Top Gear vs Tesla

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nivek

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http://www.allcarselectric.com/blog...hot-before-test?utm_medium=feed&obref=Outloud

Believe it or not, most of what you watch on television is scripted.
What you may not know is that some shows which appear unscripted, like the BBC’s infamous Top Gear, are also scripted word for word. Everything from the banter between its three middle-aged hosts to its madcap challenges and car reviews has been meticulously planned, before any filming takes place.
Two years ago, Tesla Motors found out what that really meant when its duo of 2008 Tesla Roadsters were doomed to a biased and unrealistic depiction on screen before the film crew even unpacked their equipment or TopGear presenter Jeremy Clarkson had stepped on set.
In documents released as part of Tesla Motor’s libel claim filed against the publicly owned British Broadcasting Corporation earlier this week, the Californian automaker detailed the negative script delivered by Clarkson while reviewing its Roadster, alleging that the infamous scene showing four members of the TopGear crew pushing a supposedly drained Roadster into a hangar was completely staged.
The court documents, filed in the U.K. detail how Tesla’s former U.K. Director of Sales and Marketing expressed concern to the producers of the show after seeing a script on the day of the shoot before filming had even begun.
Tesla versus Top GearEnlarge Photo
Describing everything from the car being filmed ‘running out of charge’ to the host’s conclusions of “It’s just a shame that in the real world, it absolutely doesn’t work.”, the Tesla employee reportedly confronted the show’s researcher who agreed that filming the $109,000 sportscar being pushed into a hangar having run out of charge was not acceptable, noting “We don’t want to be sued”.
Without Tesla's knowledge the shoot went on regardless with the script being stuck to rigorously. It wasn’t apparent until after the initial airing of the show in December 2008 just how many misleading accusations had been made by the motoring entertainment show about the car's performance and reliability.
In addition, the show is alleged to have made false claims about both cars loaned to them for the shoot, including the implication that both cars were rendered unusable after spirited driving. These claims are refuted in the court documents, detailing testimony from a Tesla engineer present on set on the day of filming.
Since the initial screening of the episode on U.K. television, the episode in question has been screened worldwide, placed on Internet video sharing sites such as YouTube and even sold in TopGear DVD Box Sets.
It is this continued disregard for Tesla and its cars which has caused the automaker to sue, 2 years after the initial show aired.
Ben Collins (The Stig) With TeslaEnlarge Photo
If successful, Tesla will win a court injunction preventing the BBC from airing the show in future on its own or syndicated networks as well as preventing the broadcaster from ever repeating such allegations.
Tesla should note however, that scripted or not the multinational, multimillion-dollar Top Gear franchise has repeatedly been accused of homophobic, nationalistic, xenophobic stereotyping. It has dodged many of those accusations in the past by claiming it is nothing more than an entertainment show.
Will such a claim work this time? We hope for Tesla’s sake that it won’t. After all, since Top Gear's former Stig Ben Collins came out of the electric car closet as a fan of the electric sportscar we think Tesla may just stand a chance of winning.
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Well there goes any credibility they might've had
 
If you watch top gear and believe everything is ad-hoc then there's something wrong with you.

It's the motoring equivalent of WWE, but it beats watching 5th gear / cartalk / rpm / the-SA-one-where-every-presenter-wears-sunglasses-throughout-the-entire-show / whatnot
 
While I still love Top Gear I find 5th Gear has really become a better source for car porn. They've consequtively brought new models to air before TG. Top Gear have become too focussed on over-produced inserts. It really pains me to say that.
 
topgear annoys me these days, the presenters heads have grown too huuuuge, i find hammond to be particularly annoying.
 
nivek said:
http://www.allcarselectric.com/blog...hot-before-test?utm_medium=feed&obref=Outloud



Well there goes any credibility they might've had
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Yeah, you could go ahead, pick up on that article and write them off just like that... Or... You could head on over to the Top Gear website to get both sides of this story before you make up your mind.

Here's Andy Wilman, the Executive Producer of the show's response:

"You may know that Tesla has issued a writ against Top Gear for defamation and malicious falsehood over the road test that we broadcast of the Tesla Roadster in December 2008. The normal procedure for the BBC in a legal case is to acknowledge receipt of the other party’s claim, and then say no more and get on with preparing its defence for court.

Tesla, however, doesn’t seem content to wait for the legal eagles to settle matters. On the contrary, it’s been very busy promoting its side of the argument through the media. Why even last night the Top Gear office accidentally received an email sent from a Public Relations firm to The One Show, asking if it would like to have the Tesla spokesperson on their programme to talk about the case. It says: “PHA Media represent Tesla and this could make for a fantastic interview.” And the PHA man’s not finished there. “The presenters could have some fun with this.” He adds. “Matt and Alex could even take the Tesla for a spin and test it out, reaffirming its virtues?” Plenty of respect for editorial independence in that last line there and I wish the chaps from PHA Media all the best in their crusade.

