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Comment by declan_roberts | Hacker News Reader

You know a Tesla was involved in an accident because they always make it part of the headline.

It's kinda like Apple where they both benefit from and also are hurt by the fact that putting "Apple" in the name makes more people click.

Added exposure/free marketing when the news is good. But then if the Duo is having some issues with cracked screens, that'll also get more attention.

Tesla doesn’t spend billions in advertising so media needs to make their money back via clickbait and ads.

If they posted such headlines about Toyota - they wouldn’t get a single ad contract from them.

There wasn't really a political angle with Apple, but the coverage of Tesla and SpaceX changed dramatically in most of the media after Musk switched sides during early Covid after a CA legislator told him to get out of CA and said F*k Elon Musk. Since then it's been a constant stream of negative stories and witchhunts that similar companies who do the same things are not subject to.

What exactly are you claiming?

It's quite obvious that Tesla has huge brand identification and Elon goes way, way out of his way to make things about himself. But are you suggesting Big Vax or a CA assemblyman is controlling the press?

You forget all the media stories on the early 2000's about SUV's doing things, like they didn't have a driver.

Live by the sword, die by the sword.

You know it's an article at least slightly critical of Tesla because declan_roberts left a comment.

You know a Tesla was involved in an accident because they always make it part of the headline.

Because it's novel. Once Tesla trucks are commonplace, it will no longer be noted.

No conspiracy to be had. It's just like the news covers train crashes, and not train arrivals. Because they're unusual.

You’re too kind. I think it’s just that “Tesla” generates clicks, whatever the real underlying topic.

...that and - combined with clickbaity headlines that are, sometimes, not all that newsworthy... ugh... i actually do filter 'Tesla' from my RSS feeds because it is that bad...

Only HN gets a free pass - most of the time...

They do it because it gets clicks and upvotes on places like HN and Reddit, almost never see a positive or neutral news article about Tesla on there. SpaceX successful launch news on Reddit would have like a 65% downvote ratio to suppress it, and it works.

I guess this headline not saying "Elon Musk's Tesla" or "Elon Musk's SpaceX" in a negative news article is a slight improvement compared to places like CNN.

On the contrary, problems with Teslas are underrepprted in media.

This is despite Tesla beeing involved in a significant number of high profile accidents, many with fatalities [1] [2].

According to NHTSA complaint records it is also one of cars that breaks down most often. Model Y is on the bottom of quality lists in multiple European countries [3].

[1] https://myelectricsparks.com/tesla-crash-germany-father-chil...

[2] https://apnews.com/article/car-crash-tesla-france-fire-be8ec...

[3] https://www.tuev-nord.de/de/wissen/ratgeber-und-tipps-mobili...

Which is really unfair. Why does the media continually do that when they don't treat other car companies the same? Especially when it's clear the fault is not the vehicle?

Legacy car makers probably have a longstanding relationship with the media?

How is it "clear the fault is not the vehicle"?

because other manufacturers aren't promoting their FSD software as "safe"

Its actually not. Most Tesla accidents are not reported as such. And thats a problem.

Teslas are death machines which should be treated as such.

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