Flufferbot exception?
Innovative Disruption is another name for stupidity and failure.

Elon specializes in stealing 100-year-old IDEAS that failed the first time, while REFUSING to use 100-year-old METHODS that have been perfected by painful trial and error.

Electric cars failed for a good reason, which hasn't changed. Charging time. Elon didn't solve charging time, so his electric cars will still fail.

Carmakers established dealer networks for a good reason, which hasn't changed. SERVICE and CUSTOMER FEEDBACK. Elon decided to do without dealers because Wi-Fi. The result is perfectly predictable.

Detroit assembly lines have been perfected over 100 years, which means they have figured out the correct balance of human workers vs automation. Elon refused to learn from EXPERIENCE, instead assuming that his vast crackhead EGO could use THEORIES to replace EXPERIENCE.

Perfect example is the 'flufferbot'. Elon decided that a robot should perform the task of fitting a sound-absorbing pad over the battery pack. He spent millions developing a robot, which completely failed.

You don't need to be an industrial engineer to figure this one out. Ever since oxen started pulling rocks, machines have been better than humans at heavy lifting. Ever since the Jacquard loom, machines have been better than humans at tasks requiring near-microscopic precision.

This task is neither heavy lifting nor microscopically precise. It's ideal for humans and completely impossible for robots. It requires a quick and adaptive FEEL for a soft object. Normal factories would pick uneducated low-IQ reliable workers for this task, and those workers would perform it beautifully for relatively low wages. There was NO NEED to even THINK about automating this task.

Experience always wins. Theory always kills.

= = = = =

There's one apparent exception to this rule, but it's not really an exception. In the '70s Detroit was failing. Toyota came along with what looked like Innovative Disruption, and succeeded. But in fact the failure resulted from a DEPARTURE from experience. Around 1958 the dead drunk executives of the Big Three started following their own alcoholic Bright Ideas instead of listening to their customers. All cars expanded drastically and turned horribly ugly. GM went in for Bright Ideas like the Corvair and Vega, both of which abandoned the methods and configurations determined by experience. Detroit also abandoned its previous arrangements with workers, and let Walter Reuther define working conditions to enrich Walter Reuther.

Toyota returned to older configurations and older practicality. Toyota returned to pleasing its customers and workers instead of pleasing the blind-drunk egos of corporate and union executives. In short, Toyota REMEMBERED what Detroit had FORGOTTEN.

Labels: Experiential education

  ¶ 3:06 AM