this post was submitted on 27 Dec 2024
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Electric Vehicles
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The first point rings true, but the other points seem like cherry picking.
Unreliability: https://www.kbb.com/car-news/consumer-reports-subaru-lexus-make-the-most-reliable-cars/ Tesla is below average on reliability, but unreliable Mainstays like Jeep still are lower. Other lists put Tesla in the middle of the pack, Cybertruck nonwithstanding. Still not great.
Fatal accident rate: This comment explains why: "As for fatalities, neither the article nor the comments I've seen so far have raised the obvious points of mis-use or over-reliance on automated driving systems or the shock (as in a famous case in Texas a couple of years ago) of an inexperienced driver given access to, let's say a Model S Plaid, stepping on the accelerator and being thrown back against the seat and into a state of shock such that the foot remains pressed on the accelerator while the car runs off the road."
Spying: Unfortunately, every single brand spies on you and your driving, as shown in https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/blog/privacy-nightmare-on-wheels-every-car-brand-reviewed-by-mozilla-including-ford-volkswagen-and-toyota-flunks-privacy-test/
A note on the "Fatal accident rate" topic:
A car which uses touch panels for control and electronics for simple things like doors, and relies only on a camera to do self-driving (no lidar), is bound to be unsafe in multiple ways. Drivers make more mistakes because they aren't provided physical switches and levers, they make mistakes because they're distracted by light from screens, in emergencies there are issues with unlocking doors and finally, when machine vision fails, there is no backup to tell of a Big Old Obstacle right ahead.
A note on the "Spying" topic:
Mozilla compared privacy policies. They didn't actually take apart cars, intercept their comms or dissect manufacturers' apps. I wish there existed a review of actual behaviours, as opposed to policies.
A car's ability to actually spy on the user depends on its tech, not just the policy. So a very simple car (not a Tesla, obviously) with a very agressive policy of "we collect everything" would be safer than a smartphone on wheels with a modest policy. You can't spy if you haven't got sensors.
As far as your points about the fatal accidents stuff goes - maybe Tesla shouldn't call it Full Self Driving if it can't fully self-drive without killing you, and maybe their cars shouldn't go 0-60 in 2 seconds by default, if that proves too difficult for inexperienced drivers to control.
"Reliability" is a difficult metric. It can cover everything from faulty seals on a door to a transmission that fails in 5k miles. One thing to search for when you're trying to see how reliable cars are is technical service bulletins (TSBs); the more a given make/model has, the more likely it is that there will be significant reliability issues.
IIRC most electric cars from newer companies have reliability issues, while electric vehicles from established brands tend to be more reliable.
As far as privacy goes, unless you buy with cash, you aren't going to have a lot of choice to turn off telemetry. And you might lose parts of the dashboard (e.g., the entire infotainment system) if you pull fuses.