However, back to Top Gear, and yes, normally we would follow the pre-legal etiquette of keeping schtum until we get our day in court, but since the other side are being quite noisy with their views on how we conduct ourselves, I just would like to point out one or two things to Top Gear viewers:

1. We never said that the Tesla’s true range is only 55 miles, as opposed to their own claim of 211, or that it had actually ran out of charge. In the film our actual words were: “We calculated that on our track it would run out after 55 miles”. The first point here is that the track is where we do our tests of sports cars and supercars, as has happened ever since Top Gear existed. This is where cars are driven fast and hard, and since Tesla calls its roadster “The Supercar. Redefined.” it seemed pretty logical to us that the right test was a track test. The second point is that the figure of 55 miles came not from our heads, but from Tesla’s boffins in California. They looked at the data from that car and calculated that, driven hard on our track, it would have a range of 55 miles.

2. We never said that the Tesla was completely immobilized as a result of the motor overheating. We said the car had “reduced power”. This was true.

3. Tesla claims we were lying when we said the brakes were “broken”. They now say that all that had happened was that the fuse to the vacuum pump had failed, which meant that the brake just had to be pushed down much harder than usual. Well – to my mind, if the brakes are broken, then they’re broken, and if this happened to your car, you’d take it to the garage to get it fixed. Odd it seems so trivial to Tesla now, because on the day of filming they insisted on repairing the fuse before we could carry on driving the car.

The above points will be argued over in the near future by brainy people wearing wigs, but in a layman’s nutshell, this is where we stand on the matter. Before I finish though, I must clear up one important issue: scripting. It’s alleged by Tesla that on the day of filming one of their employees caught sight of a script that had been written, before the car had even been driven, already containing the verdict that in the “real world” the Tesla doesn’t work. This, they say, proves our guilt, because we’d condemned the car in advance. May I just say in reply:

a) The truth is, Top Gear had already driven the car prior to filming, to enable us to form a view on it in advance

b) Our primary reasoning behind the verdict had nothing to do with how the Tesla performed; our conclusion was based mainly on the fact that it costs three times more than the petrol sports car upon which it’s based. It takes a long time to recharge, so you can’t use it as easily for the carefree motoring journeys that are a prerequisite of sports car driving. You can actually reach that conclusion without driving the car. As it happens, when it did come to the subjective area of how the car drove on the track, we were full of praise for its performance and handling.

c) Just so you understand there’s nothing devious going on, you need to know how this filming business works. When you film a car review, the reviewer is only the tip of the iceberg. Behind the lens is a film crew, and only a day’s worth of light to shoot the eight minute film. This means we have to prepare in advance a treatment – a rough draft of a script so that the director and film crew can get to work right away, knowing what shots they will need to capture. It will contain the facts about a car, and what we think of its looks and so on, but how well the car actually drives is added on the day. If we’ve driven it ahead of filming, as we do with most cars, we will also have an idea how it feels to drive. But, and this is crucial, as we uncover fresh information about a car whilst filming it, it is entirely normal for the treatment to be modified as the day unfolds. Jeremy is always tweaking the scripts to reflect what his driving experience has actually been on the day.

There you go. I’ve said my bit, and now we’ll hopefully shut up and prepare for our day in court.

PS: As this is going through the courts right now, we’re afraid we’ve had to turn off comments on this one, but we wanted to let you all know how we see it."

Link: http://transmission.blogs.topgear.c...gear-andy-wilman-on-our-current-legal-action/


Edit/ Sorry 'bout all the "&" instead of what should be " ' "... Bad copy and paste, bad...
 
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They do tend to over exaggerate everything. In the last episode of season 15, they showed that the speedometer becomes the navigation screen on the Ferrari 458 and as a result "you can see where you going but not how fast" when using the navigation. There is however, very clearly, a digital reading of the speed at the bottom of a screen which is on the opposite side of the speedo/nav screen (screen on the left of the rev counter). You can see this screen later on when they do the drag race. So this issue with Tesla doesn't surprise me one bit.
 
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ponder said:
+1 Clarkson is also annoying, only oke I like is capt slow.
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Capt. Slow is the only guy of the 3 who can you a proper, sort-of-unbiased roadtest.

Slow was correct when he said that Clarkson is just about ... POWAHHHHH!!!
 
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Top Gear = Entertainment Show
Fifth Gear = Motoring Show
I like both but Fifth Gear > Top Gear, but I can't believe they replaced Tom Ford with the Ben Collins (formerly the Stig).
 
Carbon_Fibre said:
Top Gear = Entertainment Show
Fifth Gear = Motoring Show
I like both but Fifth Gear > Top Gear, but I can't believe they replaced Tom Ford with the Ben Collins (formerly the Stig).
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For me Top Gear > Fifth Gear but I have to agree about Collins. He is a great driver but on-screen he's really, really, really... really dull.
 
I wish there were more episodes of the shows Hammond and May dud like Invisible World and Man Lab
 
So the shoot went on without Teslas knowledge - yet an engineer from Tesla was available on shoot to repair the brakes?
 
Im not a ham mechanic so I just watch these shows for entertainment. I like Top Gear... its funny. A car is mostly an extension of the penis for guys... I have no desire to flash or extend mine.
 
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