Fun with Elon's Cybertrucks

So far, I've seen 3 of Musk's behemoth Cybertrucks puttering around the neighborhood. Them things are big and intimidating. And really ugly, IMHO. Unfortunately for Elon, there's been a slew of problems with the beast. 

Standard color is stainless steel silver

Note guy at right with green Mohawk hairdo

(he looks suspicious)

Mashable reports on the woes of the poor cybertruck:

The Cybertruck's failure is now complete

Tesla's latest vehicle was widely mocked even before its accelerator pedal problem. Now it's a national joke

An "unapproved lubricant" used on the Cybertruck's accelerator pad caused it to slip off and get trapped in a bit of trim above the pedal, according to a recall report [PDF] by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. If you've been on TikTok this week, you might have seen what that can mean, thanks to a viral video of a Cybertruck owner whose accelerator jammed in the "pedal to the metal" position.

Result: Every single driver who paid for a Cybertruck, all 3,878 of them, now has to haul their extremely angular EV to their local dealer in Tesla's biggest recall to date.

Crucially for Tesla's future, we may have reached a tipping point: The Cybertruck has become a punchline in a way that its owners cannot get out from under. The joke is that they are dupes who paid through the nose for an extremely expensive vehicle that looks like it was designed by a child and does not actually perform many of the functions we expect from a truck, and that they'll put up with any design flaw whatsoever.

You can see this clearly in the most-liked, and highly representative, comment on that viral TikTok. "Every Cybertruck owner is like 'I paid 80k for this and it almost killed my entire family. Small issue. Love the car!'"

Actually, the owner responded, he paid $122,000 with extras.

"Sick flex, brother," replied another TikTok user. "I also paid $122k to be a ludicrously irresponsible threat to any vehicle or pedestrian in my vicinity."

Cybertruck comedy, still legal, continued over on Musk's Twitter (which, in common with Stephen King and at least one potential juror in the Manhattan trial of Donald Trump, we still refuse to call X).

... while the notion of the Cybertruck as a "snowflake" vehicle that cannot encounter any real-world conditions took hold.

Cybertruck steel forms rust spots 

when rained on or washed 🤪

The recall also revealed, inadvertently, how far short of Musk's ambition the Cybertruck has fallen thus far. The CEO estimated 250,000 Cybertruck sales per year in a recent earnings call. It's fair to say that 4,000 Cybertrucks delivered in the first 6 months is a little short of that goal. Not only is that 10 times less than the number of Rivian EV trucks sold so far — and just to be clear, Rivian is in trouble too — it's also less than half the total number of Deloreans sold in the U.S. in the 1980s.

Then, sadly but not surprisingly things got out of hand:

Cybertrucks do not have septic tanks!

By Germaine: Keeping an eye on technology  👀  😵

Egads! It grew a tumor and infested a forest!