One of the unintended highlights from Elon Musk’s Cybertruck presentation in California on Thursday night was when the company’s CEO called on design lead Franz Von Holzhausen to throw a metal ball on the pickup’s supposedly unbreakable ‘Armor Glass’. It didn’t go as planned. Two throws, two cracked windows.
On Friday, Musk tweeted that the same exact test on the same prototype we saw on stage went without a hitch during rehearsal. “We threw same steel ball at same window several times right before event & didn’t even scratch the glass!”
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To prove it, Musk shared a video of Franz practicing his right arm throw on the Cybertruck prototype before the presentation, tweeting, “Franz throws steel ball at Cybertruck window right before launch. Guess we have some improvements to make before production haha.” Bonus points if you noticed that the window automatically (?) lowered down a couple inches after being hit by the metal ball.
However, the (short-term) damage had already been done, as Musk’s botched theatrics in combination with the lukewarm reaction to the Cybertruck’s oversimplified and raw sci-fi design sent Tesla’s shares tumbling nearly 7 percent on Friday, sinking Musk’s personal net worth down by $768m in a single day, according to reports. But when you’re one of the richest people in the world worth over $20 billion dollars, I think you can afford to break a few things without worrying too much. Today it’s 6 percent down, tomorrow it’s 8 percent up. That’s how these things go.
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As far as the ‘windowgate’ is concerned, it’s overblown. Remember, the person (or company) who doesn’t fail is the person who doesn’t attempt anything. Beyond being good for a few chuckles, you don’t need to take it too seriously right now. After all, this is a prototype vehicle that’s at least a couple of years away from production. That’s a long enough time to get everything right, ironing out all the kinks. Hopefully, they’ll also iron out the design kinks too, as that could turn out to be a much more pressing, serious and enduring issue for Tesla.
We threw same steel ball at same window several times right before event & didn’t even scratch the glass!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 22, 2019