Tesla dealerships are getting protested and, in some cases, vandalized. Sales are down on 9 of the top 10 countries Tesla sells in. Yet Tesla stock is up. Twitter is a cesspool of nazi-themed bots, and somehow just pulled in $1bn and raised its valuation back up to $44bn.

How is any of this possible? It seems really artificial to me, but I don’t really understand business.

  • TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world
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    13 days ago

    You are not wrong. Elon Musk is the PR man for the companies he either founded or have a majority of shares in. However, his companies’s products and services are not actually superior to his competitors. Take Tesla, the cars are not road-worthy, they are expensive, the battery sets on fire more often, and uses inferior image-detecting camera when driving automatically. Meanwhile, Chinese competitors are cheaper, more safe and use better LIDAR technology for automated driving (but only because the Chinese government heavily subsidise in EV companies making their cars far superior).

    So, as someone already mentioned, hype up your company and convince anyone to buy shares, then your companies’s valuations increase tremendously. It creates the illusion that your company is productive and valuable when in reality it is not.

    • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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      12 days ago

      Why is the alternative to Tesla on here is always “Chinese EV” when traditional manufacturers exist and make better products? We don’t want Chinese dumping their cars and leading to the loss of even more manufacturing jobs in North America and Europe.

      Fucking hell, the fight against globalization truly was for nothing, people these days are even defending it against their best interests…

      • Stovetop@lemmy.world
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        12 days ago

        Normally I’d be the one to say this is an unfairly harsh take, but when BYD is continuing the proud Chinese tradition of using slave labor to make cheaper products than the competition, I’m inclined to say that maybe they should be off the table as well.

        Maybe EVs shouldn’t be as affordable until the industry is actually sustainable. I’d rather buy a vehicle made by union workers who are paid fairly for their labor, even if it’s more expensive.

      • Clent@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        12 days ago

        We don’t want Chinese dumping their cars and leading to the loss of even more manufacturing jobs in North America and Europe.

        Who is this we, here? I want this. The people employed in these manufacturing jobs are not people I am concerned about.

        When China gets bored with subsidizing our economy, we can spin up new state of the art facilities.

        We are being sold a lump go fear, uncertainty and doubt around this stuff by the people who profit off these industries.

      • TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world
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        12 days ago

        Chinese EVs are cheaper, unfortunately, so they are competitive.

        Fucking hell, the fight against globalization truly was for nothing, people these days are even defending it against their best interests…

        Globalisation is not bad, it is mismanaged.

        • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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          12 days ago

          They’re cheaper as a dumping strategy to make us reliant on China after all local manufacturing is gone, just like China did for everything else.

          Globalization lead to all the bullshit we’re currently living, good jobs left for Asia, people can’t afford housing. Yay globalization! If you want to keep local jobs you can’t be in favor of globalization.

          • TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world
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            12 days ago

            We wanted cheaper products, and now we are reaping what we sow.

            Globalisation is not bad, it is mismanaged. Why? There is no globally harmonised rules, policies and regulations to prevent exploitation of workers in third world countries to produce cheap products and services, compensate workers for their jobs being outsourced, prevent environmental degradation, and prevent over accumulation of wealth at the hands of miniscule amount of people. Norway can’t exactly tell Bangladesh they should pay the same wages that workers in Norway are getting.

            How are those going to be resolved? A world government that implements rules and regulations uniformly; instead of dealing with different standards, regulations and policies of other countries-- or lack thereof in case of third world countries (which is why we have cheap goods because these countries offered themselves to be the world’s factory).

            The world government is like the EU but on the world level. It should be able to address the unequal distribution of wealth, unequal division of labour and enviromental issues that the current lawless globalisation “order” has wreaked havoc both to humans and environment. Are you down for that kind of set up? I thought so.

            • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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              12 days ago

              Even then, with global trades comes the environmental impact of transporting goods all over the world. It’s not normal to expect the whole world to have access to the same things, it’s not normal that I can purchase a pineapple in Canada, especially not in the middle of winter. All regions of the world would be better served by focusing on local and adjacent productions. Hell, China understood that, they don’t rely on the rest of the world for their shit, they mostly produce what they need and export surplus and are laughing their way to the bank.

              • Rhoeri@lemmy.world
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                12 days ago

                For someone who is in another thread attacking someone for having an opinion on something you feel they aren’t relevant enough to have anyone to care about their opinion of,

                You sure do have a lot of opinions.

                • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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                  12 days ago

                  If you looked at my comment history you’ll see that I mentioned that contrary to the person I’m talking about, my opinions aren’t shared in mainstream media. She can have all the opinions she wants and share them, I don’t give a crap about that, I’m concerned when mainstream media starts giving importance to the opinion of people who have no expertise on a subject.