily by natural gas, a much cleaner fuel than coal.

This is a win-win for everyone.

Who has better battery tech than Tesla?

 

[spinedoc77]

[shrug] I assume you took this as funny because you don't think it's the high road; whether or not you like Cook as head of Apple, he does strike me as a gentleman. Example: Jobs snapped back at customers that they were holding their phone wrong when they couldn't get good reception on it. Cook didn't say any such thing to customers when they complained of phones bending.

Making no reply about such things is often seen as "the high road." People talk trash about you (justified or not), you refuse to respond to it. But maybe I've missed Apple's tart retort to such things over the last four years (excepting, of course, "Can't innovate anymore, my ass!")? Which is why you found my remark funny. Send me a few links, I'd be delighted to know that Apple has been responding in kind to this sort of trash talk.

Cook talks trash as well, him taking the "high road" is a bunch of BS. That refrigerator and toaster comment is the one that sticks out to me, and ironically because those words came back to haunt him when MS trounced them just a week ago, AND MS did it in a very classy fashion refusing to talk trash about Apple when they easily could have.

Beyond that I think the actions of a CEO and a company are much more indicative of their following any high road. Does the company employ 3rd world child labor in working conditions which would not approach acceptability in the US? Does the company hide most of their money offshore to avoid paying US taxes? Does the company sue every other company who has any kind of tiny similarity to their product? Does the company make anything open source for the good of the industry and its customers?

Look I'm not saying Apple isn't doing anything every other major corporation is doing, but I don't understand why Apple gets this pass to do anything because they are so altruistic. They're not, their number 1, 2, and 3 goal is to make profit and nothing else. They don't want to change the world, unless it makes them a profit. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with that, it's capitalism, but it shouldn't be warped into something resembling Tim Cook walking through a field of lilies giving away iPad to everyone for the betterment of society.

 

[diogenis]

Have you done it? How do you know I'm wrong?

I've already done it. I've got solar on my roof and a Tesla and a Leaf. My electricity bill is zero are I use zero gasoline. Even the electricity I use in the evening is delivered primarily by natural gas, a much cleaner fuel than coal.

This is a win-win for everyone.

Who has better battery tech than Tesla?

Ok with that I'm done:
So, great your electricity bill is 0, then
How much have you paid for your Solar, Tesla, Leaf.
How much are you going to pay in 4 years when you will be forced to recycle those battery packs in both cars?
Add all the above, then divide with the electricity charges you would have and the gasoline you would use and it will be like several decades before breaking even. But I love how you run your bills For the very least you have peace of mind, even if you are completely mistaken, but that's fine.

Let me give you an advise: go find an Electrical Engineer specialized in energy, and ask him to give you an energy/cost report. He will at least guide you scientifically and you will avoid the big mistakes in the future

 

[Dmunjal]

This is actually an even bigger scam than its vehicles. They sell you their battery pack (the box) but they won't sell you the inverter unit. Can you imagine why? Because all the actual hitech is happening in the inverter, or how do you guys think, you gonna attach this unit to your live power network in your home? Can you tell me how?

This is idiotic. Every solar installation already includes an inverter. Why should Tesla install a second one?

 

[Dmunjal]

Ok with that I'm done:
So, great your electricity bill is 0, then
How much have you paid for your Solar, Tesla, Leaf.
How much are you going to pay in 4 years when you will be forced to recycle those battery packs in both cars?
Add all the above, then divide with the electricity charges you would have and the gasoline you would use and it will be like several decades before breaking even. But I love how you run your bills For the very least you have peace of mind, even if you are completely mistaken, but that's fine

My Leaf is 2011 and going strong with 30k miles. I'll probably keep it for another 4 years. Zero maintenance except tires and wipers.

My Tesla is 2012 with 40k miles and again zero maintenance except tires and wipers.

No oil changes, no tune ups, no gas station fill ups every week.

My solar is a zero down lease and I've spent no more on my Leaf and Tesla than I would have spent on an equivalent Honda and BMW.

It is the best automotive decision I've made and I've owned every kind of make car over the past 30 years of driving.

Your ignorance is showing.

Edit : here's the math so you might understand.

I charge overnight at 10 cents a kwhr. A full charge on a Tesla 85 kwhr is $8.50 which goes 250 miles. A typical BMW/Mercedes need 10 gallons to go 250 miles which is about $35 where I live. This is thousands of dollars a year in savings.

 

[dotnet]

Let me give you an advise: go find an Electrical Engineer specialized in energy, and ask him to give you an energy/cost report.

Everyone I know who invested in solar energy for their house has done just that. Maybe you need to get out of that barrel for a change and do the numbers yourself?

 

[sudo1996]

Nah, you don't think. You just make things up. At least try to make an argument why the world is better off with Tesla in it?

I already talked about it before, and I don't want to copy/paste one of my previous comments. Of course, nobody expects you to go back and look through the comments; that's just a problem with how forums work.

 

[nick42983]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choice-supportive_bias

Jimrod, it's actually much simpler than that. I use an Apple Watch regularly, the aesthetics and user interface are great for me, I don't need to justify my purchase, I would have returned it if I didn't like it. Elon Musk hasn't used the Watch much, if at all and he's in competition with Apple. If he has used the Watch and still says it's a bad design, he's just lying.

