Marsrover

[lukefrisbee]

I did not come up with it, but dang Big Ee, show some balls. Rebrand the Cyber as Mars Rover.

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[UpToNoGood]

So what you are saying is the Cybertruck should be called Mars Rover? I like Cybertruck

 

[lukefrisbee]

So what you are saying is the Cybertruck should be called Mars Rover? I like Cybertruck

I didn't question the name "Cybertruck" when it was said the first time, but the VEHICLE Big Ee had developed is more of many other things than a "truck", and the application of the word "Cyber" was only in homage to Some artist that made "cool looking automobiles" of the future. So nothing to do with the word "cyber."
People have pretended that the vehicle is cyber by definition. It has nothing to do with the word "cyber." I can live with writing the word "Cyber" when referring to this vehicle. But to have the word "Truck" as part of the name is extremely disingenuous on Big Ee's part. Perhaps his Sales Department felt the pick-up truck market was too big a peach to not try and take a bite out of so they wanted to have the vehicle identified as a "Truck." When it truly is not a truck. Even The Tesla Team refers to the utility area in the back as a "vault" and not a pick-up "bed."
It is so much more than any SUV out there, but it is an SUV with a "vault" instead of a "bed." It isn't my own name for it, but it would be correct to put it in a category called Sport Utility Truck (SUT). I think of it as even less limiting, more of a "utility vehicle." period. It is a wonderful passenger vehicle. An SUV, A camper, and has a vault.
The argument has been presented that the Ford Mustang is not a horse, nor the Thunderbird a bird. So I should not be questioning the "Cybertruck" badge. But in all other names of vehicles it is clear that the vehicle is not what it is named, or at least their is no misleading, limiting, or confusing name. And Tesla in the past named its creations non-confusing or misleading names such as "Model Y." I think the Marketing team should have named it the "Model" T if they want to attach the truck stigma to it.
But it is "his creation". He has final say so. It just seemed to me that the vehicle would have been marketed less "professionally," and more honestly.
It has nothing to do with "cyber" that all other electric vehicles will have, and it is so little a truck that the word should not be used as the official name. So one half of the name differentiates it from no other electric vehicle, and the other half of the name severely limits an understanding of what it actually does and is.

 

[UpToNoGood]

I like Cybertruck and I like pancakes.

 

[lukefrisbee]

Also "MARSROVER" is so inter-squiggly in my mind...
Elon SpaceX Stainless Steel Body (how cool an interplay?)
Mars Rover/ Lunar Rover... ties it solidly into the space program's past.
Promotes the SpaceX Program now and into the future.
Goes 500 miles which is like going to MARS for an electric vehicle.
Space Vehicles are built Function first, just like the "MARSROVER."

For years it will put SpaceX in the public's eye as going to Mars.
And after we do go to Mars the MarsRover will be even cool as a "We did it!" Reminder.
And if SpaceX never gets there it will also be a cool part of the history/association of the vehicle to SpaceX.
So come on Big Ee... go over Rogan's house, relax a little, and think about... it isn't too late.

 

[UpToNoGood]

The Mars Rover has already been made and copyrighted by NASA. We need something new like Cybertruck.

 

[lukefrisbee]

The Mars Rover has already been made and copyrighted by NASA. We need something new like Cybertruck.

REALLY! Damn it. What's a Government's copyright do? I think a lot of toys get to use "Government Copyright" names? And this is our toy.

 

[UpToNoGood]

Ford probably wanted to call the Ford Astro van "Space Shuttle" , but that was already taken.

 

[lukefrisbee]

A quick search about the copyright indicates they use an additional name like "Mars Exploratory Rover" or "Mars Curiosity Rover".
And I found a term that stated that NASA copyrighted material is for use in the public domain. And I can't find where NASA has specifically copyrighted "Mars Rover".

 

[Eye of Elon]

Cyber Truck looks similar to NASA manned Mars rover.

 

[lukefrisbee]

More reason to not call the vehicle a Cyber" anything.
https://io9.gizmodo.com/today-cyber-means-war-but-back-in-the-1990s-it-mean-1325671487

 

[ajdelange]

That link actually makes it very clear why Cyber is a very good (and very clever on the part of Elon) name for this truck. But you have to know a bit about Norbert Wiener to understand that. See https://www.cybertruckownersclub.com/forum/threads/cybersex-or-cyberwar.508/#post-5388 for a wee bit about him relevant to this discussion.

 

[lukefrisbee]

yeah it talks about how terrible a name "CYBER" is unless you hang everything on being a geek and adoring some wiener.
Perfect sense... naming the vehicle a name which has no concrete meaning and now is a negative one... But never has the definition of that word had anything to do with this vehicle.
However if they rename it the Oscar Meyer Weiner mobile I will be all in!

 

[lukefrisbee]

Or let's make it
THE WIENER WAGON...all hail the mighty weiner.

 

[ajdelange]

Perfect sense... naming the vehicle a name which has no concrete meaning

Most of the advancement of mankind comes from thinking in the abstract domain and knowing how to apply the results to the real (concrete) world.

and now is a negative one... But never has the definition of that word had anything to do with this vehicle.

Clearly you do not know what the definition of the "word" is. Had you consulted a good dictionary you would have found that it isn't a word at all but a root from Greek kybernetes (a steersman) or kybernan (to steer) used in words such as cybernation, cybernetics or Cybertruck i.e. words which describe the control of something or something that is being controlled. Wiener was, among other things, a controls guy. He wrote a book about feedback control in which he coined the term Cybernetics. MIT professors get to do that (coin words, that is, but they get to write books too). It was after the publication of that book that the prefix cyber entered modern use (though academics in other fields had been using it previously). Since controls were passing from pnuematic and mechanical kluges at that time to computers cyber tended to be associated with things controlled by computers (or more broadly, machines) and we got words like cyborg (cyber + organism) and cybernetics. As the English language is so flexible we can also make words like cyberpunk in which cyber still refers to control by machines but in which punk refers to a dystopian outcome. Apparently you are laboring under the misapprehension that cyber and dystopia go together. Nothing could be further from the truth, at least not in Norbert Wiener's vision. But, see below, we think Elon is actually relying on this negative connotation.

When you get your 40th call of the week from India about how your computer is sending error messages or when your hard disk fails as you are saving the Power Point for your presentation to the customer that starts in half an hour, or, more relevant to Tesla vehicles, you navigation screen goes blank as you are whizzing down the freeway you may be a little browned off on computers but no, cyber definitely does not have, in general a negative connotation. At least not to people who understand what the word means.

So when Elon coins the term Cybertruck (I guess billionaire owners of international corporations get to do that too) it is quite apropos and educated people know what he means. Now he is having his little joke. The least educated* will perhaps think only of the similarities to the Blade Runner cars and this was doubtless a large part of his intent. As we used to say in the engineering biz "If you can't fix it, feature it!" Elon has come up with an ugly, unpainted angular design which is, relatively speaking, dirt cheap to produce, and rather than having this drive buyers away, he projects a "bad boy" image (from Blade Runner) onto it and it sells like hotcakes. More educated consumers will understand that cyber also refers to the advanced control systems in the vehicle and, perhaps, be somewhat mollified WRT the ugliness and image. Only the most sophisticated will appreciate the implications of this vehicle in the broadest of Wiener's intended application i.e. the societal aspect.

Again I am floored by Elon Musk's genius.

*Educated here refers to STEM, at least when I speak of the most educated consumers.