 

[SirCheese]

Jimrod, it's actually much simpler than that. I use an Apple Watch regularly, the aesthetics and user interface are great for me, I don't need to justify my purchase, I would have returned it if I didn't like it. Elon Musk hasn't used the Watch much, if at all and he's in competition with Apple. If he has used the Watch and still says it's a bad design, he's just lying.

First, he's not in competition with Apple, and if he says it's a bad design, it's not lying, it's his opinion. Just because YOU think it's not, doesn't mean others can't. Simple as that.

 

[felt.]

Thank god for all these internet forum users here to protect Apples honour from the big bad Elon.

 

[Zen Desk Pro]

So we've left reality to life in read-between-the-lines land. Good for you.

Can you use your head? Define "poaching" for us all, please, Gudi.

It certainly isn't "hiring fired employees from so-and-so company.

 

[SteveW928]

As company is not valued by its bank balance, but by the products, services and innovations it offers the world.. Whenever an ifan feels Apple's offerings are sub par, they instantly resort to quoting balance sheets which is redic as that has no bearing to the man in the street..

True, but having hundreds of billions in the bank sure doesn't hurt to help weather any low points.

 

[SteveW928]

A company is literally valued by its share price times its number of shares. I'm not trying to make a statement about doing good. Yeah, I think Tesla helps the world more than Apple does. I wasn't saying anything about that.

Huh? Someone making an electric car (and someday, one outside of a luxury sports car, hopefully) is doing more to help the world than a company who brought computing technology into the home and revolutionized smart-phones so they were actually useful and productive? (and, I could go on with a list of like 20 or 30 MAJOR innovations Apple has contributed to technological advancement)

Seriously? Just start thinking for a moment about how just those couple of things above trickle their way down throughout the world, improving things. They are both important... but come on, lets get real here!

 

[SteveW928]

Dais group you mean?
It's different. Pretty low 'capacity', so it's not for mobile electronics technology. The main point in that is that you can charge fast. It also uses carbon/graphite. Cool paper and decent technology, but atleast 10 years away of it becomes commercial for grid storage. Nothing revolutionary in my humble opinion.

I'll have to look into the capacity thing... I thought I read somewhere about 1/2 or 2x compared to lithium-ion, but maybe I didn't understand it (or the article I read didn't get it right). It seems like it would have to have some capacity for commercial grid storage, though.

Anyway, hopefully battery tech will do some major advancement, or I'm with the nay-sayers that as cool as electric cars are, they will only be a part of the future. Once/if battery technology gets there, there will be little if any advantage to ICE. They are more complex, less reliable, less controllable, lower performance, etc. I'm all in on electric cars, except for the very real problem of range (and currently, cost). But, for me, it's mainly the reliability and performance, not the supposed 'green' aspects.

 

[SteveW928]

It's fascinating that not much has changed in battery technology over the years. It's like the combustion engine
We need something different to make tesla or similar cars a big success.

I'm not sure I'd go quite THAT far. Do you remember laptops from the mid-2000 compared to now? That's only a decade.

 

[SteveW928]

Whenever somebody is braging about Apples profit, he kinda forgets that he is the sheep thah beaner counter Tim and co. are shaving. While I understand that every company is here for profit, I belive that there is no other company that is so shameless than apple. They sell Macs that are 3x the price, yet offer way lower performance (integrated graphics card, measly 128 SSD, 4g of ram) than modern base win computer. Lets not forget ****** screens on macbook air(bleedthrough from the start, cheap panel in 1.5k euro machine), keyboard scratching screens. And with all the trouble that OS X is having for last 4 years, Win is just as good if not better (it is faster, than is not even debatable).
Further more they are keeping features for the sake of next year cycle (ram in iphone is the best example).

This is regional problem:
apple stuff is having insane price increces over last year. It just doesn't make much sense to buy some of their products (case in point: iMac 27 base model in usa is 1700 dollars, in EU its 2300 euro.... that is 2600 dollars!!!. Even with american tax added the price difference is just to much for normal person to not feel offended and like money sheep).

The problem is, forgive the pun, you're not talking about apples to apples comparison. I used Windows machines all day at one of my previous jobs for years... yet I buy Macs now. Or, to put it another way, it's kind of irrelevant how much XYZ Windows machine compares in specs... it's a Windows machine. (That said, I do appreciate the advancements of Windows 10 finally... it's kind of the first time I might be able to stomach Windows personally, should Apple take a dive.)

 

[SteveW928]

Tesla will be flat until they can produce a car that can compete with the 100 mile choices consumers have to endure the pitiful 100 mile range!

I know Tesla fanboys will say the Model X will be that car but I don't see it being sold just yet!

Huh? It's more like 200+ mile range (well, 250+, but I'd never play with that margin for safety)... and I think the Model X has less, actually. (And, the video of it pulling an Air Stream is kind of hilarious! Think about THAT for just a couple of seconds...)

It will be interesting to see what the range/price of the consumer-level model will actually be. THAT is what will determine the ultimate success of Tesla (at least in North America).

 

[SteveW928]

Yeah, right. Elon Musk has a company that literally builds ****ing rocket ships. And he heads that company, AND an eco-friendly electric car company at the same time. So you're right. Building cars isn't rocket science. But building cars AND rockets? Not to mention other "small projects" like PayPay, solar city, etc.

He studied applied physics.. at Standford. He's literally a rocket scientist.

What say you to that?

Maybe the better question... what's the big deal about rocket science?